“Celebrities doing calendars in America is a normal thing and South African personalities need to start doing the same. There were a few in the past but nothing any more. I want people to enjoy more of me.”

This is what Minnie Dlamini had to say about her upcoming 2015 calendar where, for 12 months, you will be able to see a different picture of Minnie Dlamini on your wall, desk, fridge or wherever else you keep your yearly calendar (I keep mine on my ceiling, so that when I wake up, I need only look upwards to know what day it is today). 

She was in Durban this week, as the Sunday Tribune exclusively shared, to shoot the last few pictures for this calendar; she wanted to sign off with pictures from her home town. 

Kudos to her; Minnie Dlamini is a big brand, a talented lady and is already setting up for another big year in the limelight in 2015. But is this calendar the way to do it? 

Let's face it, local celeb branded products don't do amazingly in South African markets unless they are creatively executed (Clothing is a big one with Jack Parow being possibly the finest proponent of this type of promotion). But a calendar? I'm not 100% sold. 

In fact, having spent time in the USA and UK, I've seen that THEIR celeb calendars aren't exactly the biggest selling items off the shelves. If you're going to use American celebs as rolemodels, why not emulate more successful products? I'd much rather buy a Minnie Dlamini pashmina scarf than a calendar, for instance. 

Did Minnie spot a lot of Celeb calendars while she was in the US? 

I also find it a little amusing that Minnie mentions that "American celebrities are doing it" as her reason for choosing to go the calendar route. Aren't we always trying to branch away from the trends set by our overseas counterparts? To then cite this as a reason for doing something back home seems a little hypocritical to me. 

As for her claim of wanting her fans to see "more of me"; Minnie, we've seen a healthy amount of you in recent months :) 

Why not post a different picture a day on Instagram for 365 days? Sure, there's no money to be earned when posting your pics on the net for free; but it's not as if she'll be losing out on millions of calendar sales.