I was going through some old information I had gathered for my business when I found this article on how doing arts and crafts makes people healthier.  In this time of economic uncertainty and worry we could all use better health.

Other ways that arts and crafts make these times better for us all. They give us a job and income that only we control (job security). They also give our local economy a boost as the more money we make selling arts and crafts the more money our city, county, and state will have circulating in it. So buy local handcrafted items and enjoy selling them for your health.

Can Quilting Really Promote Good Health?

May 2005 – La Mesa, California – Around the world, there is an increasing awareness of the health benefits derived from participating in various forms of art.

In hospitals across the US, doctors, nurses and patients are discovering that participation in the arts – including quilting, dancing, listening to music, and working with beads, clay and collages – is beneficial to the healing process, and in staying healthy. As a matter of fact, last year more than 300 health and arts professionals gathered in Alexandria, Virginia for the 13th annual conference of the Society for the Arts in Healthcare (SAH). This group is slated to meet in Alberta, Canada in June 2005, and will combine its conference with Partners in Healthcare.

Stories abound of patients suffering from cancer, ALS, Diabetes and stress-related diseases, whose recovery has benefited tremendously from their participation in various forms of art. Once considered on the fringe of healthcare, the arts are being used by a growing number of healthcare institutions around the globe. Here in the US, the University of Washington Medical Center uses art in its entrance to create a friendly, welcoming environment and reduce the stress of actually walking in to their hospital. Quilts, paintings, sculpture and musicians scattered throughout the hospital continue the theme of relaxation and reflection through art.

Frequently patients are given directions to offices or labs with references to sculptures or the Healing Garden. Nurses are known for taking a piano break, and providing soothing live music in the corridors. Artists work with patients teaching them new art skills so the patients can express themselves creatively during their stay in the hospital.

And what’s the Quilting Connection?

The Society for the Arts in Healthcare sponsors the Healing Gardens Quilt Show, a collection of 27 quilts made by Northern Virginia Quilters. These quilts are currently on tour and available for members to display in their healthcare facility. Each quilt depicts a plant currently under study or being used as a potential source of cancer-fighting drugs. This display uses art to educate people about a healthcare issue.

While men and women find joy in making “happy” quilts – baby quilts, wedding quilts, graduation or friendship quilts – many find relief in making quilts that depict life’s tragedies such as divorce and death. A case in point is the AIDS quilt project which now contains more than 44,000 quilt panels; each panel memorializes the life of a person who died of AIDS.

And, if quilts and making quilts can be helpful in healing, won’t it be helpful in preventing illness?

It must! Advice from healthcare professionals around the world includes engaging in constructive, creative activities as well as contemplative activities. Quilting is all of that. During the planning and construction of a quilt, all of your contemplative and creative talents are tapped into. As a matter of fact, many quilters report that they get completely “lost” in their quilts time and time again, thereby providing relief from life’s stresses and promoting good health.

So, the next time your spouse or other family member asks you about your quiltmaking activities, just say “I’m doing it for my health!”

© 2005, Penny Halgren. Penny is a quilter of more than 24 years who hosts www.How-to-Quilt.com, Inspiration and Education for Beginning Quilters, and seeks to interest new quilters and provide them with the resources necessary to have a positive learning experience.

Don’t forget to to visit the Ridgway Arts & Crafts Rendezvous in Ridgway CO this Aug. 11 & 12, 2012.

Arts and crafts festival vendors contact Kentee Pasek at 970-318-0056 to reserve your booth now.  Remember to tell her thank you for listing her show with The Extravaganza Craft News.

Want more information on this and other art and craft fairs in Colorado each month subscribe to The Extravaganza Craft News at www.extravaganzacrafts.com.

What does Real Estate have to do with selling arts and crafts?

The way I see it your art or craft show booth is kind of like trying to sell a house. If you try to sell an empty house people can’t see in their minds what the house will look like when it’s all finished, painted, furnished, and decorated. You will also have a hard time trying to sell a house that is full of clutter, people can only imagine that the rest of the house hasn’t been taken care of well. They will see that the house will be too much work and cost too much money.

Your art or craft show booth is like selling your house. The booth will help your customers imagine using the product they have purchased from you. You have to do the imagining for them. How?

First you need to think about your product, who is it designed for, how and where will it be used? The answers to these questions should affect the theme and design of your booth.

Is what you’re selling for boys, girls, men or women? Is it for children, preteens, teens, young adults, or mature adults? Don’t present children’s items in an adult setting or adult item’s in a child like setting. Use colors that appeal to the ages you’re selling to. What ideas and themes appeal to them?

For instance fancy jewelry for teens might be presented as if at a prom, towel racks might be presented as in a high class hotel bathroom, and clothing needs to be presented as if it were in a fancy closet but also as outfits on the person.

When you created your product you had a vision of how people would use it, your booth is your opportunity to present them with that picture. Want to see pictures of art festival and craft show booths? Read Art and Craft Show Booth Display Pictures

Stage your booth just like you would a home that you were trying to sell. Imagine yourself as a customer walking into your booth. Critique and criticize as if you were the customer, ask friends and family to do the same. Ask for them to point out things that are distracting, look odd, and especially anything they feel is not safe.

1. There must be enough people interested in buying your arts and crafts.
2. You must be able to persuade people who are interested in your art to buy.

These are two very separate and distinct problems with different solutions.

First one needs to realize that to be very successful selling their handcrafted goods they must chose to create a craft that is wanted and needed by a large enough group of people to support the number of sales the artist needs per day, week, month or year.

Most artists choose which craft to sell based on which one they like to create the most, the one they get the most compliments on, or the one they like the best. This is actually backward and can be detrimental to your business ever succeeding.

Crafters spend too much time looking for those who want their crafts this way. Artists don't realize they are trying to make people who aren't even interested in their art not only like it, but buy it-a losing game to be sure. 

They are always looking for people interested in their handcrafted merchandise and have no real direction to look... instead of going to a group of people who are already interested in their crafts and trying to persuade them to buy.

It's like trying to tell your customers their favorite color is purple when really their favorite color is green. They aren't going to even want to stand around and listen.

Like trying to sell hand tatted doilies to every child, teen, and young single adult that comes near your booth rather than slightly more mature married adults and grandmothers.

Let's be honest here we can't make people like what they don't like or want. They just won't buy it and our time and money will be wasted in the effort.

If your artwork meets the needs of a large group of people but still seems like people aren't interested the problem may be:

• is the group of people who want, need, and like your product large enough?
  • one caveat here is that you want to target a very specific group of people. Get too generic and you go back full circle.
• are you targeting your prospects well in your advertising, marketing and offers?
• are they are willing to pay your price to get it?
• are you selling where your buyers are, where they are prepared to buy, when they are prepared to buy?

You can still succeed selling your artwork this way if

• there is a large enough group of people who want, need, and like your product.
• they are willing to pay your price to get it.
• you learn where your buyers are and go where your they are to sell your product.
• you don't mind that your business will be less profitable than it could be.

On the other hand persuading a person to buy your crafts when they are already interested is much easier. It requires many skills but most of them are small and can be learned over your career.

The skills you will need include:

• correctly pricing crafts.
• using signage and tags effectively.
• proper displays.
• learning to make small talk that draws out the needs of your buyer.
• recognize the needs of your customers from clues they give in conversation.
• not over selling or underselling -giving the customer just the right amount of information so they don't feel overwhelmed or that their questions haven't been answered.
• recognizing when a buyer is on the fence-knowing what will get them off the fence and on the buying side.
• using coupons, discounts, sales, samples, upsells and downsells effectively to persuade an undecided buyer. Read Do Sales and Discounts Hurt Craft Show Sales?
• staying in touch with and following up with customers so they will buy for the first time, make repeat sales, and refer you to others.
• using your business documents, fliers, business cards, to sell more handcrafted works of art.
• asking for the sale and calls to action.

The difference between trying to create interest in your crafts and persuading people to buy your crafts is: You won't be able to create an interest in your crafts where there is none! You will be much more successful trying to persuade a large group of people who want, need, or like your craft already to buy.

The way I see if people really aren't interested in buying your artwork you have 3 choices:

1. Go where people are interested in buying your crafts.
2. Find a craft they are interested in buying and sell it.
3. Find a job working for someone else.

What do you think?

“Your ability to discipline yourself to set clear goals, and then to work
toward them everyday, will do more to guarantee your success than any
other single factor.”
~Brian Tracy

How do you know if your craft show booth is successful if you haven’t defined what success means to you?

Does success mean money to you, if yes how much money? Does success mean time to spend with your family, how much time? Does it mean working fewer days and hours a week, how many hours a week is success to you? Does success mean working from a constant vacation-where, working from home, quitting your other job, or having a really great car -what kind? Does success mean talking to 100 people and getting the contact information for 25 so you can follow up with them?

Write down your goals for your handcrafted art and craft business. Define success for your craft show booth.

When you achieve your success who do you want to be there with you? Write it down.

Set goals both for your handmade craft business as a whole but don’t forget each time you are doing something for your craft show booth or business to define success for it. Remember if it’s not accomplishing something to help you reach your long term goal it is just a waste of time and money.

Haphazardly wandering through your business is like wandering aimlessly through the wilderness without knowing which peak you are trying to climb. You won’t ever reach the top if you don’t know where the top is. Choose a goal and know where it is then choose a path to get there.

Now choose a path that will take you to that place. Choose a narrowly defined path one that keeps you on track to achieving the goals you have set for your craft business. Wider paths can take you many places and are less likely to take you straight to your goals. Break down your large goal into the smaller more specific steps you can take to get there. Get out your calendar and write down 30 things you can do to help your business reach your goals. One on each day for the next month. See my series My 30 Day Plan to Greater Profitability to see some of my goals.

Your plan to reach your business goals is like your map to reach the top of the mountain. So choose your path to success and let everything you do for your craft business lead you to that goal.

Art and Craft Show Expert Shasta McLaughlin provides articles, hints and tips, checklists and more for artists and crafters that sell handcrafted products who want to save time looking for shows, packing for fairs, and get more sales at festivals. Now she is revealing how to collect your customers contact information, follow up with them and make more money while working less. Go to http://www.extravaganzacrafts.net to get her newsletter, The Extravaganza Craft News, that will help you avoid mistakes, save time and money when preparing your craft show booth.

Your customers won’t buy art from you if:

• They don’t know where to find you or your product.
• They aren’t prepared to buy now. For instance they weren’t expecting to see a product they wanted so they don’t have money right now.
• They don’t know what you are selling.
• You aren’t selling what they want.
• If your handcrafted product is hard to get, the wrong price or bad quality.
• You haven’t asked them if they would like to buy.

We were selling World’s Finest Chocolates as a fundraiser to earn our trip to Jamaica with ROC Wheels in March 2011.

The first day the kids sold chocolate bars, they sold very few. The next day more people knew they were selling them and several bought. The third day their sales increased again because people knew they could count on them having them and had their money together.

Problem: Not knowing it was available!

Solutions: Consistency, advertising, marketing your finished crafts to correct market, having a website or blog to show case your art work, email marketing.

One day my son took the chocolates to school. A child asked him if he had Mint Meltaways. He answered yes and was swarmed by kids who wanted the mints. They hadn’t bought before because they didn’t know he had them.

Problem: Not knowing what was available! Not offering enough variety.

Solutions: Better advertising and signage, having a website or blog, email marketing. Offering the right product to the right customer.

We arranged to sell the chocolates at a grocery store in town, set up a table and sat down to wait for our first customer. I noticed that although we were directly in front of the door many people walked right by or bought a product right next to us without even seeing we were there. When we asked if they could use chocolate for stocking stuffers many people checked out what we were selling.

Problem: Not knowing where to find you. Not knowing what you are selling.

Solutions: Consistency, better advertising and signage. Not being afraid to offer your product and ask for a purchase.

The favorite chocolate we are selling seems to be the caramel candy bar. Chocolate sales increase when we keep those in stock and decrease greatly when we run out. Some people will buy another variety, some won’t.

We noticed however that when we sold to a wider variety of people (at the store instead of the school) the different flavors all sold about the same.

Problem: Not selling what the customer wants.

Solutions: Find the right market for your product by selling to a different group of people. Change your product to meet the needs of the group you are currently selling to. Offer a wider variety of products or narrow your products to the ones your customers buy.

People at the store weren’t expecting to see us so they didn’t have a few dollars cash on hand. They usually went to buy groceries and came back with money to spend.

Problem: Customers aren’t prepared to buy now.
Solutions: Follow up through mail, email, a website or blog or even an occasional phone call. Remember just do it respectfully always giving the customer something they want for instance information they need, a discount, or even a special just for them.

One problem we didn’t face was resistance to price or quality. The problem is that a low price can give the idea that a product isn’t high quality, but if the price is too high customers won’t buy. The solution is to do your research and carefully set your price within a range the customer will pay. Decide if you want to have the lowest price, the highest price, or some where in the middle.

The Extravaganza Craft Productions would like to thank Montana Arts Council for publishing the article “Grow Your Business During Tough Economic Times” by Shasta McLaughlin in their November/December issue of State of the Arts.

The article contains suggestions that help you cut costs at craft shows and market your business to grow your craft show business during tough times.

View the article at http://svcalt.mt.gov/art/soa/pr.asp?ID=1289

Thank You Montana Arts Council!

Don’t forget to to visit Winterfest Arts & Crafts Festival in Evergreen, Colorado happening Nov. 12, 2011.

Arts and crafts festival vendors contact Becky Guy at 303-674-0056 to reserve your booth now.  Remember to thank Becky for listing her show with The Extravaganza Craft News.

Want more information on this and other art and craft fairs in Wyoming each month subscribe to The Extravaganza Craft News at www.extravaganzacrafts.com.