Today it is excruciatingly cold and I would rather spend the afternoon on the couch curled up with Angus and watching Kids in the Hall reruns. Alas there is always something to do (those goblets I posted about a few weeks ago? Some should be on Etsy before too long) and I’d been meaning to do some ’splaining about the quantity of vases and shot glasses.
After completing all (well, most) of my holiday items, gifts, and orders I decided to reevaluate my production process and business model, as it were. Leading up to the holiday rush I devoted most of my time and energy to unique (and time consuming) angular vases and spoon rests. And while the spoon rests were popular, there is a limit as to what one can reasonably charge for a utensil holder and still expect to sell, no matter how funky and peculiar. I also began thinking about the quantity of work (both in amount and value) I could produce in a week. Considering each item requires two firings (bisque and glaze) I could run on average 3 kiln cycles a week. (On the seventh day the kiln rested.) Considering the foot space of the spoon rests I could only fit 4 and possibly 5 in the kiln, meaning 12-14 per week if that was all I was worried about. But that doesn’t make for many listings on Etsy, and if I want to sell X amount of items in either quantity or value I need to produce that same amount per week.
So from a numbers standpoint I haven’t been producing enough or at least not enough to have new listings everyday. I need something tall and skinny and looking back on previous items I’ve made the obvious ones were vases and shot glasses. I began posting these last week and will add new/different/unique designs in the weeks to come. I am also creating other similarly shaped (tall and skinny) objects - the aforementioned goblets, tall vases, and perhaps some redesigned ring/jewelry holders. The main limitation is the size of my kiln: about 8″ x 8″ x 9″ tall. Whatever I can fit into that space in significant quantities (meaning at least 9 pieces) will be attempted.
Will this work - will more items mean more sales? I guess we’ll see. In this economic environment I’m not getting my hopes up, but one has to try.
(I used a lot of parentheses in this post.)
