Multiple shops? Or expand in Sections? Descisions, descisions.
Hi All,
We are at the point where we want to start parting with our hoard of vintage, collectible and antique items. Also, my wife is getting comfortable enough in her jewelry making to start selling on-line.
I am primarily a worker of wood, as is evident viewing my Zibbet shop. But, I am curious to hear opinions on expanding into the vintage and jewelry realms.
Should I stick with the DustyNewt brand and revamp my banner, avatar and logo, then add the appropriate sections to my shop? Or, should I start from scratch with a new shop for each?
I am leaning toward the uni-shop as it would make it easier to maintain and allow me more workshop time (which is in short supply now). I already maintain a DustyNewt presence on Etsy, ArtFire and Ebay, as well as a host of related entities. I don't want to become a "webmaster" and forego any more shop time than I am now.
I would love to hear advice from ya'll, especially those maintaining two or more shops in any one venue.
Peace in Wood, Scott
We are at the point where we want to start parting with our hoard of vintage, collectible and antique items. Also, my wife is getting comfortable enough in her jewelry making to start selling on-line.
I am primarily a worker of wood, as is evident viewing my Zibbet shop. But, I am curious to hear opinions on expanding into the vintage and jewelry realms.
Should I stick with the DustyNewt brand and revamp my banner, avatar and logo, then add the appropriate sections to my shop? Or, should I start from scratch with a new shop for each?
I am leaning toward the uni-shop as it would make it easier to maintain and allow me more workshop time (which is in short supply now). I already maintain a DustyNewt presence on Etsy, ArtFire and Ebay, as well as a host of related entities. I don't want to become a "webmaster" and forego any more shop time than I am now.
I would love to hear advice from ya'll, especially those maintaining two or more shops in any one venue.
Peace in Wood, Scott
Tags: branding, diversifying, expanding, expansion, jewelry, multiple, selling, shop, shops, vintage, More…
Views: 20
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by All About The Buttons on -
I get crazy with clutter in my shop. I have varied things from clocks to hats to bookmarks with the tie in being buttons, usually. If you have very organized sections, which is easy to do here, I'd start out keeping just the one shop BUT if it expands too fast and is too varied, maybe a 2nd shop is the way to go. Yes, it's more work but cleaner IMHO. I have 2 on etsy and wish I had done that here but frankly don't want to spend more $ at this time.
Re-reading this, I'm thinking I haven't helped at all!
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Permalink Reply by DustyNewt on -
All input helps. Thank you ma'am! I don't want to clutter up what is already working with stuff I am unsure will go, but the money thing is a consideration. ~ Peace in Wood, Scott
All About The Buttons said:I get crazy with clutter in my shop. I have varied things from clocks to hats to bookmarks with the tie in being buttons, usually. If you have very organized sections, which is easy to do here, I'd start out keeping just the one shop BUT if it expands too fast and is too varied, maybe a 2nd shop is the way to go. Yes, it's more work but cleaner IMHO. I have 2 on etsy and wish I had done that here but frankly don't want to spend more $ at this time.
Re-reading this, I'm thinking I haven't helped at all!
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Permalink Reply by LOC Design Studio (Vicki) on -
I have three shops, each with it's own theme. Like Barbra, I don't like clutter. For me, Barbra's Zibbet shop is not cluttered. She offers a variety of different types of items but they all have the central theme of "buttons" which works and holds it all together.
There's nothing wrong with an all in-one-shop. However, for me personally I find that type of shop a bit overwhelming and rarely venture past the FP. To see jewelry and soap and supplies, etc all on the same FP is confusing to me.
As far as promoting, I think it's easier to promote themed shops than it would be for all-in-one shops. I would think that you would have to work extra hard at promoting each type of item and that branding would be more difficult.
Just MHO...
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Permalink Reply by Melissa on -
With Etsy it's easy to do 2 shops since there's no monthly fee.
I have 2 shops on Artfire for my separate items (jewelry and scrapbooking)... but paying for 2 fees with no sales is getting to be too much.
I have 1 shop on Zibbet and I'm going to be adding everything to 1 shop. (my scrapbook stuff is a thing that once it's sold I'm done with that line)
So if you can afford the monthly fees you should separate them, otherwise do what ever you can to get your items sold and make money.
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Permalink Reply by Portable Graffiti Graphics Judy on -
Scott
I had combined shops to start here.
Vintage and supplies
Buttons
Graphics
I didn't like how it looked.
Portable Graffiti has been selling buttons since 1979 under that name, and listing my "junk" aka vintage stuff on the same shop made it look....well junky.
Although I did sell this one vintage item on the button shop, before I moved all the vintage over to it's own shop.
http://www.zibbet.com/PortableGraffiti/artwork?artworkId=17730
I also tried combining the graphics and buttons and that didn't work right either.
I recommend separate shop.
Judy
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Permalink Reply by Jess Telford (Zibbet Developer) on -
Keeping a good brand name is essential to the online world, so I'd definitely suggest keeping that going along side your other venues.
But don't think that you can't open up a second shop because you're locked into the brand - try a shop name something like DustyNewtVintage, it keeps the brand going but clearly divides the items you're selling, then link to your other shops via the Front Page description.
You can setup a second Basic seller's account for free and see how it goes - if it gets too much and you want to go back to one shop, you wont have lost any money and may have picked up a few tips/tricks along the way for organisation.
Whatever your choice, it's great to see you're expanding and really taking a firm grip on selling online, I'm sure it'll work out well for you!
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Permalink Reply by NIFTYKNITS (Heather) on -
What Jess says!
I have Niftyknits
but the last two are just sitting waiting for me to do something with them (including which to go with!)
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Permalink Reply by UmeOrigami (Origraphix) on -
Heya Scott -- I've been starting to consider the whole thing as well (for me it is origami and graphics), and I am opting to have two separate shops. However, like Jess suggested, the second one is going basic for now. I just cannot afford it any other way.
So to keep things unified, I have "ume origami" and the new shop is "origraphix" which keeps the "origami" part in both. I dabbled with the idea of "ume graphics" but I didn't like how it sounded. But for me, DustyNewtVintage or DustyNewtJewelry both sound fine for what you are wanted to do!
I get turned off with too much clutter. It may be just me, but the front page should represent something cohesive. One way to do this if you want to stick with one shop is with the rearrange feature. As I started to incorporate different kinds of origami, I can organize them into columns if I wanted so that they look neat despite being diverse.
Can't wait to see what you come up with regardless!
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Permalink Reply by DustyNewt on
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Thanks to everyone for their input. Ya'll have helped me imagine my front page with my handmade wooden items mixed with Arbabia Finland, Disney stuff and copper concho earrings and I shuttered at the sight. Even slight, controlled chaos makes me nervous. I'd be a terrible politician.
So, I think we will start with 25 items in a "basic" DustNewt Vintage shop and see how it goes. The DustyNewt Jewelry shop should follow (when Julie is happy with ten of her items). Each shop has different needs than my "made to order" keychain shop, I believe this will be the best choice for now, for Zibbet anyway. I may follow this plan through in my Etsy, and ArtFire accounts as well. We'll see. Ebay is..., well... Ebay.
Peace in Wood,
Scott
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Permalink Reply by Diane Svete-Noxon on -
I haven't even started on my second shop here but it will be under a different venue of vintage items that are not related to clothing and jewelry that I now have. I like a little order and boundary's.
I definitely like the idea of a second shop for your Wife based upon the aforementioned reasons of order and boundary's. It's a hectic life selling online. A bit of clearly defined categories serves to make things a little easier!
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Permalink Reply by Running Garlic on -
I haven't even gotten that far along (yet) where I need to add another shop, but in the same thinking I used this approach on my blogs. My primary RunningGarlic blog was for writing about gardening and then delving into recipes, but I also started to create crafty items and talk success and motivation. So I created a second blog RunningGarlicDesigns to deal with all that. I figured people are looking for one topic say gardening and keeping that main topic separate was wise since these are generally two different types of audience - they can easily go read the other blog which is shown on each blog. Also the idea of different target audiences is a main issue - I want to attract gardeners, cooks, motivation and fitness (yet another area of interest) and I don't want to jam it all into one blog - it will confuse me and the reading audience. Have to keep my mind uncluttered so I can think clearly!!!
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Permalink Reply by Rebecca West on -
I have also been trying to make this decision, and after reading all of this, I'm going with a basic second shop and will consider premium for it after I see how it goes. Jewelry is such a saturated market, but I believe my soap and jewelry needs to be separated Clutter has taken over my life long enough, and it's time to knock it out!! Thank you all for all the discussion it's helped me a lot!
Becky
http;//www.rwestdesigns.com
http://www.zibbeters.blogspot.com
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