To bead or not to bead…

 

So I have been cutting back on going to in-person sales, festivals and other events where I could sell my hand crafted pretties.  My one friend that was my major helper in getting things moved in and out and doing the set-ups and breakdowns, had her shifts changed and was not available for the typically Saturday events and I am not able to manage in my own anymore.  So I am trying to decide where best to go for online selling of things like my handpun yarns, hand knitted wearables, and my beaded jewelry and charms.  It’s hard enough to find a decent and affordable online venue, where I might actually make sales and I come up with a new product idea!

I was talking to a friend on the phone one day and we were discussing the aromatherapy bracelets and how the idea was neat, except she wasn’t a jewelry person, so a bracelet wouldn’t work for her.  In a few minutes my brain came up with these… A single lava bead will hold your drop of essential oil and then you can attach it to a key chain, zipper, cell phone case, or they can be converted to a pendant to wear as a necklace if you *are* a jewelry person.  She suffers from stress and anxiety and does find aromatherapy helps, I wanted to find a way to make it work for her and the rest as they say, is history….

So I pulled out my inventory of beads and findings and started creating. Next came the challenge of trying to photograph them, one of my crystal clusters turned out to be perfect for getting the right angle to show them off.  For now I have a sales page on Facebook that I have listed them on.  (https://www.facebook.com/frogpondcollective)

I am going to have to work on pictures of my other stuff so I can get things online, although I find it challenging really… Finding that balance between setting my stuff up just right, then getting just the right shot(s) and then spending all the time to list is and then not have any traffic looking at your work.  Honestly there are days I am wondering if I shouldn’t just make it a big discount sale for charity and give up doing sales of any kind all together.  Sorry, my frustration is showing…  Let me tuck that back in the corner for now.

I’ve posted a couple of pictures of the new product here as a sample, if you have a Facebook account, please stop by my page, take a look at the rest of them and maybe leave a like.