Sterling chains with some sparkle

I have added a series of Sterling Silver chains to my ETSY shop, covering 16", 18", 20", 22", and 24" lengths.  Those tend to be the more common lengths.  Since I hand cut all my chains and then add the clasps, I can make chains in literally any length.

These Sterling Silver chains are made with flat cable chain links, and finished with a 5mm spring clasp. The 2x1.5mm links in this chain give it extra sparkle because unlike many chains that use round wire to form the links, this chain has had the links flattened slightly, which results in a larger flat surface area to reflect more light, and hence they have more of a sparkling appearance.  These chains can be worn on their own, to create a light and airy appearance, or can be stacked in combination with other necklaces. It is a fairly light weight chain that probably would not be good for larger pendants or dangles.

I felt that this would be a good addition to my listings, to offer customers the option of a plain chain.  If it seems to be popular, I could add medium and/or heavier chains for larger pendants, and also as an option for men.  Time will tell whether this will be an area to be expanded.  One other possibility might be to go to large link chains for both men's and women's bracelets.  Lots of possibilities here.

Jewelry Making Journal

I have been fortunate enough to have a write-up about my jewelry featured on Jewelry Making Journal's website. You can see the article by clicking here.  Jewelry Making Journal is a combination of online magazine and community journal.   It’s the place where friendly jewelry artists from all over the world are sharing jewelry experiences, creations, ideas and knowledge.  I have enjoyed reading many of the sections and write-ups on JMJ and recommend it to anyone who has an interest in handmade jewelry.

They have just recently decided to add a section called Men Making Jewelry, and my story was the first  in that new section.  While men are definitely in the minority when it comes to making jewelry, we are still a part of that community and this addition gives us an opportunity to share our perspective.  Hopefully other guys will take the opportunity to add a posting in our new forum.

Learning some new lessons.

It has been several days since I posted anything here, and I need to be more faithful about finding the time to keep this blog updated.  My last post concerned the opening of my Vintage shop on ETSY and that has gotten off to a slow start but then that seems to be the way of life.  It just takes time to get things set up and then get all the Titles and Tags working so the traffic gets directed to your shop.  Nothing seems to go as quickly as you would like it to.  Learning to be patient is one of the biggest lessons I am learning as a seller on ETSY.

On my jewelry shop I did get a new item set up and listed.

Tiny Silver Sideways Cross Necklace 

This really is a cute piece and I am very pleased with the way it looks.  The cross is quite small, just under 1/2", but the light weight chain seems to match up with it very nicely.

I am finding that it takes a while to get things standardized, and get all the bugs ironed out.  I ordered some Sterling Silver chain from a supplier that I had not worked with before, and it was just very slightly smaller than the chain I had used before.  The problem popped up when I tried to use my "regular" jump rings.  The "old" rings were just a little bit too large to fit through the new chain links, so I had to order some new smaller gauge rings to work with the new chain.  That delayed making a couple of new necklaces that I have been wanting to put together.  I guess the lesson learned is that you need to find the parts and pieces that work, and then stick with them.  Don't change things without understanding that the changes won't come back to bite you.

New Vintage shop

It's been a few days since I posted anything and that is because my wife came up with a brainstorm.  We are in the process of getting our house ready to sell, because we are going to move closer to the kids and grand kids.  In our book, family is what makes the world go round.  And we are planning to downsize so many things are going to have to go.  So wifey recently said, "Why don't you put this on your ETSY shop" or "You could see if you could sell that on ETSY".

While the concept was good, it didn't seem like listing an Antique Victorian Birdcage right next to a Cross And Infinity Loop Necklace was a good strategy.  So I opened a second ETSY shop to list Vintage merchandise.  Right now I have 15 items listed and have several others to add.  Figuring out how to set up the first shop was the hard part, but setting up a second one was pretty easy.  I read in one of the forums that when you open a second shop, one of them becomes the red-headed-stepchild, meaning you don't pay much attention to it.  But that doesn't seem to be the case with me thus far.  I have also read that some ETSY sellers have 3 or 4 or even 5 different shops.  Not sure I want to go quite that far, but at this point 2 seems to be very manageable.

If you get a chance, stop by my new shop From Years Back and take a look.  Who knows, you may just fall in love with that Antique Victorian Birdcage.

EtsyGadget

The other day while reading, I came across a reference to something called the EtsyGadget.  It is apparently something that ETSY is still developing and it is still in the beta stage.  While there is very little information about how it works, EtsyGadget is apparently designed to help you improve the tags you are using in your ETSY shop, and in turn improve your position in ETSY search results.  I have played with it a little bit and plan to spend some more time trying it out, but it does seem to offer some very helpful suggestions for improving listing tags.

I mention it here because it is not released into mainstream ETSY, but you may find it a useful tool to help you with the 'titles and tags" phenomena that has everyone puzzled.  Here is a link for you to try

EtsyGadget

I hope you find it useful.

Necklace lengths

I just added a couple of charts to my ETSY site showing different necklace lengths for use by those who maybe aren't sure which is the proper length.

Another method is to cut a piece of string to a certain length and then hold it around your neck to see how it will fall on you.








Hopefully these charts will prove helpful in selecting the proper length to order when purchasing a necklace.

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