Back to the soy protein yarn, this time to use it up, once and for all! Unless I find more stashed away somewhere, although I am pretty sure this batch is the last of it. Whatever is left will go into my 'good cause' scarves that I knit in the evenings. Four warps of 4 scarves, four warps of 2 scarves each.
I've also been thinking a lot about the path I ought to take in the future. I am hoping very much to be able to continue to teach and have a pretty full schedule for 2013. Nothing for 2014, yet, but that's okay. Let's get through '12 and '13 and see how it goes. :) (Dates on my Schedule page on my web page)
DH wants to add another craft fair to the circuit, but that means doing a show in December, something which I'm really not wanting to do because of the iffy travelling conditions at that time of the year.
Writing isn't terribly lucrative - there is really only Handwoven and none of the published themes for the rest of the year appeal to me in terms of wanting to weave or write for them. There are a few other publications but frankly, the weaving community is so small that one really can't look towards writing about weaving for magazines for any sort of significant income. Some of them don't actually pay anything at all so the contribution is a donation, which is fine - I've done loads of those - but right now I'm looking for income producing activities.
So that leaves me with more publications like A Good Yarn. Right now I am wrestling with the number of copies to produce. Initial sales were brisk and then fell off pretty much completely. While I realize that it is summer and most guilds are not in session, I have to decide what to do about marketing. Paying for an ad in Handwoven is not an insignificant amount.
Recent discussion on one of the chat groups indicates that people want to see more 'technical' content, which is what I tried to provide in AGY and intend to continue that with the next installment, on rayon.
But what I really need, gentle readers, is for those of you who invested in AGY and let me know that you were pleased with it to do book reviews publicly. It's called Word Of Mouth and is one of the most effective marketing tools in this society.
If you are not on my contact list and are interested in AGY: Rayon, email me at laura at laurafry dot com. If you did not get a personal notification when AGY: Cotton was ready, I don't have you on my list (or your email changed - I did get a couple of emails returned as undeliverable).
The other thing on my consideration list is whether or not to shut my website down. The hacker who is 'stealing' bandwidth from me continues to send out spam via my website. I've had my website since the late 1990's and this is the first time I've actually been significantly hacked so I'm at sixes and sevens about it all. Grateful that I got away without problems for so many years. Vexed because we can't seem to shut the person down from using my website. Sigh.
Currently reading Before the Poison by Peter Robinson
8 comments:
Hi Laura - I think you are right. Sales 'should' pick up again in fall. I LOVE AGY and have shown it to a few people but because it is summer and all that entails I have not yet shared it with the usual crowd I run with. That will happen at the first guild meeting in fall. Hopefully that will inspire others to buy. Keep up the good work - it is appreciated!
Thanks Reni, I'm hoping to be 'up north' again next March. Be great to see you. :)
cheers,
Laura
Hi Laura
I convinced my guild to buy a copy of Magic and when they start back up this fall I'll recommend AGY cotton. I'll purchase a copy of Rayon but would love to see one on linen. I can't be the only one who uses linen.
Keep weaving. (and stay healthy)
maggie
That's a very pretty warp. Having seen the beautiful things you've woven with space-dyed warp yarn, I might have to reconsider trying it out myself! I've got lots of yarn that needs dyeing, so it might as well be multicolor, right?
The nice thing about dyeing your own yarn is that no one else has anything quite like it. :)
cheers,
Laura
Laura, if your website is not secure, it's not wise to do any business through it. If your customers are hacked as a result of the issues that remain unresolved, it will make the spamming problems seem trivial. I'd run all sales through ArtFire until this is remedied.
If the person handling your site security is unable to do the job, instead of taking the site down, why not find someone who can fix it?
I'm not worried about the 'sales' aspect as everything is done via Paypal not on my website as such.
cheers,
Laura
I talked about AGY at our Guild meeting, but it was a small informal meeting and Betz was weaving with you. Imwill bring it to our first big meeting in September. I hope Betz bought one!
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