Bohemian Mermaid Palace

Hey well maybe I'm back to blogging for real. We'll see. I do have many many things flying around my brain right now, and what are blogs for if not to blab about them? Maybe I can bore my friends on facebook a little less. Ha. Mostly I've been planning my craft show season for 2015. This always gives me a kind of Far Off feeling... concentrating on all the details of the summer and fall, I get kind of stuck there. Already living in the future in my mind. Imagining where I'll go, where I'll stay, what kinds of festivals I will attend, who I'll visit on the way. I'm already there. Sunset over the Winthrop Rhythm & Blues Festival in Winthrop, WA. It's shaping up nicely so far. At the start of the new year, I sat and thought about what I wanted my year to look like. What are my goals. The only thing I could see was doing another long distance Mermaid Tour to North Dakota and back, like I did last year. So I'm doing that. I'm still con...

At long last, Part 4 of a series I'm calling (5 Steps to) Get Started Selling at Craft Fairs . Read Step #1: Find Your Shows , Step #2: Booth Display , and Step #3: Marketing Materials . Money Talk Okay, now we are getting down to business. I think most of us start out just making things because we love to, we are compelled to. Soon we have boxes of things, and then begin trying to sell them simply because we want to make more. At some point you can't help but consider making a living doing all the things you love most. And I fully believe in that dream. But now after so many years, I can tell you... while it is possible, it is not easy. Very few artists I know make a full time living, where they can buy houses and support families. For that you need some real business finesse, a way to sell consistently in multiple venues, and probably mixed with teaching classes or other service based offerings. I don' t have any data behind it , but this is what I've...

 Ever since my first time selling crafts at a festival (circa 1995), I knew immediately it was for me. The energy, the direct contact with customers, talking about my work... and just the excitement of putting myself out there. It was electric. I felt then, and still do, that when I'm selling my work at a show I am my best self. It's so much fun! But it's also a ton of work. Physical, mental, emotional work. Which also feels good in its way, but may not be for everyone. Here I will lay out some of the pros and cons to consider when you're deciding if the craft show life is for you. Pro: Good Fun   Oh man. There is plenty of good fun to be had while vending at a festival. In fact, many of my friends think I have the best job ever. Well, I do. There are bands to hear, beers to drink, neighbors to visit with, customers to say nice things to you... oh and money to be made. All kinds of fun times. I mean, it is a festival. Most everyone is having a good time and l...

Part 3 of a series of posts I'm calling (5 Steps to) Get Started Selling at Craft Fairs . Read Step #1: Find Your Shows and Step #2: Booth Display . Marketing Materials   Even at the dinkiest of shows, you have the opportunity to get your name and your work out into the world. I think it's the most basic marketing requirement to have a card to give out to your customers, with your contact info and what you make. People will see plenty of other booths throughout the day. If they are interested enough to buy your work or ask for a card, give them something to take away that will keep you in their minds long after they get home. It doesn't have to be fancy, but it should be a good reminder of what they saw in your booth, and where to find it later. My big 3 I have 3 marketing items I always give out in my booth - flyers, business cards and hang tags. I print all of them with my computer on card stock. You can get fancy stuff printed online fo...

  I talk to a lot of artists and craftspeople, many of whom have Facebook pages for their businesses. I'm always a little surprised that they don't do Facebook ads. I think to most people, the whole process is pretty mysterious. I don't claim to be an expert, but I can say after some trial and error... they are cheap to run, very easy to point at your specific target market, and have served me pretty well.  Cheap you say? Yes. When I run an ad before a sales event, ie craft show, I usually spend $10-$20 for a week. The cool thing about FB ads is that you set your own daily spending limits. You do need to check that number each time you edit your ad, it will default to some ungodly number automatically. I believe the trick to keeping the cost down is to choose the Pay per Impressions option. This charges you each time your ad is shown 1000 times. Usually less than .50. Hey now! I did try the pay per click, and I found they only showed my ad a few h...

    A lot happened I guess while I was away from my beloved blog. In November I opened a tiny store front in downtown Eureka, CA. I guess it was about a year before that when I started fantasizing about it... a place where I could sell my goods between festivals, even in winter when I usually pack all my stuff into boxes and get sad. A place where I could have some tiny bit of self discipline and a regular schedule to my work day. Something my husband thought I could never put up with... being tied to a thing like a schedule. Haha that is what I run from in normal day jobs, it's true.  But this is mine. That's the difference. This is all me, my place, my work... even my schedule. I dare say it's the best day job ever. Well, because it's not a 'day job' it's just my job. I love it.  It's still growing of course... I chose a location that is a little off the main shopping drag, but there is a lot of fun stuff happening in my neighbor...

Something fun happened to me because of this little blog... are you ready for this?? My goofy yet popular tutorial for making Beer Can Hats got the attention of one fabulous author in Portland. "Author of what?" you may ask, "A book about making stuff out of beer cans? Yeah right!" Yeah. Right!  That's exactly what happened. The lovely and talented miss Shawn Gascoyne-Bowman asked me to contribute a couple hipper variations of my crochet can pattern to her book Beer Crafts . She even put one on the cover! I am famous as hell now. Or soon will be, so get ready. But seriously... this book is SO stinkin cool! So many creative projects that I can't wait to make. Far beyond your old beer cap earrings, way beyond. Soon I will have these books for sale right here on my little blog thing. For now, please watch this book trailer video. This alone will show you the extreme levels of awesome this book reaches. So happy to be a part of it!  

This is part two of a series of posts I'm calling (5 Steps to) Get Started Selling at Craft Fairs . Read Step #1: Find Your Shows .   Booth Display Figuring out a booth display can be a little overwhelming at first. So many options and issues to address. You might not have much product to display or money to spend. I suggest, for this reason and many more, you find a friend you can share space with. That cuts your booth fee in half, gives you less space to fill, and a helper during the show for breaks and whatnot. In time you will grow more stock and maybe a desire to fill a whole booth alone. Help and company are still nice to have. Start by looking at other vendors' displays for ideas. You can find samples of booth setups all over the web , search for "booth shot" or "craft booth" on google or pinterest. If possible, attend some craft shows and pay attention to the displays of booths selling the types of crafts you make. Take notes, ...

 [*Updated* 2019] Since I posted 5 Essential Tips for Craft Fair Selling , I've received some questions about how to get started... finding shows, figuring out a display, etc. Since I never get tired of these topics, I put together a list of 5 steps to get started selling at craft fairs . They got pretty long so I am splitting them into a series of posts. I hope they are helpful!  Start Selling at Craft Fairs #1:  Find Your Shows Start Your List You probably already know of a few craft fairs that happen in your area. The first step is to start a list. To organize my show list, I use my google calendar. I love Google calendar because there is room for notes, links, and you can color code different aspects (like my deadlines are code red, so I can see them easily).  When I find a potential show, I add it to my calendar along with the pertinent info including cost, type of show, web site, and whether the ap is online or has been requested. If I'm...