2009 Hot List

Well, my shows are over for the year, and now I’m prepping for the impending avalanche of online sales.  It’s interesting what was hot this year at the shows.  Hands down, my bookmarks were the show stoppers.  The most consistent comment I received was “I’ve never seen wood bookmarks, what a great idea”.   It was fortunate that I got carried away with them this Spring.  I zoned out for a couple of weeks and did nothing but bookmarks and ended up with about 500 of them.  They are almost all gone now.  I wasn’t as lucky with the other hot sellers.

I have a 20″ x 7″ breadboard in my kitchen that has been very useful for a number of situations.  I made it a couple of years ago and decided this spring to make a few to increase my booth variety.  I would take three or four to a show and sell them all, believing it was because of the small quantity.  It wasn’t until the fall shows that I realized how popular they were.  I took large quantities to each show, and was selling out on the first day.  I got caught behind the eight ball and could not make these fast enough, or in enough quantities to make it through each show.  I never brought any home with me after a show.

I had a customer at the Sandy Springs show order two medium size boards with handles.  They turned out so nice that I decided to make a large quantity to take to the Foothills Fall Festival.  Here again, I underestimated the demand and they were all gone by the second day of a three day show.

The  end grain boards didn’t sell well in the spring, but came on strong in the fall shows.  The two most popular were the solid walnut and the whisperer design with walnut, maple, and cherry.  I had to make quite a few sets of these this fall.  What was interesting was if I brought one back from a show, I would have an online order waiting for it.  The turn over was pretty steady.

Overall, it’s been a good year.  The Spring shows were challenging because of miserable weather.   I’ve had whole days canceled and some half days because of rain.  A few this summer were so hot and humid, that I would have preferred to be home in the air conditioning.    However, the good shows made up for all the challenging ones.  I didn’t accomplished much last week because I needed a break from the boards, but I have started building my inventory back up over the past couple of days and have finally got some of the new face grain boards listed for sale on Appalachian Craftsmen.   There will be more new ones added within the week as soon as I get them built.