For aspiring artists — or at least for arts-and-crafts junkies looking to support their habits — it’s showtime.
Every December calendar is thick with holiday craft shows and bazaars, staffed by enthusiastic vendors, emerging from their basements and workshops to make a few bucks from their labors of love.
But the business world can be a cold place for the creative soul. That’s why The Columbian stopped by Saturday’s craft fair at the Clark County Historical Museum to get tips from 13 jury-selected vendors on how to close sales in the Christmas season.
• Offer a big range of prices. Though you’ll do most business on items under $25, show one or two big items, said woodcarver Richard Reay. It makes the other items feel less expensive, and people will be more motivated to support you if they’ve at least seen your best work.
• Don’t put too much on your table. Be like a fancy restaurant, not a suitcase ring salesman: don’t swamp your patrons with choices. "If there’s too much, people don’t really see what I have," artist Harmony Roselli said.
• Find a way to make it useful, whatever your medium. "Put it on a pin, a card, a calendar or a journal," said Denise Long, a graphic artist. "People have plenty of stuff on their wall."
• Make something funny. "I think sometimes art has got this too-serious reputation," said Michael Hem, who sold out Saturday of his five big-eyed, finger-size clay slugs, $5 each. "The slugs had an element of whimsy to them."
• "Earrings, earrings, earrings, earrings." That’s jewelry designer Ruth Mabrey’s Christmas-season motto. Other vendors, including Lee Ann Gauthier, agreed: as a gift, the earring is recession-proof. "It’s shiny," Gauthier said.
• Watch the fashion trends. Even holiday bazaar shoppers are influenced by what’s hip. Jewelry maker Cirith Anderson-Sebree visits Nordstrom and Macy’s before she designs new items.
• Team up. Anderson-Sebree and Mabrey design, craft and sell their jewelry separately, but share a table at two shows a year, and talk about once a month year-round to exchange honest critiques and compare inventory. "It helps to have somebody push and inspire me," Anderson-Sebree said. "I’m relying on her; she’s relying on me."
• Have something to say about every item. When someone compliments something on your table, be ready with something more than "thanks," said Casey Newman, who stitches coffee sleeves, baby hats and coin purses from recycled sweaters. "I like buying things that have a story," Newman said.
Madya Panfilio, who makes Lewis-and-Clark-themed glass boxes, photographs of flowers and castles and glitter-lined photographs, agreed.
"You reach, perhaps, the artist within them," Panfilio said. "We’re all artists. It’s just a matter of what you perceive yourself to be."
Michael Andersen: 360-735-4508 or michael.andersen@columbian.com.
