Turner from Florida

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Cindylee

Member
Joined
Oct 5, 2008
Messages
102
Location
Cape Coral, FL
Hello,

Since I have been lurking in the shadows long enough I thought I would introduce myself and say thank you for all the advice I have gathered by reading through countless threads. The experience you all share is wonderful. All of the tips and tricks really save time and resources.

A little about me, I retired last year and started turning more. It has been a good way to make gifts and goodies for family and friends for a number of years, but once I retired there wasn't anything keeping me out of the garage. It brings my partner and I so much joy that we decided to start our own business with my turnings. We love to camp and RV and we thought doing some craft fairs would be a great way to see the country and make a little extra cash. We have a new web site and we are still working out the bugs on that, but our main goal is to travel and do some small shows.

I followed a number of threads and have tried to stick to the advice given in those in starting up. We did a number of local small craft fairs and we were fortunate that we made our table fee each time. Nothing earth shattering just a few dollars over each time. We felt lucky that we were getting our name out in the community and not losing money doing it. We recently signed up for a bigger event with our Community Redevelopment Agency. They are holding a downtown street market one Saturday a month for 6 months.

We again feel blessed that we made our table fee for the entire 6 months in the first show and made several contacts. We were invited to come to two more craft fairs that are being held in town through different organizations. One of them is a juried show and if we make it past the jury it will obviously be our first. So I would like to get some advice from some of the veterans about displays and amount of product and such.

I hope to get to know some of you. You all seem like a great group of folks.

Thank you,

Cindylee
 
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Ligget

Member
Joined
Jan 13, 2005
Messages
13,474
Location
Bonnybridge, Scotland.
Welcome to the IAP Cindylee, there are many penmakers in here who do craft fairs regularly so I`m sure you will get all your questions answered.
 

djz9

Member
Joined
Nov 4, 2007
Messages
131
Location
Spring Hill, Fl, USA.
Welcome Cindy. Make sure you know the history of the wood you use if that is what your medium you work with. Tell them as much as you can when they come by, they eat that up . try not to just let them look and walk away marking things down.
 

cnirenberg

Member
Joined
Jan 26, 2004
Messages
2,700
Location
Fort Myers, Fl
Wow Dave you are in the Cape...That is awesome. We are over near Santa Barbara and Trafalgar area. Are you also a pen turner?

Cindy,
Apparently there are more of us than you may think. Before Rollerbob chimes in, we all may want to look at starting a local chapter/group up. There are 6 of us to my last count that are IAP members, (superdave, you, me, mredburn, kruzzer and akbar24601) with 1 on the way (hurry up already, Chuck(Dalecamino)). This may not be the forum to discuss all of this but now you know.
 

Super Dave

Member
Joined
May 4, 2009
Messages
867
Location
Cape Coral FL
Cindy, I live off Santa Barbara & 37th Terr. I would like to get together sometime to compare our turnings. I have learned so much from the very talented people on this site. I would also be open to the idea of forming a local chapter of the IAP

Dave
 

leehljp

Member Liaison
Joined
Feb 6, 2005
Messages
9,314
Location
Tunica, Mississippi,
Welcome Cindylee. Great name by the way! :biggrin: I know you have a great deal of experience and you have been reading much of the info here. However, I don't want to leave you out of the normal welcome with the links to some good articles (that you probably have already read.)

Below are links to two threads/articles that have lots of information on pen turning. The first one is a very basic overview of the many aspects of getting into turning pens.
http://www.penturners.org/forum/showthread.php?t=42446

The second link has postings by different pen turners and what they wish they had known earlier:
http://www.penturners.org/forum/showthread.php?t=46654


Here is another link - a PDF on the acronyms used here. While confusing to new turners, it sure helps abbreviate a lot of repetitive typing.

http://content.penturners.org/articles/2009/Acronyms.pdf


IF you have the chance, meet up with Dave. He has lots of tips and ideas. Although he has only been posting here since May and his post count is not real high, it is easy to tell from the ones that he does post that he is knowledgeable on the lathe and with many kinds of wood too!
 

ed4copies

Local Chapter Manager
Joined
Mar 25, 2005
Messages
24,523
Location
Racine, WI, USA.
WELCOME!!!!

First and foremost, have fun!!

After that, maybe you can "make a buck or two".

Juried shows can vary widely. Some, you are "in" if your check clears, others you really do have to impress them with your application.

The picture(s) of your booth setup are important to getting you a good location. Most promoters want their "best" booths at the beginning of the show. So, try to get some good pics of your booth (set it up at home, if you must).

Product pictures are also important. Make reference to something the judges will understand. "Same madreperlato used by high-end pen companies, made in Italy" adds an air of elegance to your "hand-made" products.

Also, I like to indicate that we DO have products in the $20 gift range, for more "crafty" shows and we make writing instruments that are "one of a kind" for the "artsy" shows.

Hope this helps,
Did I mention, HAVE FUN!!!
 

Rollerbob

Member
Joined
Apr 26, 2009
Messages
1,601
Location
Athens, Texas
Cindy,
Apparently there are more of us than you may think. Before Rollerbob chimes in, we all may want to look at starting a local chapter/group up. There are 6 of us to my last count that are IAP members, (superdave, you, me, mredburn, kruzzer and akbar24601) with 1 on the way (hurry up already, Chuck(Dalecamino)). This may not be the forum to discuss all of this but now you know.

And your delay is??:biggrin: BTW, welcome to the forum Cindy, you might need to nudge these guys a bit to start a local chapter. I assure you they are a great bunch!!:wink:
 

CSue

Local Chapter Leader
Joined
Jan 16, 2007
Messages
2,368
Location
Laveen, AZ, USA.
Welcome Cindylee! I''m on the other side of the continent in sunny southern California. Theres lots of stuff on showing and selling in the "Marketing and Showing" forum.
 
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