Magickal Realism

When my Bucza¹  was dying, we flew her sister Helen² come over from Poland to help care for her. In the process of helping Aunt Helen learn the basics of the area where her sister lived, my parents had to show her the post office, the pharmacy, and the grocery store. My mother started with the grocery store, and encountered a strange situation.

Aunt Helen froze. Then, she burst into tears. She finally got my father to translate what Aunt Helen was saying from his US-ethnic Polish: “There are too many choices,” he translated. “She’s overwhelmed by where to begin.”

It was an “Oh yeah,” moment for my parents. Communist governments in the 1980s weren’t so big on providing consumer options. As we learned later, Helen among other Polish people survived by stealing what they could and selling it back at black market rates.³

Bath and body shoppers face this same feeling of being overwhelmed. There are thousands of brands and microbrands all vying for you to buy things to slather and soap, to spritz and to steam. And any conscious shopper wants their shopping made easier: those of us who make what we make need to give you a reason to buy, a reason we’re different. And therein, pardon the pun, lies the rub:

One of the unavoidable facts of life in creating any bath and body product is that someone has done it before. While we may change the packaging and the pitch, when it comes to originality, each and every one of us who makes what we make learned at least the basics from someone else, even as we have divined the secret to making the basics really rock through trial and sometimes very painful error.

A good bath and body maker will have lined up the best suppliers or even gone so far as to grow/raise the desired materials. The ingredients for these materials, once someone know the ropes and can identify good quality from poor quality, are essentially the same: fats, oils, and extracts. Emulsifiers. Catalysts, here and there. Necessary-for-your-health-and-safety preservatives.

So what really sets us apart? Aside from skill - some soapers are better than others, some perfumers have more olfactory vision, you get the idea - it comes down to marketing and innovation. We draw you in with the prettiest packaging, with the best reputations, and with finding new ways to use the same old stuff, or new ways of presenting the same old thing. This is true of the  tiniest home bath and body business to the gargantuan giants of cosmetics.

This world has provided us a lot of materials to work with, and because of the abundance of the earth itself, we can allow trends to come and go. One year vanilla is all the rage, and the next we’re all about the pomegranite. Lately people are wild for figs. The way we recombine these has a broad number of combinations, but the basics are the same: base cosmetic at the desired consistency, preservative, emulsifier, fragrance when appropriate.

1. Polish for grandmother [↩]
2. not a woman of good character, but a pretty typical example of a Polish black marketeer from the Iron Curtain era [↩]
3. Somewhere in Poland, there’s a now wealthy family that owes me two years of my college tuition. [↩]

I get asked more and more regularly by people who live close to my locale whether I have a storefront. I don’t.  While I know there are potential customers who would only consider buying from me if I had a physical storefront, I am placing my faith in the increasingly Internet-savvy group of customers who are already accustomed to the risks of buying bath and body products online.

¹

Most of the reasons for this are expense related: I started this business in 2006 on $200 and a pile of essential oils I still had from a previous business attempt. I have not and do not plan to take out business loans.

And perfume making is not the only thing I want to do with my life.

This is the world of multiple revenue streams: read “To get by, you need to do more than one thing for a living.” For some unfortunate underpaids in corporate life, that means two jobs are necessary. In my household, both my boyfriend and I work in multiple fields in order to pay rent, keep food on the table, and pay off student loans. A personal illness has complicated this matter, and it means that I in particular must find more creative ways to contribute to the household.

I know it would be easier on curious parties if I did have a store to just wallk in - but it would take away a lot more from me than I’m willing to give up, and in the long run wouldn’t make financial sense. I would have to set aside writing and writing time to keep regular business hours. I would need to raise my prices to meet overhead. Signage, maintenance, permits, insurance… all these things are things I would need to deal with. All these things would take me away from what I love.

So sorry, no storefront. But you’re welcome to explore our samplers listing.

1. photo taken by magickalrealism on flickr [↩]

We’re witnessing a great big fancy revival of DIY culture and spirit. Anyone “hip” has to get their little hands dirty creating something to wear, or taste, or to furnish - and this is great. Sometimes it saves money. Sometimes these little diy-ers discover hidden talents. And I know that many are taking away the satisfaction that they are somehow subverting “the system” by not putting their money in the hands of others (well, directly - there’s still money changing hands for materials, and some straight to the very organizations they’re trying to subvert.)

But along with the DIY spirit comes the dark side, because all things have at least a double-edged nature: what I would call DIY Greed, or more aptly, DIY arrogance. Sounds harsh, doesn’t it? I know. Please hear me out:

So DIY-er has had great success making pipe cleaner chains, and has decided to take this to the marketplace. That’s great. It’s certainly a developed skill that no one else has.

While at the marketplace, this new pipe cleaner chain business owner perceives that the fuzzy-wuzzy-weebit makers are doing brisk sales, and that they seem to unload a LOT of merchandise. DIYer then decides, in a fit of desire for the money that s/he believes the fuzzy wuzzy weebit maker is making, to then sell fuzzy wuzzy weebits.

So the DIYer goes out and buys Weebit Making for Dummies.  But the Weebits made according to those careful instructions keep tipping over. So this pipecleaner chain whiz goes tromping over to the original Weebit Maker. “How do you get them to sit up straight?”

Now, this Weebit maker, unbeknownst to the Pipe Cleaner Kid, has spent eight years training those Weebits to sit up straight. It’s taken wire, bribery, even electroshock. At long last the Weebit found the secret to making good, upright Weebits - and between the time, and the expense of the material, it’s cost that person around $5000. Weebit maker is only recently seeing a return on this initial investment. And all this goes through his/her head as s/he stares at the Pipe Cleaner Kid, wondering what the hell to say to this demand for hard won information.

Eventually, instinct wins: Weebit Maker says no.

And the result is that Weebit Maker immediately has a full-on-tantrum coming from the Pipe Cleaner Kid. The Pipe Cleaner Kid fully believes that s/he is owed the information,  that in a free society it should all just be shared and given freely. Pipe Cleaner Kid will not run a Google Search. Pipe Cleaner Kid will not visit the library and read some books on the information. No, Pipe Cleaner Kid wants it straight from the Weebit maker, the Weebit maker’s own business, time, and effort be damned.

¹

This is the parable of artisanship, and respecting artisanship. This is also where the DIY spirit and the artist-making-a-living-spirit diverges. It is not possible to be good at all things. In a free market economy, even a small one that allows for bartering, it is not necessary to be good at all things. It is, however, a duty to honor the talents of others and to recognize that when it comes to the exchange of money, goods, and services, that it is better to get it well earned and slowly than fast and sloppily by selling a product that is cheap and may eventually hurt someone.

I’m seeing this sort of thing happen a lot to my soap-making colleagues. Someone on Etsy sees a few soapers that are selling with great success, and jump on the bandwagon. “It’s easy!” they tell themselves, frequently buying a kit. What most don’t know is that there can be thousands of dollars and hours spent in making soaps that lather right, that are safe for the skin, that are the right texture and weight. Even those who use soap molds run into trademark issues with the molds available, and sometimes they are forced to add the skill of soap mold making.

More than one has told me about an acquaintance, witnessing their hard-won success, who decides “well, I’ll make soap too. It’s fast money!” The original soapmaker than has all sorts of trouble with product line imitations, demands for trade secrets, and a complete disrespect for the work that s/he has put in to making his/her soaps.

This isn’t the stuff of anti-competition. That’s another topic. This is the stuff of undervaluing a skill. Essentially, the “DIY spirit” can loop right back around to “Wal-Mart thinking” where all things are cheap at the price of someone else’s poverty. Stepping into the arena of bath and body, or any other art form, without practically revering it, devalues the people that have already put all the work in, and leads in the end to a shoddy product.

So when it comes to crossing the line between DIY and artisanship, remember: it’s about money earned, not money grabbed. Money earned slowly as people put down their investments in quality has a profound impact on changing our culture into a place that is sustainable for the earth, ourselves, and our neighbors. But making money “grabs” by doing something “fast and easy” just because you see someone else making money at it only enhances the poverty and mis-distribution of resources cycle.

Do what you’re good at, or what you’re passionate about. Take your time. Do it right.

1. from the defunct show Daria. Used without permission, just great amounts of fan worship. [↩]

While Etsy did indeed report an increase in traffic over Cyber Monday, there’s still a lot of factors to consider: first, last year around this time, the site kept breaking. Second, that 30% increase was about 13,000 items selling. And if you look at that increase, that means around 25% of Etsy sellers had active sales over the Cyber days. That means that 75% of Etsy sellers - the vast majority - saw no sales at all.

And believe me, it was a noisy day for listing.

While I do know of one fellow bath and body seller who did quite well (she’s very well established), it was a modest day for many online mavens. Again, now we’re in the hard slide through January, so what really happens with the holidays won’t be seen well until January 31.

Magickal Realism itself is in the process of getting our back catalog up and available - much should be available for purchase this weekend, including less-frequently offered items like our incinerates, new sampler packs, and Sex and Politics along with other new scents to be premiered throughout the winter.

So hang in there - we’ve got a lot coming for you!

I’m hearing a lot about Cyber Monday. It’s all the hype among retailers, large and microscopic. And I’m seeing a lot of my fellow Etsy-ers in particular, leaning forward, drooling.
Here’s what I’m going to say to you, in the spirit of helping you set realistic expectations that involve marketing yourselves gradually:
Cyber Monday is a myth.
I repeat, Cyber Monday is a myth.
This is especially true on Etsy.

This isn’t to knock Etsy - Etsy is, and always will be, what you make it. That’s the entire point. But the way I’m seeing it hyped in forums and encouraged by admin is doing a disservice to the sellers, and quite possibly to Etsy shoppers who WILL shop online tomorrow. They’re also quite likely inspiring the ire of Adbusters and other anti-commercial outlets that would otherwise, quite possibly, be allies because of the connection between handmade goods and reduced consumption. Make no mistake; I am a capitalist, I’m a capitalist who believes in setting a cap - which is part of why I’m not going to close my shop for Cyber Monday but I’m not going to do anything different from the way I usually work and sell that day, either. There is no malice whatsoever in Etsy’s decision, and no malice in my comments on why I think this is a poor choice from a business perspective (except, of course, any gain garnered from increased listing fees, which will most certainly happen tomorrow).

((image by Soon. on flickr))

Why is this a disservice, you ask? It’s pretty simple:
Etsy has a high signal to noise ratio. Right now the buyers really do outnumber the sellers, but it’s still by a slim margin. This is in part because Etsy has chosen to rely on word of mouth and focus on the technological aspects of the site, a common occurence when the tech guys are making the main business decisions. Since their money is made off the sellers, that’s who Etsy tries to reach. And it looks like a good idea to whip the sellers into a listing froth: lots of listings will make for a reasonably profitable day for Etsy.

But then there’s the downside: with so many listings coming so fast in all categories, regular shoppers/buyers are going to be overwhelmed by everything coming at them. The general “Etsy first, individual seller next” approach isn’t going to work because the day has been so hyped. A lot of stuff sellers have been saving just for Monday are going to be missed, as the listed goods pile higher and higher. Sections that buyers do you use, like promotions, are going to move at an overwhelming rate. Using the marketing methods as Etsy promotes them to their sellers isn’t going to work.

More significantly, actual purchases tend to increase in January, when people start using the money they were gifted over the previous holidays.

I’ve been advised to be less generous with how much marketing information/how-to I share, so I’m going to leave some small suggestions here, for you to take or leave:

I’m not knocking Etsy, and I don’t think that the thinking is entirely “yay, slew of hyperactive listings!” I think they’re enthusiastic, and the site is still very new - so new that no one knows what the patterns really are; I simply know my experience with increased sales in January was reflective of sellers who were on Etsy the year before I was.

As always, you can’t just post items and expect them to come to you. You’ve always got to shoot up a few flares.

As mentioned on other blogs, I’m a fan of Clean House and I’ve signed on to the decluttering movement (though you’d never know it given the small tornado that has hit my motel room). I also just this week have marked a complete reorganization of my home office/studio - not too shabby for a roughly 10 x 15 foot space that I share with my boyfriend. So I’ve been quite eager to jump into conversations about getting more organized with other artists, because darn straight I want to brag! It took me months to get everything where I want it, and even tantalized by that “one last thing” (in my case, candlemaking) I feel like I’ve accomplished something truly significant in my life.

At the same time, traveling as I do among artists, I hear a lot of defenses of the clutter. “It’s creative.” “I know where everything is!” “I’m an artist, it should be that way.” “Organization is just another form of creative suppression.”

To all of this I say: What utter crap. If you just don’t want to do the cleanup work, own it. Denial is going the way of the land line. And I can assure you, being better organized is better for you all around. Here are my 10 reasons why:

1. You will get your projects done faster.
Most wasted/inefficient time is time spent looking for things. If you’re organized, you spend much less time locating the tools you need to work.

2. You lower production costs.
You finish your creation faster, you waste less because it’s easier to work in your space, and you have the exact right tools to work with.

3. A well organized space encourages creativity.
The practical burdens of “where’s my brush” or “where’s my dropper” are removed, leaving you free to focus wholly on your creative process. The cleanup also takes place within this,giving you the proper and healthy mental exit.

4. You look really good to customers.
Fast turnarounds, a photographable space, and a space where people besides you are comfortable should you do consults and commissions - these open up avenues for promotion and word of mouth.

5. Taxes
When you’re organized as you go, you’re less likely to be taken surprise when the tax body wants that 33-40% of your profit in exchange for such services as working stoplights.

6. Good organization makes it easier to recover from other bad decisions.
Let’s say that craft show you did at the truck stop went poorly. If you’re well organized, when you get a call from that gallery owner the next day, it’s much easier to jump on the opportunity and leave the bad experience behind - in part because you don’t need to dig anything out, it’s all right there.

7. Your friends and family will like you better.
Sure, the ones that really love you accept you as you are, chronically late, artistically self-absorbed, or perpetually lost. However, you might get more out of those relationships if you are together enough to set up that alarm for that lunch date - and you will also wind up appearing reliable, and thus impressing future clients you may run into in the course of your social life.

8. You just might find decluttering improves your aesthetic.
There’s no guarantees, of course, but sometimes forcing yourself to root through and discard belongings also forces you to root through and discard conceits - the honesty makes for a better artist.

9. You’ll plan your business and creative life better.
While some say that the first step to organizing is to get rid of the excess, the real first step is to envision the life you want to have that is immediately within your reach. Basically, it all starts with, “OK, I haven’t won the lottery. What can I do to live better now?”

10. Freeing up space makes room for new opportunities.
Just ask anyone who practices Feng Shui.¹

These aren’t the only reasons to get organized and stay that way, but they are good ones.

1. validity of Feng Shui neither endorsed nor denied. It’s worked for me thus far, but it’s not like I’ve paid super expensive interior decorators [↩]

I’ve written this a few times and other places, but I feel like I’ve got using the USPS down pretty well. I personally think it’s a good system, as long as I can avoid some of the personalities within it (a lot of postal regulations seem to be at the whim of the postal representative, a system I’m not wild about.)

The USPS actually does make an effort to get some tips out to you to ensure a speedy delivery and all that good stuff. One thing I will say that is unpopular with a lot of people: DON’T USE THE LABELS PAYPAL PROVIDES. I say this because every time someone sends to me using one of those damn labels, I never EVER get it, and it leaves me supremely annoyed as I tell these sellers beforehand not to use the damn things, which they’d know if they bothered to check the “notes to seller” field. They’re not a foolproof system for many, many reasons, not least of which is that in larger cities, the bar codes don’t always read correctly. I’m not the only person this happens to, but I’m one of the few that’s figured out the problem.

Besides, taking a few extra steps to make sure you’ve done everything YOU can to get the package to your buyer is due diligence and just plain good business. There’s a difference between being efficient, and just taking a shortcut.

So, those comments made, here is my recommended procedure when sending materials by the US mail:

1. Verify your customer’s address, step 1. Usually, the correct address to send to is the one issued from Etsy. It makes sense, since the person fills out and checks that address at the time of purchase. If it doesn’t match the PayPal address, don’t be surprised, and of course, check - and 99% of the time it will be the email given at the point of sale, which is the one that Etsy has.

2. Verify your customer’s address, step 2. Run the address through the USPS search. This does two things: it makes sure you were given the correct address, no typos, and it gets you the 4 digit zip code extension. I have had around 5 customers to date make typos in their addresses; if I hadn’t run the check, I wouldn’t have known and we’d have had a horrible merry-go-round of trying to get the package from point A to point B.

The 4 digit extension will also do one significant thing: it will get the package to its destination faster. The better the details on your shipping label, the higher the priority the USPS gives it.

3. Print the address electronically AND in caps. The USPS has a priority ranking system on regular mail, and even within special mail (cetified, priority, global, etc.) If it is printed electronically, in caps, and has the 4 digit zip code extension, it gets sorted first. If it doesn’t have the 4 digit extension but all else applies, it goes next. And so on. By marking the package with the four digit extension and making sure the label is printed electronically and in caps, you move your package to the front of the line.

4. Follow all the other rules.
You know them: don’t reuse priority mail boxes. If you reuse other boxes, black out all previous markings with a permanent marker. Pack WELL - use bubble wrap, tape, tissue paper, whatever. Follow the basic laws that apply to shipping interstate and international.

Above all, be humble before the mail gods. If something bad hasn’t happened while you’ve used any mailing system, it’s just because it hasn’t happened yet.

While I can certainly wax on endlessly about things fauna, there are concepts even more abstract that are the domain of this blog: Magickal Realism is, after all, an indie business, and indie businesses are affected by things involving money, and taxes, and marketing. Because I work with things more abstract and regulated these will often merge, but for now, here’s a topic I want to discuss up front because it affects everyone in the US who purchases items on the Internet: the Internet tax ban that is ending on November 1, 2007. That’s right - we have a little less than one month to definitely enjoy tax-free purchases on the Internet (that you know you’re supposed to be reporting anyway, right?)

¹

Says the Wall Street Journal:

Pro-Internet lawmakers, led by Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden and New Hampshire Republican John Sununu, had assembled the votes to replace Mr. Carper’s pseudo-moratorium with their strong, permanent tax ban. If Mr. Inouye keeps trying to push the phony moratorium, Mr. Wyden tells us that he now believes he can move the real deal through the Finance Committee, which also enjoys jurisdiction. The Wyden-Sununu permanent ban would give investors a strong incentive to fund broadband investment that will empower consumers with a faster Internet.

Clearly, there’s bipartisan support on either side of this bill - for Internet tax and Internet no tax. Being a woman of flagrant self-interest, I clearly favor the no-tax. Our tax dollars already support the Internet; the infrastructure comes from the military invention of the ARPAnet (not ALL military spending is bad…). While I don’t know how the Internet infrastructure is funded these days, I’m reasonably certain it still is - the Internet has effectively given us a second universe without having to leave the planet, after all.

Still, in the event of an Internet tax, it won’t be the end of the world. PayPal already has auto-tax settings, and it wouldn’t be long before Google Checkout set them up. Still, I’d jolly well better know what my money’s going for - it’s not like broadband is easily available to everyone, or even most.

1. Image from http://bluecollarrepublican.com [↩]