No Storefront for Me :-(

The craft fair/store I was planning to participate in this holiday season is a no-go.

The woman who was putting it together is a good friend. She's also my officemate at the dayjob 3 days a week, so I got to watch the whole process from idea -- I had no clue how much is involved in renting a retail space, from utility negotiations to insurance & accessibility concerns--to finished plan. This week I saw it fall apart when the landlord decided to turn down 3 months of guaranteed rent for the chance to get a longer term lease in the space (which has been vacant for quite some time...) She had a couple back-up locations, but they all fell through.

I feel really bad for her; I ~know~ exactly how many hours she devoted to making this happen plus the hours of time she spent building product for her own booth. And, *poof* it's gone.

I have a confession, too.

While I am NOT and NEVER WILL BE glad her business venture was crushed, I am a little relieved.

I'm slow. I figure somewhere between an artist and an enthusiast when I craft -- I like to make beautiful things, but they have to be beautiful to me; I don't really care what others think, and I don't like to make the same thing more than once, for the most part. Which meant that building inventory for my little corner/shelf in her store was stressing me out. Alot. I thought I was doing well (I was still making the last three weeks I haven't been updating) building supply.

I saw a formula somewhere indicating that your inventory during the holiday season should be roughly 3x what you hope to sell (dunno where the hell the math for that came from).

I was planning to rent a 1' x 4' wall shelf for my stuff, nothing big. Last weekend I bought a big wheeled 45gal plastic tote to store the stuff I was making for the holiday store.

Spatial awareness is not my forte. The tub was too big to fit in the trunk of my VW. I got it in the backseat, just, but it took some doing. Will fit fine if I put the backseat down, but still. Yea.

Lugged the box up the stairs to my office/craft room/disastrous pit/home of all lost objects ever and loaded it up with my inventory. Which is to say I was unable to cover even the bottom of this 4'x2'x2.5' tub. Well, I might have, if I unstacked the scarves... But you see what I mean. What started as an enthusiastic purchase to help me get organized for the craft bazaar quickly turned into a graphic visual reminder of how impossible this was in the midst of everything else I do.

So while the news of the bazaar's cancellation was unexpected and disappointing, it was also a bit of a relief.

On the other hand, now I'm wondering what the heck to do with all these scarves and wine charm sets!

Tally Time!

Okay - so, a semi-productive week on this front, but a disaster on most others... Ever wonder if the universe is telling you something? Even though two different people told you this week that you should be selling your stuff? No? Just me then...

But I did get a few things done:

- 5 scarves
- 1 pair earrings
- 1 wire-wrapped stone pendant
- 1 set (of 4) wine charms
- 2 necklace/earring sets

I'm trying to do more with the jewelry, but now that I have a probable venue (pal is learning all the ins and outs of retail, utils, insurance, etc., and it's not as definite, sadly, as it was a week ago -- she's meeting with the owner of the location this weekend so I hope to know more next week) my ideas have dried up. No pressure (ha!)