CRAFTFest weekend!

Craft Fest is an exception to not doing more craft fairs - this is because it's a craft fair from your own home!

Check out all the stalls here 


My stall is here - but if you buy anything on the website, and use the code CRAFTFEST you'll get 10% off anyway - BUT it'll only work on 26th and 27th November!

Why I'm not doing any more fairs

This might sound like a melodramatic announcement, but part of why I'm making a concious decision on this, and writing about it on my blog, is because I might forget that I made this decision, and book another fair, and then get annoyed.

I started doing craft fairs about 2 and a half years ago. I did a small craft fair at a church selling paintings. I did this fair to get me out of the house and see what people not in my group of friends and family thought to my paintings. I sold 3, got my photo in the paper, and got myself a stockist. The more I did, the more I realised this was not a normal occurrence, and I also needed smaller stuff to sell on stalls.

Getting more stockists, I realised % of sales given to different stockists differs wildly, from 10% to 70% just in the Yorkshire area. This means if you start stocking in other people's shops, you have to have a wholesale price which allows you to still  make a profit at whichever % the shop charges.

As I got less and less naive about business, it seemed the difference between  hobbyists selling their stuff at craft fairs, and wanting to sell your crafts as a business, is also a massively wide gap. I've done too many fairs which turn out to be glorified car boot sales, and people don't want to spend more than a quid on something.

What I'm trying to say is that most people selling at craft fairs who don't do it as a business sell their items basically at wholesale price to customers. I know I was before I started being stocked elsewhere. Something I could sell at a craft fair for £5 and make a profit needed to be sold at £10 in a shop.

So then you open your own shop, and you stock your own stuff as well as other people's. It took me a couple of months to realise that you have to sell your item not at the wholesale price, but as if you were being stocked elsewhere. Having a shop has overheads you wouldn't believe (unless you've opened one yourself of course).

I haven't done a fair for a while, because of time constraints, in some cases because I'm a dope and have forgotten it's on or forgotten to buy petrol, or in a couple of cases had a migraine. The last event I did I shared a table at a Vintage Fair with two other people; the table cost £45 for the day, and people were being charged £3 to get in. Consequently it was ill attended, I lost money (and I got a speeding ticket on the way home). Despite this, I knew I had to get back into events for Christmas because it's good promotion for the shop.

Yesterday I went to Glasshoughton to do the 'Xmas Craft Fair'. It was superbly organised to the last detail, and I have no complaints about the organisation (particularly as it was the lady's first fair), or about the centre, which was clean, friendly and had ample parking. It was well publicised, free for the public, and busy constantly.

So, why am I grumbling?

Recently, due to the economy no doubt, people have been setting up their own businesses from home left, right and centre. This is awesome, and I applaud them for it. Top culprits are Avon, Usbourne Books, Phoenix Cards, Partylite Candles and women who somehow manage to get themselves a Country Baskets card. I have nothing against any of these obviously - my issue is that they are NOT crafts.

I've been to a few fairs where one or two of these have shown up. Sometimes it's been billed as a craft fair, and I'm annoyed with the organiser, but it seems more normal now to advertise things as 'markets' or just 'fairs' without any prefix. For example, last summer I did 4 out of 5 of the Pannier Markets at which an occasional Phoenix or CB woman turned up, but due to the large area of space, and the naming of the event as a 'market', it wasn't a big deal.


Yesterday's event was a bit of a last straw moment. There were three rooms of stalls. One room was small, dark, and had 4 or 5 stalls, all of which were handmade crafts - I know because I talked to them. The cafe also had some stalls in it - I didn't get to see all of them, but they looked pretty much crafty. My room, which had about 15 stalls, had the following in it
- Avon
- Partylite
- someone selling some sort of slimming meal (I don't know what it involved, because she offended me by suggesting when I walked past holding a mince pie that I could be eating something more healthy, no doubt meaning her sawdust gloop)
- someone selling children's books and toys they'd bought in
- someone selling sweets they'd bought in
- someone selling aftershave they'd bought in

I'd been very careful to select items which I'd made by hand due to the name of the fair. I also wanted to sell everything at the same price as I sell in the shop, because I've learnt about pricing my items properly, perceived value, and the fact that customers aren't stupid.

After a few minutes, it was easy to see I wasn't going to sell anything. The centre is a kind of local community meeting place, and everyone was looking for small, cheap items they could allow their children to buy after they'd been to the Santa's Grotto. I shuffled things around, and found a few things I could afford to make £1 (baskets full of stuff for £1 seem to work well when children are involved).

There were a couple of good things about the fair. As I said, the organisation was good, there was a very sweet bunch of old ladies who meet at the centre for a knitting group who were selling their hand knitted toys and stuff, and two amazing chefs with a big load of pickles.

But all in all, it was a bad event for me. Everyone wanted to buy sweets, and as the children were the main customer the lady next door with books and toys did a roaring trade. Good for her, and for the pickle chefs who ran out of their jars of lovely jams. At the end of the day, it wasn't a craft fair. No one else seemed to have made their own stuff, and anyone that had was selling them at a very low price (as I was 2 and a half years ago) because it was their hobby.

This makes me sound really arrogant - but I'm really not trying to be. It was disheartening not being able to sell a necklace for £3 to someone who was trying to barter me down to a quid, when I've had no problem selling the same necklace for £5 in the shop. If it wasn't for the stand of earrings at £1 a pair (only priced as such because I've had them for a while) I wouldn't have sold anything.

So I have an evening event in December at a burlesque night, which I'm going to attend because it's going to be a good show, and then a three day fair at an art gallery in Leeds - after that, I'm not doing any more. I'll keep my shop as my base, continue to meet the public in there, whilst using it as a kind of studio base as well. Fingers crossed I won't regret this.

Rebuttal

Just a quick blog post, as I'm getting slightly annoyed about commenting on the Bird's Yard blog and saying the same thing over and over.

As you all know, we've been slogging away at this shop. It's an uphill struggled some days, because we're in a position which is slightly out of the way - it's not a street which people walk down. We have feedback from customers saying that now they've found us, they'll be back - and they come back, again and again. Some people don't - maybe there just isn't anything for them,, maybe they don't like the staff, whatever.

Anyway, so we had a meeting the other week between all the shop owners. The shop's owner told us she'd had permission from the landlord to put banners up on the boardings at the end of the street. From our shop, we can look up the road and see the main town centre - we talked about how if people just knew where we were, they might come and see us, and some of those people might like us.


We got a few quotes, and found one which was affordable. We talked about the risks - we'd had a banner up there before which had been drawn on, but it had been up there for a while before this happened. We knew they'd probably get drawn on, or ripped down, but we thought the potential advertising before this happened would be worth the £25, and if they weren't damaged or lost, then we could use them again.

A friend helped us design the banners after we sent him advertising images, and they were all sent off to print. I went to Bradford in rush hour traffic on Friday evening to pick them up. On Saturday morning, Michelle and Craig hammered them all up on the boardings, and we admired them. On Sunday morning, when 3 were missing, I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach. All that work, and they never even lasted a day.

So for anyone who thinks we were naive, or we should have expected it - we did expect it, we just didn't expect it that quickly.

Then when 4 more went missing, I became angry. We all know people do stupid things, but why does that mean we should put up with it! It's theft, pure and simple. I rang the police, and they didn't think we were petty. They agreed to look at the CCTV footage for us. We wrote the blog for us yesterday because we thought that someone, somewhere, knows something about this, and we were hoping we could get some help tracking them down. They're probably in a student kitchen, I agree, so maybe someone will see the post and get in touch.

This comment was the one I read this morning at 6am, and why I deleted my other comments. I'd like to reply to each point in turn here.


People have things stolen every day.

That doesn't make it right

You pointed out that your shop has been open a year and due to the loss of these posters your dont think you will last another year?

The loss of these banners will not be what kills the business. But unless we start getting new customers in, then yes, we might have to close. The same customers returning again and again is how we've managed to stay open for 15 months. To continue, we need more regulars.

Surely that means that you shouldnt be in business because after a year, and winning the awards you mentioned you should surely be making a profit and be in a good place


Show me a company in profit after a year of trading. Any business expert will tell you it takes at least 3 years to actually be turning a profit.

Also,if you have won so many awards then why arent lots of people in your shop all the time? Surely this would set off an alarm in your head and show that when people visit your shop they dont like it so they arent returning or bringing friends? Which is why your struggling?

Not everyone who comes in the shop will like it, but a lot of them do, and they bring their friends in. We're doing something right. Every retail business is struggling. We've tried all sorts of things to get new people, like holding events, giveaways, flyering in the town centre (which we have a flyer pass for), and this steadily increases our numbers.

Making a big song and dance about the loss of some posters is not productive. Maybe spend the time cleaning the shop and looking at ways of been positive and bringing people in instead of going for the sympathy vote

I disagree with this, but only because I know the truth. One person wrote a blogpost, and we've all shared it. It took no time at all out of our day. Life in the shop went on as usual, and that means making the shop appealling, comfortable and doing some promotional work.

I can tell you yesterday what everyone in the shop was doing - if you have any suggestions about what else we should have done, I'd like to hear it.
- On the ground floor, they were changing the window display, redressing the mannequins, and cleaning and tidying the shop.
- I was polishing and tidying my shop, and sending out online orders. I was also putting together goody bags for the Twitter winners, and making a gift voucher to be used as a giveaway at a school fete. I also painted my window frames.
- Mighty Baby owner Michaela was putting out new stock, as well as flyering in the town centre. She also cleaned the staff toilet
- Upstairs, Lisa was putting out her winter collection, whilst Aisha was cleaning the carpet and stock-taking.
- Inbetween day long appointments, Rohey the hairdresser was flyering over at the wig shop. She also cleaned the customer toilet
- Finally, Anna was putting up the Christmas decorations, as well as trying to organise a card machine so customers don't have to keep going to the cash machine, and picking up lunch for everyone.

No one in that building sits around doing nothing - even if we look like we are when you come in, you've probably caught us inbetween jobs. If you come in and the shop is untidy, it's probably because we're in the middle of getting ready for a photo shoot, fashion show or craft fair to raise awareness of the shop. There's no excuse if it's dirty, obviously, but we all do our best.

Anyway, I'm rambling, and it probably seems like I'm going for that sympathy vote again. I think the point I'm trying to make is that the post about the banners being stolen wasn't written as a sympathy vote - it was written for information.

If there are any more questions, I'll gladly answer - I'm not the official spokeperson, but I care about the shop, and I'm online a lot.

Competitions on Facebook

So, following on from my last post on using Facebook as a promotional tool, I've been doing some more research. I've run Facebook competitions, but it appears I've been breaking Facebook rules, and I bet lots of you have too, without realising it.

Facebook have a whole page on promotions on Facebook, available here, but in case you're lazy, here's the basics.

Promotions on Facebook basically CANNOT use any Facebook functionality. So you cannot ask fans to tag themselves, comment on something, check in somewhere, 'like' something, etc, to enter the competition. So those competitions where the picture with the most 'likes' is the winner? Totally against Facebook's rules.

You also cannot tell people they've won the competition through Facebook, either by tagging them in posts, sending them a private message etc.

You must also make sure your fans know they are giving information to YOU and not to Facebook, and that the competition is not affiliated with Facebook in any way. This seems obvious, but I've never said this in a competition either.

So how CAN people enter? And how can you let people know who's won?

 

Facebook allows entries via any apps which connect with Facebook. Now, I'm quite good with html and stuff, what with my brother being a programmer, and I can't work out exactly how to write one, and I have neither the time or the inclination, so I'm guessing most of the people reading (crafty so and sos as you are) probably won't be able to either.

So how else can I have a promotion?

The best, and most used way, is definitely to have a blogpost running the competition. Blogs are a great free promotional tool, and allow a lot more scope for promotion. A great example of this are these posts by my friends Kim and Peach - both give you more than one way of entering, and you don't have to break Facebook's rules to enter either competition (you have the option to 'like' Peach's page, but the main way of entering is via a comment on the blog)

Posting about a competition you're holding off-site is, of course, totally fine with Facebook. It also gets round the whole 'this competition isn't affiliated with...' and 'this information is being given to...' bore-fest. Your blog followers should know who they're giving information to, and if they're not totally braindead, they know you're not affiliated with Facebook. As far as I can tell, Twitter don't mind you posting links to competitions off-site either, so go ahead and post on both sites. (as a side-note, I know nothing about Twitter, but that is next on my list for working out what works, what doesn't, what people hate, and most importantly the rules given by the site itself.)

So why is all this important? Well, a friend of mine found out why this week. You break their rules, they'll find out. Notice how Facebook knows what you're posting about, and tells you who else is posting about this? They no doubt have a mechanism in the programming which tells them everyone posting about 'enter my competition' and checks them all out. This is a big business, we're all small businesses, and no matter how insignificant we seem, they're on top of us all.

If you're a burlesque dancer, you'll probably know exactly what I mean. If you have your stage name as your profile name, you're in danger of getting deleted. If you have a photo of you wearing pasties (that's right, showing ABSOLUTELY nothing more, and considerably less, than you'd find in many men's magazines and newspapers, and your photos will probably get deleted.

In a nutshell, if your page gets deleted, there's very little you can do to get it back. You lose all your fans, all your photos, everything. Plus if it's your profile which gets deleted, then ANY fanpages of which you are the only admin will also be lost. (as a sidenote, I recommended having two admins on any fanpage last time I spoke about Facebook, and I stand by this!)

 

So from now on, all competitions will be held on here, and I'll also be taking a tip from Kim and incorporating a competition into an interesting article instead of just saying 'enter my competition' - as usual I'm learning all the time, and I'd hate to see any other small businesses lose their fanpage through ignorance.

 

N.B. Facebook's definition of a competition, and of a sweepstakes - "By “contest” or “competition” we mean a promotion that includes a prize of monetary value and a winner determined on the basis of skill (i.e., through judging based on specific criteria). By “sweepstakes” we mean a promotion that includes a prize of monetary value and a winner selected on the basis of chance."

How I come up with a character

I've been asked a few times how I come up with a character for my jewellery ranges, and I've never been able to tell them. Not because I'm keeping my cards close to my chest, but because I honestly don't know. I know Apis Mellifera arrived in my head during a car journey the day after watching The Prestige for the millionth time. I tend to think a lot anyway, but when driving, there is nothing for me to do but think. I arrive at my destination, and immediately start scribbling things down.

I'd already decided to do something with a doctor, because I'd seen an amazing necklace by Galibardy shaped like a stethoscope. So, on a long drive, I started thinking about Nicolai Tesla, and what other experiments he might have done. In the film he transports the main character from one place to another – I began to imagine he might have managed to transport other friends through time. So a time travelling doctor, who finds work as a magician, was the start of the Mellifera dynasty.

The introduction of a wife gave me scope for children, and as Scott agreed, the children would no doubt be twins. I've always had a thing for twins, not in a sexual way, which is partly why I fell in love with my husband (shallow?). So what were the children going to be like?

The first thing that happened was that someone accidentally called my friend Claudia 'Calusa'. This sounded like someones name, possibly a daughter. Apis had been named purely because I was drawing a lot of bees at the time, and Apis Mellifera is Latin for honey bee, whilst Millie was named after a woman at work who gave me a lot of buttons.

After that, all in the same week, Ian saved a photo of 'the northern lights' to the laptop, we watched QI with Professor Brian Cox, and I started drawing with wire for an exhibition in December. The wire loops and spirals started to look like planetary paths, especially when combined with large spherical beads which looked like planets. I imagined a softly spoken astronomer, describing the paths of planets with enthusiasm. Could he be Calusa Mellifera?

Everything kicked off this morning. Looking online Calusa is actually a Native American tribe, and so it was no longer right. So what to call him? I searched for 'astronomy' on Google images, and found photos of the Andromeda galaxy, which is a spiral, and references to Edwin Hubble, who Claudia's cat is named after – so the astronomer just had to be Edwin.

Now there was a name, and an occupation. As Apis and Millie were married in the 1920s, he'd be born around then, meaning by the time he was working, it would be about the 1950s. This is awesome, because I've been wanting to do something 50s related for ages, and was even annoyed with myself for making Apis travel forward to the 1920s instead of the 1950s.

So now comes the gathering of inspiration. I travel through the internet, following links, finding things out, and saving any picture which appeals to me. This morning, I followed a link from Edwin Hubble, and after reading about the doppler effect, somehow ended up looking at pictures of swans, as well as galaxies, spiral and otherwise, and planetary orbits. Somehow the two sorts of shapes complemented each other.

Finally, I thought about colour. I've been using this amazing chartreuse green wire for wire drawing, so I looked online to see why it's so named. It turns out the story behind chartreuse is better than anything I could come up with.

Chartreuse is named after a liqueur, which has been distilled since the 1740s by Carthusian monks. It gets its colour from the chlorophyll in the 130 herbs it contains. The monks started distilling it in 1605 after a mysterious manuscript was found by Marshal Francois Annibal d'Estrees (an employee of the French king Henry IV) with the recipe for an elixir said to promote a long life. It is still distilled now, in the same distillery as Genepi, a liqueur similar to absinthe.

So all the elements I need for a collection are in place. Now, like a liqueur, it ferments inside my head for a bit while I'm messing around with the photos I've saved, until suddenly, there's a rounding off story which brings it all together.

NAME – Edwin Mellifera

OCCUPATION – astronomy professor

TIME PERIOD – 1950s (particularly space race)

SHAPES – spirals, coils, swans

COLOURS - chartreuse

HISTORY – IE how it ties in with Apis

“In 1929, Millie finally fell pregnant. Due to the unforeseen time shifts created by Apis travelling forward, there were slight mutations, and the pregnancy was a multiple birth. In the 1920s, it was much more difficult for women to cope with prolonged labour, but Millie pulled through, although the babies were weak.

With his medical background, Apis developed a medical tonic using herbs, which was fed to both twins from the age of 6 months. He believed it would make them strong and live longer, but all he managed to do was further mutate his own children. The guilt he felt was what caused him to give up trying to live in the time period he had travelled to, and he began his long struggle trying to travel back to his own time.

Edwin's mutations were primarily positive. His tremendous intellect led him to Cambridge university in1948, where he studied Astrophysics, and he contributed to the 'space race', although on the side of the Russians, due to his father's background. He worked for Sergei Korolev on Object D, and assisted Gargarin in being the first cosmonaut.”

Here's the album of images

This week - meet the designers!

Starting today, I'm going to introduce you to all the designers in my shop! There are so many of us in here now, I want to take some time with each one.

Today, obviously, I'll start with me. I'm an artist, I started painting 3 years ago, but I've always made stuff. I really flourished at college doing an access course in art, when I finally got to grips with sculpture. Now I make small enough sculptures to fit on jewellery. In an ideal world, I'd make my living from selling my odd little wire sculptures, handsewn recycled toys and paintings, but instead I'm focused at the moment on making things people would like to wear, and gifts they'd like to give other people.

Whilst I love making jewellery, I get a buzz off running my shop, and having new and exciting designers, as well as the best in the business. I like finding new quirky things I just know people will love.