Making Progress

This past week I have continued to work on the online store. There was a setback - I was speaking with someone that I thought was going to be able to help me work out some technical issues but after a few rounds of back and forth she said she does not do what I am looking for. I know I can do anything I put my mind to, I was just looking for a hand to get products out to a variety of venues and selling more quickly this holiday season.

So I picked myself up and was determined to at least figure eBay and Etsy out this week. I was able to do so and cancelled ExportYourStore in the process. I tried them for a month but it was not working well and cost as much as Shopify. I am doing my best to keep things cost effective as I am currently paying for both Shopify and GoDaddy right now. Although the folks with the Etsy free app never got back to me, I decided to try it again and it is getting the listings created. With both eBay and Etsy through Shopify I do need to edit each item and make sure all of the values are correct. But what I can see is that once I make the changes, adding new items was not wiping the changes out on every product which is what was happening with GoDaddy.

Last night I shot improved photos and posted vintage Mexican, Southwest Style and new Native American pieces which were cycling off eBay and linked to GoDaddy. I also resurrected my Windy City Jewelry Etsy shop and posted two items there. I will not be able to directly link but I will deal with it - I want our handmade jewelry to be in a different shop and it was already set up.

I also started the process of manually adding the more than two years of blog posts to Shopify from GoDaddy. At this time posts through August 2021 are on Shopify. It is actually not as bad as I thought it would be, I will try and get 5-10 posts over to Shopify per day and I will be through them before I know it.

I also received my first Shopify order this week, this beautiful gaspeite, citrine and peridot ring by Navajo artist Bea Tom. The order came through eBay which is why it is so important for me to have these products listed on other venues. The goal one day is to have a big following so all I will need is the Shopify site.

It feels like I am in a bit of quicksand with the online store because I have not been able to create new products yet but it makes the most sense to get the products in place which have already been written up. My end of year goal is to get all of the information transferred from GoDaddy so I can cancel the online store subscription there. It has been a lot of work but it will be worth it in the end. Shopify is the go-to solution for so many online stores. I believe in the products I source and want to be right there with them.

We picked up a last-minute sale in Winnetka Thanksgiving weekend and the homeowner said we could bring in whatever we like. The plan is to send four large cases of fabulous jewelry from sterling silver to costume. There will be so many amazing gift ideas in a variety of price ranges. The home is a charming 1920s Craftsman on the east side of town and the sale is a great alternative to typical Black Friday shopping. As of now there are virtually no sales next weekend and we will welcome all of the estate sale shoppers with open arms! If there is enough from the household left to sell we will extend the sale to Cyber Monday as well. CLICK HERE for details, preliminary photos are on the ads right now and we hope to have updated photos Tuesday evening.

Mother and I (mostly Mother) have been working on the amazing jewelry collection for our Palatine sale which will be the weekend of December 2. There is the largest collection of Heidi Daus jewelry I have seen in a long time, along with many other great brands from HSN and QVC. I have a case of Heidi Daus that I have been selling this fall and it has been popular. The jewelry is very beautiful, antique/Art Deco-inspired sparkling with Swarovski crystals. In addition there will be lots of great sterling silver and costume jewelry rings in styles from fancy to Southwest. CLICK HERE for the ad, again preliminary photos are on hand but we are going to be working ahead at this home every day next week except for Thursday. I will send Kuochun over for photos as soon as everything is staged.

I helped Mother some more with her basement organization, she was getting overwhelmed with all of the minutia which needs to be squared away so I suggested we just bin it all up, get the furniture in place and then she can work on the details at her own pace. We moved the rest of the furniture in place and picked up the clutter off the floor. Mother is almost ready to have Dolly come out for an hour to get her new crafting tables and the headboard out of the garage and furniture moved out of the basement which will not be staying. I am going to take the vintage black wrought iron glass top dining table for the photography area of my basement. It will look nice with the black lacquer furniture I just got. I believe Mother has two of the dining chairs in Arizona but we will get them back at our next opportunity. The new guest mattress is on the way and once it arrives Dolly can bring it downstairs and set it up for us as well.

I took Mother to Marshalls near me to try and find bedding for the new bed. Amazingly we were able to find a vintage-style comforter that was the perfect match for these cherry sheets from Garnet Hill that she splurged on. Both Mother and Rachel are nuts for cherries. I realized that this was going to tie together the results of the paint color consultation Mother had a couple of months ago but she did not pursue because she was unsure of it. All Mother will need to do is make a throw pillow out of the barkcloth which was a possible inspiration for the room and it will look really nice not only for guests but when guests are not around. We were not able to put the bed in the separate room so it needs to be in the main area in full view of her work space.

Once again I ran out of time to post my jewelry purge last Sunday evening, I tried but it is a large purge so the photos took all evening. I definitely will post it this evening, all I need to do are the write-ups and it will be good to go. There are many wonderful vintage Native American pieces in this purge.

Until next time!