Review- The 2012 Beach Plum Festival

If you haven't been following my recent blog entries- a quick catch-up... The economy has really affected my small handmade jewelry crafting business and with one of my favorite shows approaching, I decided to make a personal investment. Best case scenario, it would be a good show and I'd make my money back (and hopefully a decent profit) or worse case, I would have replenished my inventory and would put everything into my Etsy shop and gear up for holiday sales.

The Festival- for those that live in the NJ area, the Beach Plum Festival is held every September on Island Beach State Park (near Seaside) The park is gorgeous, the beaches very clean and one of the few beaches in NJ staffed with lifeguards after Labor Day. The Festival attracts several handmade crafters, displays featuring local non-profits and food vendors, along with many displays featuring the topic of the day...Beach Plums (the ice cream and jellies are outstanding, BTW) The show is very well run and receives quite a bit of local media attention. For crafters considering this event, the show always attracts a great deal of foot-traffic- many who plan to hit the beach and stroll in find a great festival in progress. If you have a beach-theme craft or business, this should be a must-do show. An overview of how the festival went for me personally would be- better than expected. I really didn't know what to expect because I was not selling much out of my Etsy shop and other crafters had reported below average sales over the summer. With many fellow crafters cutting back on shows, I didn't really know what to expect. The show started out slowly sales-wise. There was a large crowd right at the start of the festival (perhaps beach-goers) and I had a lot of foot traffic, but very few people looked to be making purchases anywhere. The traffic continued to pour in and I decided to find a few pieces in my collection to make into pendants for necklaces. I began wire-wrapping several pieces and that seemed to draw a small crowd and that seemed to change the "luck" for me, as I starting selling a few pieces. By noon, it was clear I would cover my expenses and make a little money. I'd love to say this was my best year at this venue, but it wasn't. But with the expectations I had coming into the show, I have to admit that I am so happy to have made the investment in myself because it seems that people are beginning to feel good about the economy. And they appear to be looking to buy something different and unique.

I'd love to find another show to do before the holidays, but realistically, I'm probably not going to find a better match for my product than this show. Island Beach State Park's Beach Plum Festival and my handmade sea glass jewelry just seem to be a perfect match for me. But I'll keep looking for the right spot. After the show, I sat with my hubby and discussed how the show went and realized there were a few trends on my sales and a things that helped me make sales that I hope to blog about soon. A few of these are ideas that I will continue to do at future shows and these thoughts might help fellow crafters make a few extra sales at their shows in the future. 'til next time, R

The Economy and Crafting

"May you live in interesting times" is an old proverb that comes to mind when I think of the current economic unrest in the world today. I try not to dwell on it much, but there are many times that the economy has forced me to re-evaluate what is happening with my crafting business.

Rising costs in gas and silver directly impacted my business. People just didn't have money to spend on the pretty necklace they found on my Etsy website or show display. The "I want that" draw that often led to spur of the moment purchases, had turned into "I'd like to have that" and eventually to "I wish I could afford that". My business is not one of necessity. Seaglass jewelry is not an everyday, must-have item. But for someone that lives the lifestyle of using handmade items in their ever day life, they will find a way to purchase an item such as handmade soap- if only because it is better for their skin, or it's because it's eco friendly (or higher quality than many of the massed produced, chemical laden "stuff") So not every crafting business is affected the same way. Some will continue to flourish, while others face stagnating sales because of diminished purchasing power. My sales are way down. (as in WAAAAYYY down) I did a show recently and had to invest some of my own money into my business (a QE of sorts)to be able to afford the show. You'll have to checkout my next blog installment to see if it was a wise investment... but I'll leave you with a "it was encouraging". 'til next time, R

Back Again

Well, it's been a long while. Since my last post, my blog was removed for suspicious activity (guess no activity is suspicious...lol)and I really had not been doing much with my jewelry-making. Last winter's storms wreaked havoc at the beach and the coastal towns were forced to rebuild the beaches and dunes. Great for the home owners and summer beach-goers, not very good for seaglass collectors. Not good at all The economy has also wreaked havoc on the crafting industry- at least in my area of crafting. For a while it seemed like people just didn't have disposable income for sea glass jewelry. When it comes to items that people "need" for everyday life, the money is there, but when it comes to a "want" item, I still think there are many people who can't afford small luxury items. I have several ideas for new posts. Some will touch on seaglass, some on my crafting, and on crafting in a shaky economy. My next blog entry will be about the show I did recently and how it's re-energized me to continue to do what I love - looking for, talking about and making jewelry with sea glass. 'til next time, R

Spring Craft Shows, Etsy- April Report, New Creations

Hi everyone! It's been about a week since my last blog entry and I just wanted to catch up.

I'll start with my upcoming craft show this weekend in Manahawkin, NJ. The show will be held on May 3, at the Southern Regional High School, starting at 10am. Shows at this location do very well traffic-wise. It's located on a major road in Ocean County (Route 9) and in past shows in Manahawkin, I've been able to compete well against other jewelry vendors.

I have added some hair accessories for this show (Inexpensive, fun and colorful) along with some pretty earrings in a price range that will attract younger girls. I've done very well selling many lower end items at this type of show and it's always been the difference between a weak show and one that wasn't too bad. I find Mom's love the lower end items for the little girls, especially when they are buying one of my sea glass items...it's easy (on the pocketbook) to make their daughter happy with a small $5 pair of earrings or $4 hair-tie.

The weather is supposed to be overcast for Saturday, with a chance of rain...hopefully the weather doesn't prevent the traffic from coming to the show!

As April winds down, it's been another slow month on Etsy. Sales haven't been coming as fast and furious as they did in January and February, but they still trickle in. The positive about Etsy is the changes to the site that are being made...IMO, these changes will benefit my shop and items. The changes will allow my items to stay on or near the top pages of the category longer, no that they will be removing the supplies from the jewelry sub-categories.

This change makes a lot of sense, as buyers will know be able to see what they are searching for, rather then 7 straight listings of supplies. It can't possibly be a good thing for a buyer who's looking for bracelets, to see listing after listing of loose buttons, and other supplies for making bracelets. It certainly isn't good for a seller's items when they quickly get pushed off the top couple of pages, because a supply seller has put on a half-dozen button listings.

Once again, I have several new sea glass creations for this weekend's show, along with already mentioned hair accessories and lower-end earrings ( I say lower end because of the price point, not the looks or quality) I also have a few new polymer clay pendants ready for this show and I'll soon be starting a couple with etchings, to be hand-painted. These pieces that were very popular last year.

That's it for today's blog, I'll somehow update between my boys baseball games later this week...I hope : )

til next time...

R

January updates, craft shows, what's new

Well it didn't take long before I broke my New Years Resolution about blogging several times each week. Burnout from the holiday craft season and the holiday season itself, left me wiped out and I needed a break to re-charge my engines.
While I don't have any craft shows at this time to prepare for, I have been busy over the last week to week and a half, creating some Valentine's Day gifts for my online shop at ETSY.com. The creations have been well received to this point and my magnets continue to garner a lot of views.
So far the New Year hasn't been as slow as I thought it would be. I have several sales this month, along with a reserved order listed on the ETSY site ( custom made order for a customer who saw one of my bracelets!) I've been pleasantly surprised by the flow at ETSY even after the holiday season.

I'm still patiently waiting for Volume 2 of Handbook to Handmade (produced by Timothy Adams, an ETSY seller and now book publisher) I have 2 pages in the issue and I can't wait to see which pictures were used and how the book turned out. Okay, I really ran out of patience about a week ago...but I'm trying to play it off --ya know, whatever- on the outside, but "is it here yet" every time I go to the mailbox on the inside...LOL

Looking at a craft show possibility for the tail end of February, but it's the weekend of my sons B-Day, so I don't know if I'd like to do it. I did hear there were only 5 jewelry tables as of last weekend. Tempting...very tempting! (especially if I have my handmade book to put out as advertising!!!)

Okay, let me go get my little hand-held flags and flag down my mail-person...LOL

til next time...
R

Featuring "Ribbon Craft Boutique"

My first feature of 2008, I'm going to feature a new Etsy shop owner from my home state, New Jersey. Jenna, a stay at home mom of 3, opened her shop Ribbon Craft Boutique , http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5409699 in November of 2007. The former teacher enjoys hobbies but never stuck with one very long, until there arrival of her daughter, the youngest of her 3 children.

Looking at all the girly items, Jenna found herself drawn to a long-forgotten crafting bug and she became interested in creating her own pieces. With no prior crafting experience, Jenna finds her inspiration comes from her daughter and "a love for pretty things."

Jenna says she's "learning as I go and coming up with ideas as I go along and see what different materials are available." Looking at her shop, it appears that she's a natural and it won't be long before Ribbon Craft Boutique makes their first sale.

2008 Resolutions

For this New Year, I hope to follow these "resolutions"...

1- No last night hectic creating, completing or designing of new items. I also hope to have all new items for all craft shows underway more than 1 week in advance and no more 1am nights the week before a show.

2- Spend more time with my family and work more efficiently this year.

3- More quality promoting on the ETSY forums.

4- More Blogs, especially features on fellow Etsians and suppliers. I'd like to have the time to blog 4-5 times each week.

5- More quality items, even if they come at the expense of items that sell well, but offer
a low return on my time and investment.

I think if I can stick to these resolutions, I can easily accomplish everything I plan to do this year. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out Etsy last year and I think I have a basic understanding of what will work for me and my shop. I hope to continue to offer my "wearable art" creations and offer new items that visitors to my shop will find exciting and different.

Later tonight, I'll be sending out questions to 1 supplier and one new ETSY seller and the 1st response to the questions will become my 1st feature crafter/supplier of 2008!

til next time!
R

5 shopping days until Christmas, Etsy and international shipping

Wow, the shopping season is about to come to a close. Etsy has added a link for buyers who may still be looking for a last minute gift... "shopping local", which is a good idea. But for myself, Thursday orders will need to ship Priority Mail to NJ, eastern PA, Delaware and the southern most parts of NY to have any chance of getting there in time for Christmas.
Many of my customers this year on ETSY have been on the west coast and I can no longer be 100% certain a package shipped at this point will reach them in time.

So, my ETSY shop has gone international! I shipped this year to Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and most recently to Ireland.
It's time to get the boys a world map, so they can track all countries that Mommy has shipped to! They think it's so cool and I'm happy they like to be involved (they really helped a lot at my last craft show, with the set-up and breakdown of the table and my 4 yo handed out business cards like they were candy... who's gonna refuse a cute 4 yo ...LOL)

So as my 5th month on Etsy is slowly coming to a close (well it'll be 5 full months on Jan 6th) my December wasn't bad, though I did expect a bit better, but with 12 sales ( and 2 being custom sales, that received terrific feedback write ups!) I really can't complain. The December craft shows were okay and overall I did much better than I ever expected I'd do when I started this whole little business. I still have 12 more days before the end of the month and there may still be a few more sales!

I just found out that my sweetie bought a spot in a Craft Book featuring 20 or so crafters. The spot is 2 pages and I need to submit 4 pictures and a small writeup (between a couple of sentences and a paragraph) Many of my nicest pieces of beach glass jewelry are long gone and so are my nicest hand-painted pendants ( I gave them as presents to friends for the holidays) and I have to come up with 4 awesome pictures over the next few days...yikes.
Luckily I still have some of the photos of a few sold items, and I guess if push comes to shove, I can still submit those.... I wish he would have discussed this with me first...LOL-- I should complain- I'm lucky my family supports me in this endeavor.

Well, in case I don't make it back to my blog in the next few days...
A MERRY CHRISTMAS & A HAPPY HOLIDAY to all!!!

til next time...
R

When a favorite item sells....

For those that have read my blog before, you already know of my love for Beach Glass and more specifically Cobalt Blue beach glass. I had a cobalt blue necklace in my shop for about a month and it had a bunch of views and even a few hearts, but no takers. I really wanted to keep it, but since the cobalt gem wasn't one of my personal finds (purchased from a co-founder of the North American Sea Glass Association) I promised myself I'd try to sell it.
I even bought a new camera (finally) and took new pictures of the piece and re-listed it on ETSY and again, lots of views, a few more hearts, but no one looking to pull the trigger and buy it. Craft show after craft show, lots of compliments and lots of beach glass lovers ooh-ing and
ahh-ing but no takers.
Until this past Friday night's craft show. I marked it down a bit because this show was a Santa's Secret Workshop and it was really a lot of 12 yo and unders looking to buy Christmas presents for teachers, parents, family members, etc.
So about half way through the night this young boy, maybe 8 or 9 years old comes up to the table with his Mom and while I'm chatting with her, her son is looking at some of my jewelry, beach glass pieces included. After a few minutes they stroll on to the next table. About 10 or 15 minutes later, back he comes with his Mom and strides right up to the beach glass, points out the Cobalt piece and says she'll love it.
This sweet little boy is buying the necklace for his older sister (says the Mom, who looked so very proud of her son) who loves the color blue and enjoys walking on the beach looking for beach glass... and she has never found a piece of blue.
As sad as I was to see the necklace leave, I wish I could be a fly on the wall on Christmas morning when his older sister opens this treasure and knowing it was picked out by her brother, makes the story all the better.
I hope she thinks of him every time she wears the necklace with her 1st piece of blue beach glass and I'm so happy that the story that goes with it is so sweet. Just seeing the looks on both the little boy's face and the proud look on his Mom's face, I know this creation has gone to a good home.
Now if I can just falling in love with my beach glass creations....

til next time...
R

16 Shopping days until Christmas.... craft shows, etsy, etc

Wow, the holiday season is seriously upon and I'm only about 50% finished with my holiday shopping. I know that some people still have a ways to go before they're finished, but at this time of the year, I'm usually just looking for 1 or 2 presents and my boys are always finished (with the exception of some of their stocking stuffer gifts)

Well, my craft show schedule for the holiday season has come to a close. The 2-day show was pretty good, with Friday night being the better of the 2 days. The Saturday show was a bit over-shadowed by a bigger show at the Seaport and a smaller Church Bazaar only 2 or 3 blocks away.
I had originally picked the Seaport show as my final show of the season, but their website was vague on table info and it's an outdoor show, under tents. At $100 for a spot, adverse weather would've drove the people to the other shows in town and I didn't want to risk that kind of money on the chance of bad weather.
But no complaints. Next year if everything is scheduled on the same days, I may only do the Friday night show and take my creations to another local show for Saturday ( or maybe I'll tell my hubby, he's going to run one show on Saturday and I'll do a different show!)

Knock on wood (as I knock on hubby's head) but Etsy continues to remain somewhat busy. I picked up another custom order tonight from my shop and every couple days, I've received a small order or 2, so we've made a few trips to the PO this month (and hopefully we need to make a bunch more before the end of the month)
I continue to ship internationally, this past week saw packages to both the United Kingdom and Australia ship from the post office. My sons are very interested in the international shipping and I think we're going to buy them a decent-sized world map and let them mark off with push pins, where Mommy's packages are going.

Okay, it's off to bed. I have a small knit showing tomorrow and a couple small jewelry showings this week. In both cases I have to travel 25+ miles, so I hope I'm not wasting a lot of time... time I could be spending finishing my holiday shopping.

til next time...
R

PS- This coming week, if I have the time, I plan on featuring a yarn shop, Catalina Yarns and hopefully a seller the following week.
Tomorrow's blog--- my Cobalt pendant/necklace is around someone's neck & it's not mine : (

Blog Love 12/4 Money Fairy, Craft Show Nov recap

It's been a few days since my last post. I'll start with the November recap. After a pretty good October, I thought November was going to get very hectic, but instead it started off barely crawling. My 1st sale for the month was on 11/12. I can probably attribute the slow sales to concentrating on a late Oct show and multiple November shows. I wasn't listing a lot of new items on Etsy, so my shop became a bit stale.

Despite listing and promoting heavily near the end of the month, the shop didn't do much until a handful of orders at the end of the month. My shop lost it's momentum from October and was lost in a sea of new shops, so many new items and extremely heavy promoting on ETSY.

The momentum from the end of the month has carried over into early December and hopefully there's many more trips to the Post Office in the next couple of weeks.

Money Fairies- This was a little contest on Etsy, where a group of members decided to list and post their Money Fairy creations. I made both an ornament and a pendant/necklace and placed them on Etsy very early Sunday morning. By noon on Sunday they had both sold (to the same buyer) and I bought a little one for myself and if she makes to me in time, I'll bring her to my craft show with me this weekend.

P.S. -there wasn't a winner for this contest, but I guess anyone who sold their Money fairy and everyone who purchased one will be winners when she starts bringing the money to their shops!

The pictures of the Money Fairies I created are at the top of my blog.

Craft Show- I have what appears to be my final craft show of 2007 this weekend in Little Egg Harbor. The show is sponsored by the PTA and is a Santa's Secret Workshop. It will be held at the Intermediate School on Frog Pond Rd and has been heavily attended in past years. Many students come to the show (with their parents) to look for gifts for teachers & parents along with the public that also attend looking for gifts and decorative items. The show begins on Friday at 4:30pm - 8:30 pm and again Saturday morning from 10:00am - 2:00pm.

If you're in the area, stop in and look for my table. I'd love meeting Etsy members and anyone who follows my blog!

til next time...

R

Less than 30 days until Christmas... Craft Show updates

Thanksgiving has come and gone and now we're rapidly heading towards December. Less than 30 shopping days until Christmas and I'm about 35% finished shopping for everyone. Okay enough dreary news... on to the good stuff.

Etsy has remained slow, though I did make a sale since my last blog update. It was to a member of the Yuwie site I blogged about a month ago. (it's like myspace, but you can make money by viewing pages...lol, I'm on a 5 year plan before I extract my 1st check) A new online friend bought a pair of earrings, so the extra work I put in at the site has started to pay off and since I'll be shipping her earrings tomorrow, hopefully she'll love them (don't you always keep your fingers crossed that the buyer loves your item when they have it in their hands?) and post about the great earrings she bought from ETSY. Hopefully, we'll get even more customers shopping at the site!
Speaking of ETSY... my sweetie and I invested in a camera...finally! I'm still in the process of photgraphing the entire shop and editing the pictures, but take a look at the difference! It was well worth the money.

Craft Shows-

Nov 30- Eagleswood, NJ Firehouse 6pm -10pm Free admission.

Dec 7- Little Egg Harbor, NJ- Middle school (directions to follow this week) 4:30pm- 8:30pm
Dec 8- LEH Middle School 10am- 2pm- The 2 shows are sponsered by the PTA and are very well attended.

til next time!
R

Craft Show today!!

My Etsy shop is de-activated for the day, but will be back online Sunday evening.
I'm doing a craft show in Lacey Township, NJ later this am. The show begins at 10:00 am and is one of the better attended shows in the Ocean County are. If you're anywhere near exit 70 on the Garden St Pkwy, come on over to the High School. There are always lots of great crafters... get started on your Holiday shopping.
I'll be somewhere in section G, stop by and say hello!

I wrote an article about Etsy and it was published on the internet earlier this week. It's called "Move over Ebay, make room for ETSY" Here's a link to the article... if you get a chance, give it a read and maybe a comment or rating!

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/424772/move_over_ebay_make_room_for_etsy.html

Til next time...
R

My article about ETSY was published !!

I recently wrote an article about how Etsy has taken over Ebay's marketshare when it comes to handmade items (I've notice alot of little ads when I'm on Ebay about "sell your crafts on Ebay", so I guess they've also noticed the drop-off)
If you get a chance, click on the link and check it out...feel free to comment/rate the article and pass the link along to anyone who you think would enjoy it.


www.associatedcontent.com/article/424772/move_over_ebay_make_room_for_etsy.html



I also wrote this article about my favorite pastime when at the beach... hunting for beach glass...

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/418088/beach_glass_trash_or_an_antique_gem.html


Thanks for taking a look!

R

Autumn weather finally reaches the Northeast

Finally, the summer-like weather has pushed out and more seasonable temps have moved in. The leaves in the trees are still mostly green, but the tops of the trees are showing some color change. The acorns look to be much bigger than the last few years and hopefully, it's Mother Nature's way of taking care of the squirrels when it's going to be a bad winter.
At the show I did last weekend, there were a couple of crafters with knitted items and we all had a lot of people looking at the scarves, it was kind of tough for anyone to even think about spending money on a knitted scarf when it felt like it was 90 degrees.
I don't know how other sellers of knitted items are doing on Etsy or the craft shows, but this weather had me working on other projects instead of gearing up for Autumn and Winter.
My pendants seem to be doing well, I have a custom order to make 2 pendants that have already sold thru my Etsy shop and another custom order that includes a few pieces of jewelry and a hand-painted pendant. I'm tempted to do some custom work as gifts for the holidays, but I'm leery about losing the creative control and getting swamped by orders and not having enough to inventory for my future shows.
Speaking of craft shows, I'm looking to grab a table in about 2 weeks for a Saturday evening show and I'd like to see about sneaking in a show for the 1st weekend in November, before my 2 bigger shows in the middle and end of November. I have 1 scheduled for December and I'd like to try for a 2nd, but it's going to be tough inventory wise.
I'm still working on my beach glass items and should have a couple more pieces ready for my next show.
Til next time...
R