Learning Curves and Listings

New ventures require being stretched. Would you agree? To go out on a limb to  do what you love and hope to make a living from it is a scary thing. I think it takes balls and you cannot allow negative thoughts to influence you. No, no.. not good.

When I listed my first few items on my little shop not so very long ago, I crossed a huge (to me) chasm. And when I got my first couple of sales shortly after, I was encouraged. It motivated me to move forward. I'm pressing on! It's been a slow process at times because other demands have gotten in the way but I'm sticking to it. 

Do you know there are over 19 million items for sale on Etsy? Daunting, isn't it?  But I won't be discouraged (she said with fear and trembling) I can't let that kind of competition intimidate me. Nope. Besides, I have friends in high places. That's a faith statement!

I think I have some cool stuff. I just need to share it with a wider audience. I have my "fan" facebook account. Not much happening there (yet). I'm trying to make good with twitter but I never use it, otherwise. It's fluff to me. And some items get posted on Pinterest. I love that Etsy allows you to pin items to your boards with links to your shop.

I've not been at it that long. It will take time and I have that. I feel I've barely touched the surface considering how much stuff I've acquired. I have a lot of work ahead of me but I just love the quest of finding gems amongst the junk.

I did it!

This post is so seriously late.

I have finally launched my Etsy store! I only talked about it for.. oh, a year or more (definitely more) but that's so yesterday. Why look back? 

I also started a Facebook 'fan' page and sent invitations to all my peeps. I don't have hundreds and hundreds of 'friends' so the idea of them sharing with friends and so forth was a bit naive on my part. 

And then there's Pinterest. I've yet to link items to my store. I'm sure it's easy to figure out.

Is it not Murphy's law to finally get everything up and running and then suddenly get bombarded with all manner of things not related to what you know you need to be working on?

OK.. so we got a puppy. It's like having a child (I think) and I'm often tending to one incident or another. Can you see the difference in the two photos? They're taken 3 weeks apart. 

I also have a sudden trickle of freelance work as I've taken on a couple of clients with one of them having the potential to get very busy. And I committed to doing a rural postal route, filling in for 5 weeks of vacation time. That's not happened yet but it's in the works. Yikes! I'm sure it's all good.

I thought I'd be free to just list and list and list. Funny. It takes a lot longer than I realized. Well, I kinda had an idea but I want to be very accurate with my descriptions and good photos are mandatory and researching what items actually SELL for... not what they're listed for. I've already enjoyed a few sales which is very encouraging as they came shortly after launching my store.

This blog was intended to serve as a marketing tool. I better get on it, then and keep it updated.  

Fab Vintage Milch Handbag Score!

1950s/early 60s Milch alligator handbag. So chic.

It's been a long, cold winter but that hasn't stopped my quest for thrifting. I was suffering from a bit of cabin fever after the 'historic' blizzard last week that wasn't so historic in these parts, so I headed out to see if there were any treasures waiting to be found. 

I wandered into my no.1 spot. "It's Monday!," the manager exclaims, "We're not open. How'd you get in?" Ummm... through the front door that was unlocked. Sheesh! I knew they were closed on Mondays. Talk about getting my days mixed up. No biggie. I have the place across the street to browse in.

Overall, it's been a tad dull at my no.2 place for great finds but I thought I'd wander over to the purses for a look-see, cause you just never know. I saw the cutest black beaded purse with sparkly beaded flowers but I don't think it was vintage and I would never have an occasion to use it anyway. Besides, I don't like lugging around a purse. I find them cumbersome.

Then, I saw this brown vintage thing... uh, purse. Not my flavour but it was in good shape and so very vintage... 50s / early 60s. I bought it only because of it's age and condition. And most anything vintage in such good condition just makes me swoon.

Imagine my delight when my research led me to some sites that showed the potential value of my find.

It's a Milch alligator handbag and one such site selling exotic skin purses for a pretty penny has a Milch alligator purse, a different design but same era, with a $695 price tag! I emailed her to ask if she'd like to buy mine but she's not replied. Too bad. I know she would have made a great profit considering the price I had in mind. I'm so generous.