At the end of June when I was fired from my job of almost 12 years and decided to give jewelry selling a real try, I had about 30 pairs of earrings laying around my house. I figured I'd offer up 2 earrings a day at Etsy and I'd make at least 3 pairs of earrings a day. Soon I'd have enough to do a table at a fair this summer. According to all the books, I should also start a Facebook page. And a blog was most definitely needed.
Well, I already had a Facebook page, was already making earrings and blah, blah, blahing all over the internet any way. Plus I'd have all day to do it in, since I wasn't really working. Easy-peasy!
The first imperfection in this perfect scenario was that I forgot to place picture taking into it. I now have two mini-photo studios-- one on my dining room table and one on the patio table. And, well, I'm not a great photographer. It takes a lot of time and thinking to take pictures of 60 pairs of earrings and other trinkets. This has been a great bane.
Another thought that didn't enter into my demonstrably addled brain was that if I enjoyed any sort of success, the amount of earrings in my inventory would not continue increasing at the rate it would if my efforts were a total failure. I figured at 3 earrings a day, give or take, I'd have more than a hundred pairs of earrings by August-- enough for a table at a small local fair. Ha! Not counting the earrings already posted on Etsy, I've got 6 pair in inventory. That's enough to hold me until Wednesday.
Oh, and that 3 pairs of earrings a day thing. Yeah, no. I never know how many earrings I'm going to make. I have little control over this. I've made as many as 7 on in one very fun night and I've gone for as long as 3 days without making a single pair. Also, you'd think with having only three day's worth of inventory would be incentive enough to get cracking on the earrings, right? Wrong!
Lemme 'splain. See, I was blocked for a while and couldn't for the life of me think up a pair of earrings. Craftster does these craft challenges that I never paid attention to. That is, until I needed something to get me going. I did last month's challenge and it helpled tremendously. I'm no longer blocked. The only thing is, it's not jewelry. And then this month's challenge gave me an idea I had to flesh out.
They're bug bobby pins and I think they're adorable. Perhaps I can sell them as a set on my Etsy. Other things being made by me that are not earrings: a necklace, a sorta flip book type catalog and a shed.
The last thing that I thought would be a breeze but has taken up more time than I bargained for is this here blog. Blabbering on the internet takes absolutely no aforethought, researching and planning. This blog takes a bit more than of that than absolutely none. And then there was a day like yesterday when I could not think of one single thing to write about except my mild case of vertigo. Nobody want to hear about my spins.
So in closing, I'm a terrible businesswoman. Here, visit my Etsy.
I really enjoyed the "Five movie titles that could be about pooping" post. You always have silly lists posts to fall back on when your brain isn't all creative-y.
ReplyDeleteLike I don't have to think up the silly list posts too!
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