Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Jet of the Day 8/23/11 - Rough Magic Creations

Hi there! I'm Mollie of Rough Magic Creations, my Etsy shop which proudly boasts my Jet team membership.




But I also have a second Etsy shop which, having recently awoken after several months in hibernation, may be an unknown entity to many of my teammates.



Now, before the holiday season goes into overdrive, I'd like to share a few of my experiences in selling seasonal and celebratory items (jewelry, accessories and home decor) on Etsy.


A. To dispatch with one unpleasant aspect straight away …
Especially in a slow economy, people aren't eager to invest in items that they'll be wearing or displaying for at most a couple of months (or maybe only a few days) each year. Specifically, I've learned to stay away from gold filled and sterling silver and stick with copper and silver tone base metals, which allows me still to go with the gemstones that I love.






B. Keeping more than one shop up-to-snuff can be both time consuming and exhausting. I'm eager for the long promised day when Etsy allows us to manage multiple shops with a single account. Till then, I stay signed in to one account on Firefox and the other on Chrome. Needless to say, both browsers have overloaded bookmark toolbars! It's a constant juggling act, especially as I also have an ArtFire studio and a small shop on Zibbet.





C. It pays to keep items rotating in pace with the calendar. I seldom allow an item in this shop to expire. No season lasts for four months, and renewing beachy summer items in the dead of winter would only gum up the works.


Not only does deactivating out of season pieces keep my shop looking fresh and up-to-date, it allows me to group current items in seasonally specific sections.




At the moment, I have eight sections: Autumn, Halloween, Christmas and Winter, RoughMagic Weddings, RoughMagicFun, Religious Jewelry, All Occasions, and Gifts for Men.

The first three are rotating sections. Autumn and Halloween will disappear after October 31, and Christmas & Winter will morph into two sections: Christmas, and Winter & New Years. On January 1, Winter & New Years will change to Late Winter, and two new sections will open: Valentine's, and St. Patrick's Day. When Winter goes out, Spring & Easter will temporarily replace Religious Jewelry, and Mother's Day will come up, Dads & Grads will take over Gifts for Men, and Summertime and July 4th will follow chronologically. Then back to Autumn …


Of course of this all depends on what pieces I have available at any given time, but with each rotation, items that fit logically in new or permanent sections will move there until their gig is up. :)



 For example, when Autumn is over, this necklace will receive a bit of judicious tweaking and move to the permanent All Occasions category ~






 
And this wreath will move to a newly revived Home Decor section ~



 This necklace, too limited to go anywhere else, will hibernate till next fall ~


D. As the exception that proves the rule (Rule A, that is), I've discovered that brides are happy to invest in sterling silver and gold filled wedding jewelry, whatever the season. They see these pieces as heirlooms to treasure and to wear again and again, to celebrate anniversaries and other romantic occasions. So RoughMagic Weddings stays up all year long, and I do relist those items when they expire, often with fresh new photos/







Another section that stays alive year round is RoughMagic Fun, which is useful for all kinds of things that I'm not quite ready to deactivate, and where I'm now keeping some Mardi Gras and April Fools items.



E. With holiday and seasonal items, color, texture and theme are everything. I can't stress this point enough. For Autumn, olive green, rusty red, burnt orange, caramel, copper (yay!), rustic, woodsy and leaves, leaves and more leaves! Halloween is orange and black, novelty, funky and fun. Christmas jewelry is red and green, and occasionally pale blue and white. Spring … but you know all this!


F. If you're thinking you'd like to open a holiday shop, my best advice:
Go for it! It's more fun than a barrel of ... well, a barrel of Jets.

Thank you for reading,
Mollie

17 comments :

Bob J24-7 said...

Love this very well thought out and informative post!

capitalcitycrafts said...

Wonderful post! Thanks for sharing your knowledge and humor!

Erika Price said...

What a great idea - maybe I should try a holiday shop too - tho' silly me had always wondered why you called it a holiday shop :) And SNAP, I stay signed in to one account on Firefox and the other on Chrome too!!!

JillreOzmay said...

Thank you Mollie! Good info. I have other shops but they are closed right now. It frazzles me to try to juggle them all. You've given me hope :)

Made By Tammy said...

Great info! I so understand "B". All of your shops are Fantastic! I'm so in Love with your Gorgeous Copper jewelry! Thanks for the JETs Shout Out! :)

Michele said...

Great information here does make alot of sense, thanks for sharing!!! Lovely jewelry featured also!!!!

Tracy said...

Wow, great post! I love following your thought process and find it amazing how you can juggle so much!

SendingLoveGallery said...

enjoyed your post and your advice makes good sales sense!

WanderingJewel said...

Thank you for the great post Mollie!

Lisa Lehmann @StudioJewel said...

such a great post. i'm in love with so many of your items! thank you for posting!

cooljewelrydesign said...

Mollie, this is priceless...in terms of humor, sage advice and gearing us up for all seasons...LOVE your jewelry and would hate to see you take the lovely leaf piece out...it's fall somewhere in the world!

DG Jewelry Designs said...

Mollie - love your post. Also, love those copper pieces. Just beautiful!

Mollie Ann said...

Thank you so much, Norah and Jets! You've all made this such a special day for me! Oh, how I love this team!!!

Brooke said...

Wonderful post Mollie, thanks for sharing!

Beadsme said...

Great post and loved the pics.

YourDailyJewelsBLOG said...

Mollies shops are so diverse. She is good at EVERYTHING! It is a pleasure to peruse. Great blog post. Very motivating!

Bethany said...

Fantastic Job Mollie! Thanks for your sage advice...I'm definitely going to implement these suggestions in my shop!