Success at the 'Fest!!!

Up to this point, most of our sales have come through our website or through the shops in Berea and Lexington that sell our pieces. Last year, our only face-to-face, direct-to-the-public sales venue was Downtown Lexington Corporation's Artist's Market. Even though we only set up a few Saturdays (and did fairly well on those Saturdays), we learned quite a bit about presentation and merchandising. It also gave us the opportunity to interact with clients and potential clients, some of which have since become very good friends, and get immediate feedback about our work.

A year has gone by now--we've refined our art bead and jewelry making process and have added several new collections to our work, including art glass.

This year, our first show was the Downtown Lexington Corporation's Mayfest. Based on our experience with last year's Artists' Market, we set some pretty lofty goals for ourselves, based especially on how many attendees we heard that Mayfest drew in the past. One would think that taking place during the same weekend that Mother's Day falls would hurt attendance. But not with Mayfest. The attendance was overwhelming--even recordbreaking. Response to our work was equally overwhelming--so much so that by the event's second day, we started to wonder if we'd made enough pieces. We easily surpassed our own expectations.

It's still difficult to describe the feeling of pride and accomplishment that we get when our handmade art bead and art glass jewelry pieces are complimented on and purchased by the general public. It's humbling when a customer pays their hard-earned money for our jewelry pieces--especially in today's economy.

Not only did we have two great days and meet a wonderful bunch of new friends and clients, but, to make things better, as a result of being there, we were also invited to be in two other upcoming shows--The Pig Day Festival on June 20th at Lexington's Jacobson Park and the Winchester Lions Club's Octoberfest on October 2nd and 3rd.

The very best part though was being able to share the entire experience with Mackenzie and Matthew. They loved the pony rides! Mackenzie was on Beetlejuice and Matthew was on Snowball. A great, great day! Can't wait to come back next year!

By the way, Downtown Lexington's 2009 Artist's Market is coming up and we'll be there.

Location: The Lexington Financial Center (the big blue building!) on Main Street across from Cheapside Park.
Dates and Hours: Every Saturday, June 6 - August 29, 2009, 8am to 2pm. (Exception: There will be no Artists Market on Saturday, July 4)