(+)plural makes Children Books for Blind and Visually Impaired Children AffordableBlind and visually impaired children learn Braille [writing for blind] only in school, so we had to re-think children books for blind and visually impaired
Christina Oskui, Co-Founder PlusPlural
 
Media PartnershipThis interview is in media partnership with the CONTENTshif accelerator program (https://www.contentshift.de/en/accelerator/programme/for-startups/), which we follow since its inception. CONTENTshift is the accelerator program of the German Book Publishers and Printers Association. Below you will find more interviews from past batches. We used to record the interviews directly at Frankfurt Book Fair, but since it is canceled this year due to Corona, we resorted to remote only interviews. At the time of the recording, we did not know who won the final award. The winner of this year’s batch is SciFlow (https://www.contentshift.de/en/contentshift/news/congratulations-to-sciflow/). We will publish the exclusive interview with them as the last of our series this year.
 
Three things remain with us from paradise: stars, flowers, and children.
Dante Alighieri
 The FounderThis time we speak to the co-founder of (+)plural (spoken plus plural http://www.plusplural.de/) Christina Oskui (https://www.linkedin.com/in/christina-oskui-825b8615a/, https://www.contentshift.de/en/accelerator/participants-2020/christina-oskui/). Christina wrote her first children’s book about an hedgehog, who lost his spikes, finance with a crowdfunding campaign on StartNext (https://www.startnext.com/en/kinderbuch-igel). During the writing she also designed plush figures to go along with the book (owl, rabbit, duck), but she could not find any publisher who wanted to publish the books together with the stuffed animals.
During this time she also realized that books for blind and visually impaired children are extremely expensive, due to the high amount of manual labor going into each book. Also, books catering to sighted and blind children at the same time are not available. So she aims with her social startup (+)plural and modern production techniques to change that and make affordable books for all children.
There have been no books that blind and non-blind people can read at the same time.
Christina Oskui, Co-Founder PlusPlural
 
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A child can teach an adult three things: to be happy for no reason, to always be busy with something, and to know how to demand with all his might that which he desires.
Paulo Coelho
 
The StartupBlind children learn Braille writing only in school, so many children have a very small choice of books they can enjoy. The high price comes from a large amount of manual labor going into these books (gluing, stitching, stapling of different textures, textiles, and pieces to the book).  A friend of hers has a blind child who only likes part of one of its books. (+)plural (http://www.plusplural.de/) combines 3d printing, modern manufacturing, and picture books to make affordable picture books for blind and sighted children. The books include stuffed animals, as well as 3d printed parts.
(+)plural is a social enterprise.
 
Venture Capital Funding(+)plural is at a very early stage, but they are open to talk to external investors. They are also looking for partners for sale and distribution for their books.
 
My first book was about a hedgehog who lost is spikes and I designed a stuffed animal, which went along with the story
Christina Oskui, Co-Founder PlusPlural
 
Further Readings / Additional RessourcesBraille https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/braille
Zentralbibliothek für Blinde https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Central_Library_for_the_Blind
Startnext https:...