Etsy Teams

Part of the incredible community that makes up Etsy are the street teams. There are different goals depending on the type of team, which is a very diverse mix in itself. They are grouped by geography, genre, philanthropy, etc....whatever makes sense for a group of people who are all dedicated to the same cause. In the month of January the "Etsy Team Tips" include promoting other teams. Since my team, SFEtsy, was interested in participating, we were paired with FEST (Florida Etsy Street Team) - here is their BLOG. In order to create visibility for their team I created a Treasury for them called "A Big Shout Out to FEST". Since the treasury is a fluid, rotating tool I'm copying a picture here for you to see.

Promoting other Etsy shops and teams is a great way to get to know fellow artists, increase awareness about buying handmade goods, and building a bigger and better community.

Oh the Storms!

Here we are in the middle of winter, trying to accomplish things like attending an SFEtsy gathering, but alas, the weather prevented most of us from getting to the coast. My intentions were good and I definitely planned on being there. I packed up my appetizer, a sampling of my jewelry, and plenty of business cards and off I went. My first stop was actually the Brocade bridal show in Milpitas - reason being is that I am going to be a vendor at the show in Pleasanton on February 10th and wanted to check out the vendors and see how they set up their booths. After running in and out I was back on the road with GPS set to guide me over to the northern coast. The weather was in what I would describe as a "holding pattern". It wasn't as frightful as the night before where the winds were about 100mph with heavy rain, so I figured that I would ignore the road debris and just make the best of it. Highway 280 north was clear and easy to navigate providing that I wasn't speeding, and after exiting onto highway 92 I felt that I was in good shape and almost there. I climbed to the summit at which point there were a number of flairs and a police officer directing people to drive south on Skyline blvd. due to the other side of 92 being closed. Relying foolishly on my GPS I followed the crowd, turned south on Skyline, and was "told" that in 6 miles I could turn right on "County Road". Well when I arrived at County Road it looked more like a logging road going into a forest. At this point I decided that the only destination that made sense was "home", so I punched in the updated destination and my GPS then took me through Woodside and south to home. It was an adventure and I was sorry that I missed not making it to the SFEtsy gathering, but it appears that there weren't many other members able to get there either so better luck next time and hopefully the weather won't prohibit us from meeting each other.

Treasury Countdown

The Etsy Treasury is sort of like an online auction except that you are waiting for each of the individual treasuries to expire so that you might be the lucky one to post a new group of Etsy items. Typically they have some sort of theme covering a number of topics or causes. I was lucky enough to get two in the recent past: the first one included my fellow SFEtsy street team members and the second one had a cowboy theme. As of this moment I have 4 hours and 10 minutes to wait until another group of treasuries open for grabs. My theme for this one is "I believe in PINK". UPDATE: The fight against breast cancer is something that always lies in the back of my mind and as of now is a daily topic because I'm a recent survivor. I'll have to create another post soon covering this lengthy topic that could go in many directions...back to the Treasury. There are many cool themes and I can spend lots of time surfing the numerous topics and items. Sone of the benefits I've found about spending time in the Treasury is that you can gain visibility by posting messages to the curator, and also heart sellers and items so if you aren't ready to shop at that particular point you have the items saved to your favorites. Have fun and enjoy the creative themes.

It's Official

Well today I started my blog and now feel more official. This is just a little piece of me that feels "baked" because even though my jewelry is out of the starting gate, and friends tell me "you've done it!", I still feel like I'm weeding through the process and channel of how to sell and what to focus on. Time always tells the truth and this will also be the case regarding my jewelry business and livelihood. With a little luck and a lot of drive I'm confident that I will get exactly what I want and what is meant to be. This is a photo of my son and I recently.