Forest Flower is growing...

Been having a bit of a play with the Folksy shop this week. In the light of a couple of recent trade enquiries I realised I needed to adjust my prices a bit to take their necessary discount into account and not loose money on my makes. 

Putting a price on your handcrafted items is always a difficult one - you need to take into account the cost of your materials, your time taken to make the item and lets not forget the fact that generally it is something unique and special and unlike anything you'd find on the high street. Sadly a lot of people (usually non-crafters) are so used to paying peanuts for imported, mass-produced items they lose sight of the fact that each of your handcrafted goods were designed and made with love, care and attention and that this means time and time equals money - as much as I love making my stuff and love seeing people walk away with a bag of goodies and a smile on their faces, I have to put food on the table just like the next person...

A case in point... last weekend we had a little stall at a local free music festival - a family event that combined music, dance, workshops and street entertainment. I was up till 1am the night before making sure all my goods were properly labelled and ready to go. We spent a good hour setting up our stall making the most of our small space, trying to make it look as eye catching as possible...

Unfortunately for us the stall next door was being run by a (lovely) local business woman who was selling very cheap, pretty costume jewellery, imported from China. There was just no way we could compete with her on pricing and as punters were generally working their way down the line from her stall to ours inevitably the mutterings of - 'it's a bit expensive isn't it' were heard. As anyone who crafts to sell will tell you, it hurts that people show so little consideration for your time and effort...

 Now to be fair the whole event was advertised as a 'free' music festival and many visitors weren't there to spend money (although I suspect the pubs did a roaring trade that day...) but despite the beautiful weather and the good turn out we didn't even manage to cover the cost of our stall. Definitely a lesson to choose our events more carefully in future...

But back to my Folksy shop... I have updated the banner with my new flower logo and I think it looks much better - it's bright, fresh and simple. I have also updated my profile with a little help from a great Folksy Blog post that includes tips on what to include and some basic HTML tags.  I have adjusted my postage and packing charges (they are lower!) and also my prices (I hope the small increases don't put anyone off...)

Please take a look here and let me know what you think.