compiled by Heather Skelly

What Is the Best Business Advice
You Have Ever Received?

WHAT'S YOUR OPINION?

Each month, The Crafts Report invites readers to respond to the Public Opinion question. Responses are published in the magazine. This month’s question is: How important is a favored booth location at a show? Please respond by Dec. 8, 2002. Responses to this question will appear in the January 2003 issue. E-mail: publicopinion@craftsreport.com; or CLICK HERE Send responses to: “Public Opinion” The Crafts Report 100 Rogers Rd. Wilmington, DE 19801 fax: (302) 656-4894. Anonymous responses will no longer be published.

Don’t listen to anyone with negative advice and keep on being creative and doing what you know to be the best.

Robyn A. Davis
Robyn A. Davis’ Creations
Far Rockaway, N.Y.

It has to be to start a mailing list. I don’t remember if I read it somewhere or someone told me to do this, but when everyone else is complaining about a slow show, I’m usually making sales to my steady customers who came to the show with my schedule in hand. I have been told many times that it is posted on their refrigerator! I have one customer who once a year visits me at a specific show and usually pays for all or most of that season’s mailing costs with her purchases. My customers always know where my shows are, what stores my work is in and how to find me when they need something between shows.

Hilary Shank-Kuhl
Kuhl Designs
Montclair, N.J.

Don’t overextend yourself! Be able to do the things you promise!

Debby Weaver
Fern Hill Studio
Middletown, Md.

My dad once told me not to trust buyers who didn’t care about price. Usually this is because they don’t intend to pay. Also, if something seems to be too good to be true, it probably is.

Patti Dowse
Erda
Cambridge, Maine

As a former advertising/business consultant turned artist, the best advice that I gave to my customers and that I now give to myself is, “to know when to do a job yourself and when to hire a professional, like an accountant, graphic designer, sales rep, etc. We can’t do it all!

Pavlos Mayakis
Santa Rosa, Calif.

The best advice [I ever received] is to run repeated ads. Money spent on occasional ads is wasted.

Judy Hoch
Marstal Smithy
Lakewood, Colo.

It is sad, but the best business advice I received I did not listen to. Someone told me to get out of the art specialty I was in. I did not head that advice and have paid for it ever since.

Brett Bensley
Bensley Enterprises
Charleston, Ill.

Make it easy for your customer to do business with you. I take this to mean that if they have a problem, I resolve it immediately, (from their point of view anyway). I don’t tell them all the trouble it is going to cause me. I just take it off their mind and move on to their next order.

Penny Harrell
Harrell Design
Laguna Beach, CA

Someone recommended a book, “Do What You Love, the Money Will Follow.” I bought the book and refer to it now and again.

PJ Sweeney
Pjewelry
Alexandria, Va.

Learn everything you can about your medium.

Sherry Rawh
Rawh Designs
Las Vegas, Nev.

The less money you spend, the more you get to keep. Keep your expenditures low on everything except those that become an investment in your business.

Sue Fleischer
Casual Elegance
Baltimore, Md.

Stay true to yourself is the best business advice I’ve ever gotten. While marketing and selling is a huge part of being an artist who endeavors to support themselves through their art, it can also make you feel as if you’ve lost that purity that attracted you to the world of crafts in the first place. I try to evenly divide my time between making my craft and selling it and have found a great balance that allows me to stay true to my art.

Jerome Williams
Madison, Wis.