03/20/01
CBS Early Show Mention!
The "Hib List" by Laurie Hibberd

DO-IT-YOURSELF BOOKS HELP PEOPLE STAY IN TOUCH, EXPRESS FEELINGS

Tim Revell / Dispatch
In a Circle Journey book, Amy Hoobler shares the birth announcement of daughter Eliza with a friend near Pittsburgh.

Alysia Peyton / Dispatch
A Circle Journey book kept by Kara Hall opens with a picture of her grandmother, Jeanne Bowman, and her daughter, Devon. Hall exchanges the book with Bowman through the mail to learn more about her grandmother's past.

Neal C. Lauron / Dispatch
Ohio State University senior Krista Sparks trades a scrapbook with her older sister in Seattle.

Jeff Poland / Dispatch
Gerald Schwab and a Spokane, Wash., friend take turns filling the pages of a scrapbook that they mail back and forth. "The problem," Schwab says, "is who gets to keep it once it is done."

Somewhere between writing letters and sending e-mail, Circle Journey blazes a trail for relationships.

The founder, Paul Westrick, has sold more than 50,000 Circle Journey books, whose blank pages invite loved ones to exchange words, mementos and sketches.

Through the mail, users "circle" the pages back and forth until the book is filled.

The result becomes a keepsake -- part scrapbook, part journal.

Westrick packages the books with envelopes, line guides, stickers, photo corners and labels.

The 42-year-old Columbus entrepreneur describes his concept as an antidote to an overly "e-connected" society.

Having introduced his product two years ago, Westrick suspects that the time is right for a Circle Journey explosion.

"This is just the kind of thing people need right now," he said. "It is about relationships. That is what matters most."

Consumers have recently embraced the kits with a heightened passion.

"In light of the events of Sept. 11, people are looking for ways to re-connect," said Amy Hoobler, a 30-year-old Westerville wife and mother who shares a book with a friend in Pittsburgh.

"The trend is toward gifts from the heart," said Kara Hall, who both sells and uses the books. "This fits right into that."

She co-owns the Gate House specialty gift stores in Westerville and Polaris Fashion Place, and trades a book with her grandmother.

A former designer, Westrick, 42, received a letter dated Sept. 11 from a Chicago woman who summarized renewed interest in his product.

"I gave my book to my sister," the woman wrote, "so that we might share memories of our mother, who had died recently. Tonight, however, in the aftermath of this incomprehensible tragedy, I wonder if . . . healing all these wounds will require a massive circle journey.

Sharing motherhood

In 1999, when Amy Hoobler moved to Westerville, she refused to leave behind her best friend in Pittsburgh.

Shortly after their separation, Hoobler and Tory Mackey began exchanging a book while each was pregnant.

Ruminations about new motherhood and baby pictures fill their pages.

"We have our birth announcements in there, but this is not like a baby book," said Hoobler, 30. "Baby books are more factual. In Circle Journey, we write about our feelings."

The friends are creating what Hoobler described as an "ongoing narrative" about their lives.

"I can build off her entries," Hoobler said. "She might write something I haven't thought about, and then I will respond to that."

Their correspondence has helped ease Hoobler's anxiety and loneliness.

"With a new baby, you are home all the time and tired," Hoobler said. "I felt isolated, especially being in a new city. This has been a neat way to stay in touch with someone going through the same thing."

Compiling a personal history

Hall bought a book for the 90th birthday of Jeanne Bowman, who lives in Warren, Ohio.

Since then, Hall eagerly has awaited her grandmother's responses to Hall's questions.

"I've learned a ton," Hall said. "She told me how she met my grandfather and when they decided to marry."

The contents sometimes meander, but Hall said, "I try to keep the focus on the two of us."

They send the book to each other about once a month. Hall organizes her entries with labels and spices them with quotes from famous people.

"We're getting toward the end," Hall said. "When the day comes that she no longer is here, I will have something special to remember her by."

Making up for lost time

Born 17 years apart, Krista Sparks and her sister, Tonda Kiffin, have always been strangers.

"I grew up without her," said Sparks, an Ohio State University senior from Columbus. "She was out of the house before I started school.

They began a book in February after Sparks visited Kiffin in Seattle.

Their book contains ticket stubs to the Space Needle and "other touristy things I made her do," Sparks said.

Their most telling entries are expressions of love.

"We gush back and forth about what we like about each other," said the 22-year-old Sparks. "This is a way for me to say nice things that I would be too embarrassed to tell her in person."

An exchange of views about current events tightened their bond.

"We were surprised about how much we had in common," Sparks said. "We are the liberals in my family. She was happy to learn I was open-minded."

Growing up together apart

To youngsters raised on e-mail, the handwritten word is a novelty. Emily Marsh, 13, of Galena, Ohio, found it's the best way to keep tabs on a former classmate.

Emily and Danielle Miller of London, Ohio, have not seen each other in five years. But they often wrote letters. Two years ago they started a Circle Journey.

"We only have a couple of pages left to finish," Emily said.

They write about school activities and send pictures of themselves and friends.

"I feel like I still know her," Emily said. "I know what she thinks about everything. I've learned that keeping up her grades is important to her and that her friends are boy-crazy."

The girls have not decided who will keep the finished book. It probably does not matter; Emily has already purchased a second.

"I want to stay in touch with her as long as I can," she said.

Spanning the country

The written words of Michelle Geissbuhler circulate among Ohio, Kentucky, California and Massachusetts.

"I have four of them going," Geissbuhler said of the books.

The 44-year-old Worthington wife and mother trades the books with friends, including her former Miami University roommate.

"When they come back to me, it is like receiving a present," Geissbuhler said. "People write more thoughtfully in them than they would with e-mail."

Geissbuhler compared the books to "diaries that you send to someone else."

She has been a sounding board for troubled relationships and family tragedies.

That the books are intended for posterity changes the way in which Geissbuhler writes.

"I don't want to say something stupid, flighty or in haste that I might regret later," she said.

To commemorate a trip to Australia, one of Geissbuhler's friends enclosed a sample of Vegemite, an Australian sandwich spread.

"It smooshed all over everything," Geissbuhler said.

The stained pages are part of the permanent record of their friendship.

Feathering an empty nest

To bridge the distance between college and home, Micah Ling gave a book to her mother.

"It was very hard for me to see Micah leave home," Deborah Jo Ling said. "My only two children are twins. They both left at the same time. I had a busy household, then -- boom! -- both of them were gone."

The book opens with a picture of mother and daughter. The pages include childhood memories, photos, descriptions of daily activities and future plans.

The book "is an appreciation for each other," Mrs. Ling said. "We took time to say things we don't normally say."

Micah sketched scenes of the Indiana landscape near DePauw University in Greencastle.

Through the book, "I became involved in her college life," Mrs. Ling said.

Mother, in turn, would recall significant family anniversaries, such as the day her father died.

They sometimes surprised each other with the book during visits.

With new entries, "she would put it under my pillow or I would hide it in her suitcase," Mrs. Ling said.

They recently completed the book for a keepsake that Mother treasures.

"I was sorry to see the pages end," Micah said.

Touching from afar

Yarn, sketches and watercolors grace the book shared by Gerald Schwab and Kay Smith.

They both send samples from their artwork.

"Reading our words is fine, but having a tactile experience brings us even closer," Schwab said.

Schwab, 35, is the circulation manager at the Columbus Main Library. He has seen his friend and former co-worker once since she moved to Spokane, Wash., four years ago.

The book "is a great place for us to be creative, laugh and cry," he said.

Schwab initiated the exchange, proving that Circle Journey's emotional connections do not exclude men.

"Men were not taught to do this," he said, "but I know many who are comfortable with their emotions and who would like this idea."

Schwab is starting a second book that he plans to exchange with two friends.

"I look at this as a conversation," he said. "Sometimes, it becomes personal and therapeutic, like having a cup of tea with someone on Sunday morning . . . and you can do it through the mail."

CBS EARLY SHOW MENTION!

Circle Journey was mentioned on the CBS "Early Show" Tuesday, March 20th. Laurie Hibberd is a contributor to The Early Show and hosts a segment called "The Hib List" featuring hot new products. On Tuesday, she mentioned Circle Journey as her "favorite" over a host of other new products including a member of N'Sync's own fashion line.

WITH PEN IN HAND, HE'S RESURRECTING
THE ART OF HANDWRITTEN NOTES

In our e-mailing, cell-phoning, cyber-dash mad technocracy, Paul Westrick is trying to make a living by marketing the primitive concept of handwritten communication.

When he informed me that even middle-school girls are among the most ardent devotees of this antiquated practice, I tried to imagine one telling another about her incredible discovery:
There's like this thing, see, that is kind of like e-mail only way cooler. And you use this stuff called paper. And you can do it even if AOL is busy. You just write like you are doing homework only you can write words about anything you want, or make little trees, or put Justin's name in all the corners. And when you're done, you put this sticky thing on the envelope and stuff and people take it wherever you want it to go. It's the bomb.

Concern is expressed these days about the slow death of handwritten correspondence as an institution to transport commerce of the heart.
The art is fading. Yet there is something unique and personal about unplugged mail. A thought moves from mind to hand to pen to paper. The sound is a barely perceptible scratch as the ink shapes cursive loops and flourishes, like the contrail of a stunt pilot. Writing is so profoundly different from the muffled clatter of tap-dancing mice created when computer keys are struck in a flurry of thought.

"I grew up in Hong Kong in the '70s." Westrick said. That setting would help propel him toward an indefatigable embracing of written correspondence. "My father was principal of the American school."

When Westrick's six siblings began scattering like splinters, he fashioned a tool for collective correspondence among family members. A small book made its way from Hong Kong to Europe to the West Coast, picking up, along the way, the thoughts, small snapshots and momentos of lives lived apart.

Westrick continued exchanging the little books- some no larger than a purse compact- when he began dating the woman he would one day marry.
At the Short North headquarters of the operation he christened Circle Journey, Westrick shared some of the small books in which he kept up a globe-spanning, written dialogue over the years.

Typical of more than a few artists and designers, his writing is only slightly larger than that of the boardwalk vendor who pens stranger's names on a grain of rice for a buck.

The book he used to propose marriage actually is a prototype for what ultimately would become the Circle Journey product.

He handed that original book to his inamorata during dinner at a restaurant overlooking the Grand Canyon.

The marriage-proposal book is the size of a standard picture postcard. So is the Circle Journey book.

The kit includes a book filled with French-fold, archival-quality sheets. Stickers and photo corners are included, along with mailers to keep the book in circulation.

When Westrick first tried to sell this idea, potential investors were skeptical. He recalled, "When early investors would say 'Why do we need this?' I would answer 'We don't need it, but people want it. They want to feel connected. Why are candles an $8 billion a year industry when we have electric lights?'"

Investors bit.

Westrick had to make the leap of faith from the design company where he had done the art for shoeboxes and the boilerplate packaging for a coffee store.

" I jumped off of a very safe harbor," he said.

In the year that it has been up and running, Circle Journey has sold 25,000 kits (including 6,000 last month) at $19.95 each. The people who exchange the books are mothers and daughters, sisters, lovers, school chums.

A West Coast psychiatrist gives them to couples she cousels to help them improve communication with one another.

Westrick believes the kits might be a natural for the Big Brother and Big Sister programs.

One might argue that Westrick went to extremes in his decision to make Circleville the mailing address of the Columbus-anchored Circle Journey.

One might chastise him for triggering the gag reflex with his move to dispense with corporate titles such as manager or director and instead christened key staffers "Circle of Motion," "Circle of Connections," and "Circle of Vision."

But he is a man smitten with the conviction that he has come up with the greatest idea since, well, handwritten communications.

The e-mail address for Circle Journey is connections@circlejourney.com.

FOUNDER HOPES PEOPLE WILL EMBRACE
NEW LEVEL OF KEEPING IN TOUCH

It was a startling admission.

"Honestly, I don't necessarily like to write," Paul Westrick said last week.

This from a man who hopes to completely rejuvenate the art of personal correspondence.

This from a man who proposed to his wife in writing.

This from a man who has staked his entire savings on the idea that letter-writing can return to the prominence once enjoyed when it was THE only form of long-distance communication.

This from a man who expects people to use between five and seven stamps in mailing a book of notes back and forth.

U.S. Postal Service administrators should kiss this guy.

In an era of cell phones and e-mail and the instant gratification of instant messaging, Paul Westrick is betting it all that people will once again see the charm of taking pen in hand and putting thoughts on paper.

Almost two years ago, Westrick left behind a secure, high-paying job with an international design firm to form a limited liability corporation called Circle Journey.

"It was really this simple concept that I felt any group could benefit from," Westrick said in an interview.

The concept is relatively simple: Circle Journey Correspondence Kits contain 4-by-6 booklets with 30 blank pages on which people can write as much or as little as they like and then mail the entire thing to a friend or loved one. That person, in turn, puts his or her thoughts down and sends it back, or sends it on to yet another person in the "Circle."

More than words can be included in the pages of the book: ticket stubs, sand from a beach, leaves fallen from a tree, drawings, newspaper clippings, photographs, petals from a flower.

"The tactile part is so critical," Westrick said.

You can't touch an e-mail.

"The book is on a journey, and each of us is on a journey," said the founder of the company, which is based in an office in the Short North.

Paul Westrick was born in Lafayette, Ind., one of seven children in a close-knit family. When Westrick was in the fifth grade the family made a major and wrenching move from the farmlands of northwestern Indiana to Hong Kong. Westrick's father took a job as principal of the Hong Kong International School, which, according to the institution's Web site, "offers a quality American-style education in a Christian context."

The move was not made without some soul-searching on the part of all members of the family, Paul Westrick recalled.

"We were all game for it," he said.

Westrick lived in Hong Kong for eight years before returning to his native land "because it was time."

He traveled around for several years without any great purpose in mind.

"I knew I had artistic ability in me," Westrick said.

The idea of going to school to develop that artistic ability did not occur to Westrick until five years after he moved back to the United States. He enrolled at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif., one of the more renowned design schools in the country.

After graduating, Westrick eventually returned to his native Midwest and landed a job with Fitch Inc., an international consulting firm with headquarters on Olentangy River Road. He was a senior designer with the prestigious company for 11 years. Among other duties, Westrick did "brand building" for such diverse clients as Hush Puppies shoes, Caribou Coffee and Lee Jeans.

The years at Fitch, Westrick said, helped give him an understanding of product placement, of the importance of design and of the business world.

The experience of having lived in Hong Kong and of having traveled all over the United States left Westrick with friends and family members scattered all over the globe.

Westrick eventually combined all that into a make-or-break venture of his own.

"I cashed out everything I had acquired during my years at Fitch," Westrick said. "I did take every last cent."

But after all, he had tested out the concept of a correspondence book with a friend, and then with a girlfriend, who would later become his wife after accepting a marriage proposal contained in the book they mailed back and forth to one another.

She gave her assent to the proposal in the same format.

The correspondence kits, of which there are now a dozen designs, are sold for $20 each in about 700 stores nationwide, said Circle Journey employee Kathy May, whose job title is "connections."

The first kits went on sale about 14 months ago, she said. The first locations to carry the books were Peabody Paper in Grandview and Spare Parts for the Home in Worthington, Westrick said. The national chain Papyrus also carries the kits.

The success of the fledgling venture has not yet been determined, although thousands of purchasers have written to the company offering praise and suggestions.

Westrick to appear at local bookstore

Paul Westrick, founder of Circle Journey, will be at the Barnes and Noble bookstore on Polaris Parkway beginning at noon on Saturday, Feb. 10.

The store is located at 1285 Polaris Parkway.

Westrick will be speaking on the Circle Journey Correspondence Kits being marketed by his Columbus-based firm.

The company president will be available to sign individual kits as well as offer some of his own stories, experiences and ideas.

In addition, a drawing will be held for a complimentary correspondence kit.

For more information, call Kathy May at 297-7000.

The company also offers additional details over a web site at www.circlejourney.com.