Is it just me or have the last two months flew by?
I can't believe it is already May...where is this year going? Things have been pretty busy on the Holy Noley front so I thought I would take this post to look back at what has been happening!
March : Craft Fair Crazy / Happy Birthday Holy Noley!
March started out with me preparing some fun things to celebrate the one year anniversary of opening Holy Noley. I scheduled a giveaway and a coupon code to say thank you for all of the support I have received in the last year. It has been such an awesome experience travelling on this path and I can't believe it has already been a year! Not only am I so much happier now that I am pursuing something that was a dream of mine, but I am also so changed by the experiences that I have had. As cliche as it sounds, I would not be the person I am today if I had not decided to walk down this road.
I also did two craft fairs in March, but since I had over-prepared for my first one back in November I wasn't as stressed this time around. Plus I had the help of Bri's sister and my sister so I was super thankful for that. The fairs were back to back weekends and once it was time for the first one, I felt more than prepared to tackle it.
Weekend one was very slow, but overall it was a slow fair for everyone so I found a little consolation in that. Even though sales were slow, I met a bunch of people and you know what they say about connections! It was a good learning experience too because it brought my expectations a little lower and I learned a bit about staging my booth as well.
Weekend two was busier, I had a better location (right in front of a door so I received traffic twice) and because of this, I staged my booth accordingly. I did better sales wise but I made more connections and gave out more business cards, which I feel can be more important.
Overall the two weekends were only slightly profitable but it definitely helped me realize how much more selective I need to be about the fairs that I want to participate in. I also feel like I gained more insight into what sells in person, so in the future I will be able to better prepare what inventory I will bring. I tried to just chalk it all up to it being a learning experience which is important in small business.
April : Arizona Bound
Bri and I planned our first solo vacation for this month, so for the first half of the month I was focused on tying up all the loose ends on that. I came to two realizations during this time of not really focusing on Holy Noley in lieu of vacation planning.
The first was that I needed to redo all of my product photos. I felt like they weren't consistent and didn't show off the best features of the jewelry. And since I have a better camera than what I had the last time I decided to do this, I felt like it was a good idea. As of this post, I have re-shot about 75% of the pieces and only have the necklaces left to do. Splitting them and redoing them based on type of item seemed like the best method to getting it all done without losing my mind.
The second was that I was finally focusing in on my "style" of jewelry. I love crystal healing stones but sometimes find that wire wrapping can be too much. I strive for my design to be more minimalist and simple. I want to highlight the natural beauty of the stone, not necessarily the intricate nature of the wire work. So going forward my jewelry style will be more in line with this..,at least for now. Who knows what the future holds, I may end up changing again!
The second half of the month was our trip and boy was it beautiful! Of course because there are so many mines out there, crystals were everywhere! I ended up coming home with a backpack full of stones - both purchased and ones that I had collected on our daily hikes. I'm looking in to purchasing a rock tumbler to see if any of the ones that I found can be shined up!
Overall it has been a busy few months for Holy Noley. I cannot wait to see what the next month holds! What are you looking forward to for May?
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