Take the Guess Work Out of Pricing Your Jewelry!

Today, I want to share another tip with you that has helped my business. I came across a program in 2010 that has been so beneficial that I am unsure how I ever got along without it. It has helped take the guess work out of pricing my jewelry and has created an actual way for me to price my items that I believe to be the most fair, reasonable and accurate. It has become one of the greatest tools that I could have ever invested in and I wanted to share it with you today.
I do want to be very clear that I am in no way affiliated with the program or the company that makes it. I am merely sharing it with you today because I have reaped the benefits of having it and I really hope that someone else may reap the rewards of using it as well. It is just a phenomenal program that I use every time I price an item and I wanted to share with you how it works and some of the benefits that can come from using it. I have been using it since 2010 and it is still, by far, my number one choice for pricing my jewelry items. The name of the program is BeadManager Pro and it is incredibly powerful!
The price of this program is $147.00, but I can't tell you how small that price is compared to what it has done for me as a jewelry business owner. I get free upgrades for life, and let me tell you, there have been three major ones since I purchased it in 2010 and the latest upgrade allows you to share your pieces directly from the program to your Facebook page! The upgrades have been quite simple to install, they have increased the value of the program immensely, and it has been worth every single penny I paid for it! The program is incredibly helpful when it comes to pricing, taking the guess work out of it completely. My only wish is that I would have had this program before I started to purchase my inventory. Up until this point, I had never enjoyed working with a program as much as I enjoy this one. I use this program every single time I create an item or purchase parts to create my pieces out of. It tracks everything I buy and everything I create. It keeps my customers in a data base, it creates professional looking invoices, and it helps to save time every single day. I don't have cumbersome spreadsheets to keep track of, I don't have to do a bunch of math to figure out pricing, and I don't have to depend on formulas that may not be right for my business. This is the only thing I use for pricing and it is powerful beyond belief!
I have created this video to show you what I am talking about. I wanted to show you what it does and how the features work. I wanted to show you how much help this program can provide for you. I wanted to give you some insight into how you can be even more professional in your business.
This video does not cover everything there is to know about this program, but it does cover some of the most important attributes. As I said, this program even allows you to share your items directly to Facebook, and I didn't even go into that part. take a look at the video and see if it may be what you have been looking for!
P.S. I have friends that have purchased this program for other things besides beads. It could be useful in other ways and to other types of craftspeople in the world. Just imagine the possibilities!
Here it is folks, the video to show you just what this program is and how it works for me every time I create. Spend 40 minutes of your time with me, I promise you won't be disappointed!

$0 to $1,100.00 in Four Short Hours~Sweet Success!

Over the next few posts, I want to share with you some of the things I have done to improve my business. Some of them were big steps, some of them were baby steps, and some were just improved steps, but all of these steps together have made an improvement in my business. This being day one, I want to share with you the very first thing that I did to improve my business. I want to share with you how I went from $0.00 to $1,100.00 in four short hours! Now that is EXCITING!
Mastering the craft fair is not an easy task. It takes time, determination, and to be quite honest; GUTS! It is not something to be taken lightly, but it is something that can generate some great income in a very short time. In fact, I can only think of a few *other* occupations that can make this kind of money in such a short amount of time, but we will not be going there.
As described in my last post, I began taking my love for creating jewelry to the next level in 2009. This is the time that I did my very first community craft fair. I had been making jewelry for a while, and I had some friends that were quite interested in what I was creating. One of them was so bold as to suggest that I should really try to enter a local craft fair and try to sell my stuff to people other than my friends and family members.
At this point in my life, I really had nothing to lose as I had already lost my career

and therefore, the income that said career had attached to it. I decided to take that friends' advice and try to get into one of the local craft fairs. I began talking to people~that knew people~that knew people~that could actually get me to the *right people*. I finally found the right person that could help me enter my first craft show. I filled out all of the necessary paperwork, got it in (along with the check) before the deadline, and thus was entered for a ride that I have never forgotten.
Now, I come from a very tiny, close-knit community of 6,314 people. We have some towns that are close by, but we are the second largest in the Basin. There is only one town larger than the one I live in and it has 9,653 people. It is about a thirty minute drive from where I am at. Needless to say, we are lucky to be able to eat here:

And even sadder than that...they have some of the best food in town! I do have to say that McDonald's has it goin' on in our little bitty bite of the big ol' world. Their Grilled Southwest Chicken Salad is the very best salad you can get here~hands down! Your meal is ALWAYS fresh and hot because they have a rockin' business and nothing has time to get cold or stale. It is quite yummy! "Cheap but Good" has been an all time favorite motto of mine and when I say it, my friends know I am speaking of my local McDonald's! So, needless to say, I come from a *small town* and with that comes craft shows that aren't necessarily specifically designed for niche items.
My first show was to be held at the fairgrounds. It is with great effort that some of these shows can even get enough people to sign up for booths to make it a go. There really are no specific rules to the sort of stuff that can be sold, other than the fact that it must be handmade. I packed up my 

with my tables, tablecloths, displays and my wonderful wares and I was off to make my first million at my very first craft show!
Upon arriving at the fairgrounds, I had to unload all of my stuff, set it up, and be ready to sell within just about an hour and a half. I was a hot mess! It took longer than it should have, I get nervous under pressure, I am a perfectionist and, of course, NOTHING was right! On top of all of this, I didn't have any help! Man oh man, what the hell was I thinking? I hurried as fast as I could, got my stuff set up, wiped the sweat from my brow, and I was ready to sell~ or at least I thought I was.
I have to tell you, there is a lot of handmade jewelry in my little town of 6,314 people and I believe that every single person making it was selling it at this particular craft show. There were so many jewelry booths that one could have enough jewelry to sustain a queen for all eternity! It was a disheartening moment for the fictitious bubble I had created! It was an all day affair and I walked away with about $30 bucks in my pocket and that didn't cover the booth fee. I was disappointed, to say the least, but I was determined. One thing I am not is a quitter! I went home and regrouped. I was definitely not going to succumb to defeat!
I have come a long way since that very first show. My most profitable show was actually last year. I made $1,100.00 in 4 short hours and it was SWEET! I now have repeat customers that look for me at these events and they are loyal, loving customers that help me to know that this is truly what I want to do as my heartfelt career one day. You must remember that this is a community of 6,314 people, so this is a very good profit in my little neck of the woods. I have changed a lot of things since that very first show and I want to share some of those things here with you now. These are some of the first things that I changed to improve my business, starting with the way that I do craft fairs.
I, of course, don't have all of the answers to be successful at a craft show, but I do have some pointers that may help you out. Here is a list of the things that I think can be very beneficial to you. Be sure to click on the link at the end of this post to get some craft show check lists that I believe are invaluable, after all, they were created from trial by fire!

LIST OF HELPFUL TIPS:
1) Find your niche and do it better than anyone else. I cannot stress this enough, especially if you come from a small town and are doing small town craft shows.
2) Use table coverings that go to the floor. Don't leave the front of your table exposed, as this lets people see everything that you have temporarily stored under there.
3) Use binder clips to secure the sides of your table coverings. Attach them from the under side and *box in* your table. This creates an eye pleasing effect and it pulls the fabric up on the sides so people don't trip on it. I like the binder clips because they are much easier to maneuver than safety pins.

4) Layer your table covering with different colors and patterns. Be sure to have a solid color on the very top so that it doesn't distract from what you are selling.
5) Use table displays that showcase the items that you are selling. If your displays are great enough, they can be the item that attracts people to your table instead of the table of your competition.
6) Don't use bold add-ons. Use small items that don't distract from what you are selling. I sell jewelry so therefore, I use these:

They are very large faceted glass gemstones that can fit in the palm of my hand. I have three different sizes and different colors. I also use fake flower petals. These things can be purchased at craft supply stores.
7) Try to dress in a fashion that resonates what you are selling. My items are very Victorian so therefore, I try to dress in a Victorian fashion. I happen to own this and I wear it to a lot of my shows.

 This is not to say be uncomfortable. By all means, comfort is first priority but most of us create from the heart and it is what drives us. I have  a friend that makes all things leather from boots to saddles to everything in between. He is the guy pictured in the link above. This is exactly how he dresses for the shows. He wears his own handmade boots as well.
8) Wear what you are creating and selling! There is no better advertisement than you! You stand behind what you sell and there is no reason not to bring it! Now, if you are selling wood sculptures that you build with a chainsaw, as my friend the Chick With a Chainsaw does, then it is probably not that feasible. In this instance, be creative.
9) Have your money in a money bag like this:

 when you first start out. I still only carry the money bag because it is small and it can be moved easily. My tax is built in on my items I sell at craft fairs, so all of my pieces sell for an even amount. This makes it quite simple and there is no loose change.
10) Make sure your items have a visible price tag. Some people will not even look at an item if they can't see the price. A clear understanding is already made that you are there to sell and, most likely, they are there to buy; so have a price on your items so that your customers know how much it is.
11) Engage your customers in conversation. Try to start with an open ended question and engage them in a real conversation. If you see them looking, ask them what they like about what they are looking at. Talk to them! This was one of THE HARDEST things for me. I remember standing at my first show, never saying a word to anyone. I was smiling with my hands politely tucked inside one another in front of me, being passive and watching people come and go from my booth, never having been a word uttered between them or myself. I quickly learned that this was not going to gain me any sales. Believe it or not, you can determine if someone wants you to talk to them within the first 10 seconds of opening the dialogue.

If they throw their hand at you without looking up at you directly, and say, "Thank you, I am just looking." This is usually a pretty good indication that you can end right there with, "OK, if you have any questions, I would be happy to help." and leave it at that. Sometimes people look like they don't want to be approached, but give it a shot anyway. I had a customer that still crosses my mind now and again. She came across as a very stern woman, totally unapproachable, but I tried anyway. She wound up buying a $130.00 necklace, matching earrings, $150.00 necklace for her daughter, and earrings to match that as well. Proof that you just never can tell.
12) Be yourself. Talk naturally, engage with your customer naturally. If you are nervous, it is OK. Most customers can put you at ease within just a few moments. They are there because they WANT to be, and there is no greater comfort then knowing this. They usually have a bright smile followed by a compliment the minute you begin to speak to them. Who doesn't like that?
13) Have your boxes, bags, calculator and any other necessities within close reaching distance. Don't leave a customer standing at your booth while you spend 10 minutes trying to figure out where you left your calculator, or finding a box or a bag. It is not professional and it can spell the end of what could have been a good customer relationship.
14) Use professional looking signing and price tags. I print everything myself from my home computer. I have nothing that is hand written on my table. This also gives you an opportunity to use your branding that you have worked so hard to acquire.
15) Have plenty of business cards and brochures on hand. Have the proper displays for them. This is one that I suggest.

16) Have a brochure that your customers can take with them. In it, tell them about you, what inspires you, how you came to do what you do. Talk about your product or items and let them know why you feel your item is ahead of the rest. This has been one of the best things I could do. By the way, I print my own from a template that I had designed specifically for me. I wanted to be able to change it whenever I wanted and Mary at Graphic Confections did an amazing job designing it.
17) Use a Square or other device that you can accept credit cards with. This has been one of the best things I have done for my business in the craft fair world.
18) Advertise that you have the ability to take credit cards! I use a sign that, you guessed it, I printed myself incorporating the branding I have for everything JKC Creations, including my online presence. Believe me, it is one of the most noticed things on my table!
19) Use proper sign holders. Don't spread propaganda around your booth without a specific *home*. I use the acrylic sign holders so that the signs are standing up and they present a clear message from a distance.
20) If you do home shows, have brochures on hand that explain how they work. Be sure to mention that you offer home shows. I offer incentives at mine and my brochure details it out well. Home shows can be a profitable business and you don't want to leave this valuable information behind. Having the template that Mary made for me, I am able to customize it for my home show brochure and my brochure for my business. This is a GRAND thing, indeed!

Here are a couple pictures I took of my table last year at a craft fair around Thanksgiving. I have definitely come a long way since my early days!

And now, here is the free link that I mentioned at the beginning of this post. This list includes the things that I believe are important for a successful craft show. This document is based on the Show Checklists from the Definitive Guide to Selling Handcrafted Jewelry from Wire-Sculpture.com. I hope that you find the list interesting and useful. I am sure there are things that I have failed to mention here, but I believe that you get the idea. Dress for success, and that means everything that you incorporate into the craft show experience. Yourself included!
I have one item on my check list that I have used at every single craft show I have ever done, and I have never seen it on any other craft show list. I hope that you find this list as useful as I do! Enjoy!
Craft Show Checklists

Lisa, Tim, and Me

I know I have not been the blogger that I should be these last few weeks. The truth is, I am on a mission. I am on a mission to improve all things JKC Creations. I have been enrolled in a class for a while now called 'Build a Better Creative Business'. Tim Adam and Lisa Jacobs have been teaching this class. Tim also is the mastermind behind Handmadeology. This is my story of how it all began...
One day while perusing my Facebook page, haphazardly and not really engaged, I came across a free webinar to be offered by Tim and Lisa. I am a huge fan of Handmadeology and Tim Adam. Tim has been a person of influence for me for quite some time. I decided to sign up for the webinar because I am always trying to improve my business and this sounded like another opportunity to do just that. I tuned in for the webinar and in doing so, I set myself up for an unbelievable journey. The webinar gave me a taste of what I had been seeking for quite some time. It teased me with ways to improve my Etsy shop and other things that I had been dying to figure out. In the webinar, Tim and Lisa made me an offer that I could not turn away from. They offered the 'Build a Better Creative Business Course' for a ridiculously small fee. I immediately left the seminar and signed up. I have been on a course of self discovery and revelation ever since.
In 2009, I had a career that I absolutely loved. I had been at this place in my life for about eight years. I reveled in it. I loved it. I thought that this was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I had found my career and I was never going to leave. I have to tell you, even though I thought that this was 'it'~ the career that I had been dreaming about all my life; there was a part of me that was discontent and unsettled. I felt as if I was supposed to be doing something and I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I felt like a part of my inner self was missing. My inner peace was not quite whole and content.
I continued on with my career, always there and always present, thinking that I had my dream job and I was going to stay at it for the rest of my working days. I had that dream come to a screeching halt in June of 2009. I found myself without a job in the middle of a time that it was extremely difficult to find another one. I was devastated. I went home and told my husband my heart wrenching news. He didn't get angry. He didn't get mad and throw things. He knew how badly I was hurting and he was compassionate and loving. He took me into his arms and told me that all would be OK. I wiped away the tears and began to search for another job immediately. I call it a job now, because I felt as if my 'career' was lost to me forever. I wrestled with my demons for many weeks after this. I found myself crying silently when I went to bed. I had nightmares of people in power sitting me down and chastising me and ridiculing me. through all of this, I continued to look for work. I was on the internet every single day trying to find something that I could do. I knew that I needed to find work before long. Outside of searching the internet, my days were pretty much empty.
I am not one to sit around with nothing to do so during this time that I was pursuing another job, I found a hobby. I had dabbled in jewelry making all through my childhood and teen years making little baubles for my friends and family along the way. I love beads and I love the feeling I get when I gaze upon some beautiful necklace or bracelet. Jewelry has always been something that has the power to speak to my soul. I picture myself somewhere else when I see a beautiful piece. It is like it has a will and a soul of its own. I took up this hobby once more, but with more determination. I made necklaces and earrings and before long, I had accumulated many pieces. In June of 2009, JKC Creations was born.
I still needed to find a full time job, as this jewelry thing was definitely not enough to pay the bills; after all it was just a hobby. I continued my quest to find a job on the internet but in doing so, I found something else. As I was searching for a new path, I became bored. I began to look at jewelry pictures trying to spur some creative juices. While doing this I came across a ring. It was one of the coolest rings I had ever seen! I gazed at it, totally intrigued by the design and the elements used. It was made with wire and I had never seen anything like it! I immediately knew that I had to have this ring. I didn't want to 'own' it, I wanted to 'create' it!
I left my desk and went straight to my jewelry bench. I had some wire that I got a while back for scrapbooking projects. I took that wire out and I created that ring. I loved the way it looked and I loved what working with the wire did for my inner self. I immediately began to scour the internet in search of more designs. I found so many things that spoke to me. I was totally engulfed in a world that lit a fire in my soul. I had to find someone that could teach me this artistic talent that I was so drawn to. That is when I came across wire-sculpture.com and Dale 'Cougar' Armstrong. She could teach me what I so desperately needed to learn. Wire Sculpture was selling Dale's DVD series at the time. I purchased every single one of them and immediately began teaching myself this incredible art form, with aid of Dale right in front of me on my computer screen. Right then and there, I became a self taught wire artist.
During the time that I was looking for a new career I honed my skills as a wire artist, always striving to do more and get better at the craft. I broke away from the patterns and started my own thing. I taught myself to weave wire designs and that is when I combined the techniques of weaving with the techniques of wrapping. From that moment forward I began creating pieces with my very own style, a style that I love.
Little did I know that this little hobby of mine was going to take on a life of its own. I was approached by a friend telling me about a local craft fair and that I should really try to get in it and sell my stuff. I had never done this before but one thing was for certain, I had a lot of jewelry! I took that friend's advice and I signed up. I didn't sell much, but I got my feet wet. I signed up for a couple more of them. I sold more, but still not enough to pay the bills.
I went back to work full-time in June of 2010. I had to get a job that could help with the family. Something happened to me though, that part of me that felt incomplete was no longer there. I had found what my soul was longing for all those years when I was at, what I thought was, my career that I loved.  Creating jewelry with wire is what my soul was craving all along. I cannot ever give it up.
I kept on with the wire creations, opening my Etsy shop in 2011. Since that time, I have been trying to hone my marketing skills and my online presence. I honed my wire artist skills and became brave enough to submit a piece to wire-sculpture.com to become the Wire Artist of the Month for March, 2012. Since my early days I have learned to master the craft fair, selling my items at several every year. I am still working full time at a real job, but my dream is to someday quit and be a jewelry artist full time instead.
Creating jewelry and implementing a business is a difficult thing to do with no one to guide me. I sometimes feel alone in my endeavor, but it is not enough to stop me. I don't know that I have ever been so passionate about anything as I am JKC Creations. I strive every day to do something productive in hopes that I can improve my business and create something wonderful for myself and my family by doing so. Tim and Lisa have been instrumental in putting the pieces in place even more to pursue this dream. I am part of the Maker's Movement, as Lisa calls it, and I am determined to be successful!
The 'Build a Better Creative Business Course' has given me more tools to add to my arsenal. Tim and Lisa believe in me and what I can bring to the table. Lisa says that to deny the world of my talent would not be beneficial for anyone so therefore, I will never deny the world. I have some new friends on my side and the loneliness has retreated one more step into the shadows. I plan to incorporate more of what I am learning in the next few months and build my business even more. I thank my lucky stars every single day for the social networks. Without them, I would have never found Tim or Lisa or any of the other people that I plan to let into my life in the near future.
Thank you Lisa Jacobs and Tim Adam for what you have given me during this course. I plan to take it to the next level and I hope that you will check in once in a while to have a look and see the changes that I will be incorporating. You guys helped me to see that I can take my purpose to another level and I can do what I feel in my heart I was intended to do. With sincerest appreciation, thank you!
If you have a creative business and you would like some guidance, please check out Handmadeology. If you ever have the chance to learn from Tim or Lisa, I would highly recommend it. They can teach you things that you didn't even know you were missing out on. They truly are in my corner, and I believe they would be in yours too.
I am continuing to implement the things that I have learned in this course. It will take some time, but I know that I am heading in the right direction. I plan to be more on schedule with the tasks at hand and I have put my Etsy shop at the front of the list. Once I have implemented the changes that I want to incorporate there, I will move to my blog and other places that I have an online presence. I am implementing small steps for right now, but I hope to be on track and have a better schedule soon. Until then, I hope that you will hang in with me as I strive to make JKC creations better than it has ever been.
And now I would like to show you what inspires a lot of my creative thoughts and designs. I would like to take you into a world that I never really leave. It is a place where my thoughts reside a lot of the time. I am not really sure why this is, perhaps I am a being that is unequivocally attached in some fashion to this long ago era in our history. What ever it is, I have an invisible line that draws me back in time to this...The Daily Wire Transfer.