Earring Survey Results

30 people responded to the earring survey, (and one silly goose who inadvertently skipped it).

Photo/Project Credit: Happy Together

1. Who do you think that earrings like these would be more appropriately targeted toward (Select all that apply)

• Women- 30%- (9)
• Teens- 50%- (15)
• Young girls- 50% (15)
• Other (6): "i would think high school, college, young adults would wear there, very cute!"; "tweens"; "Seniors, too."; "Young women-early 20's"; "Depending on the fabric color it could be for young girls too."; "While I think they would be most appropriate looking on younger girls, they also might not hold up on them."

2. If you were to wear these, or buy them for someone else, would you prefer solid, prints, pearls, beads, cool, warm, or neutrals? (FYI, I had to use this format for the question because I was only allowed to have 10 questions per survey and this one was part of the bracelet survey).

• Answers for this question were all over the place, but the general consensus was that anything would go. Winner of the best feedback response was: "both solid and prints would work for me. again, if it is something like this that is a little out of the box for earrings-i think the women that would wear these would like fun colors and prints rather than neutrals. Pearls are beautiful, but if you had a sparkly tiny button that would be gorgeous too! Love sparkles."

3. The average min/max price range that people said that they would pay for these is $7.50-$10.30. $5 was the lowest price suggested and $15 the highest. Three people claimed that they would not buy them at all.

My MPW suggested the following: wholesale price- $6.54; "safe" price- $11.54; retail price: $13.08, which seems to have underestimated a bit? Originally, I was thinking of pricing these for a craft fair at $4.00 a pair! Seems as though I was underestimating what people would pay, too!

I would like to reply to a couple of feedback comments/concerns that I received regarding these earrings. Actually, I think it's only one comment. One responder who said that they would not buy these, explained, "The fabric looks [like] it will fray, and they look a little gaudy." To which my response is, to each his own. I would personally never wear these either, as I prefer my earrings to dangle a bit, but I know that there are some women out there who would.

The main reason that I was considering making these earrings when I came across them was because there were so many women at my last craft fair who were excited about my pom hair clips, thinking that they were actually earrings. They were disappointed to find out that they were in fact hair clips. I couldn't help thinking first, that the poms were much too large to be mistaken for earrings, (they are 1.5"-2" in diameter!) and secondly, how gaudy that would look, but again, to each his own. But then I started thinking, well what about a smaller version of the pom....

As far as fraying goes, I think that the natural fraying of the earrings in the photo from Happy Together, actually added to the charm of them, except maybe that long bit hanging out on the left side of the photo:

Photo/Project Credit: Happy Together

 However, I believe in selling a product that is going to hold up and not fall apart on my customer, so I was planning to seal the edges of the fabric before constructing the earrings. Which I did, with the second pair that I made:

I actually wasn't very crazy about how these turned out, nor was I satisfied with the whole process in general. Hand-sewing the tiny fabric pieces together was a pain in my tushy, and I am too much of a perfectionist to have them appear sporadically arranged and messy as they did in the original tutorial, (as seen in the blue earring on the far right):

Photo/Project Credit: Happy Together

So, all things considered, I concluded that I will not be making these earrings. I didn't really enjoy doing it, nor did I like the end result enough to want to make more. If I'm going to spend valuable time on an item, then I want to be able to be proud of it, regardless of whether or not I would wear it myself.

Thank you again to everyone for the wonderful feedback! Expect to see the ring and headband holder survey results within the next week, and if you haven't checked out the results for the bracelets yet, check them out here.

Future items to make?

I have been tossing around the idea of including rings, earrings, and bracelets to my inventory. One of the reasons is because they will use up my pieces of scrap fabrics that are too small for the regular poms and flowers, but also because I want to add a bigger variety of items to the ones that I already make. These three items also seem to be ones that most women wear more of.

The rings that I would like to make would be smaller versions of the poms, (think 1" or less), attached to a metal adjustable ring base. I don't have a photo of what they would look like, so you will have to use your imagination to picture it. I have received some positive feedback from some women I spoke with this weekend. One specifially told me that she would DEFINITELY buy a ring if I made those (I am holding her to it!). These would probably be the easiest of the three to make.

The earrings that I would like to make would look similar to these post earrings made by Jessica over at Happy Together:

These look easy enough to make, but the fabric circles used for this are only the size of a dime, so they may prove tricky for my clumsy fingers. But I think they are really cute, great for women or girls, and would be an excellent way to use up the tiny fabric scraps I have collected.

The last project idea is to make fabric button bracelets. I fell in love with the one that is featured in the tutorial over at The Mother Huddle:

Unfortunately, this would be the most expensive of the pieces to make. The bracelet bases average about $3.00 apiece, and the button kits are also about $3.00, which only includes 10 buttons and the bracelet requires 9. So unless I could ensure that these bracelets would be a popular item and a great seller, then it probably would not even be doable (read: affordable) for me right now. Perhaps if I was working several days a week.... But I do really like them, so they are staying on the top of the possibilities list.

Opinions? Would you buy any of these items? Do you think one would be a better seller than the others? Which should I attempt first? (Leave a comment or participate in my new polls on the right margin).

New Headband Design: Bows

I spent three days, off and on, finishing this newest headband design:

Please excuse the poor photo quality; I took this at 11:30 last night.

I started by hand-stitching two pieces of fabric together to create each of the five bows. Then each bow was hand-sewn together and attached to a bright pink headband. Ribbon and a little bling are the finishing touches. I certainly will not be creating many of these, nor will they be custom orders, since they take a lot of time to make.

I would be lying if I said that this design was an original idea of mine. I was inspired by this headband from Ruche:

Found here

I'm still working on the pricing of mine, but it will be nowhere near the $32.99 price tag on the Ruche headband.

So, how do you think it turned out?

New Items: Rolled Fabric Pins

My first craft fair hasn't even happened yet, but my mom has already sold five items for me! Yay, Mom! Two items were single pom elastic headbands (one a mint green and the other a "Laura" pom), which I didn't get a chance to take photos of. She also sold one of the "Autumn Leaves" necklaces and a "Larkin" headband. The last item was the set of "Lucy" hair clips, which are no longer available as I only had a few scraps of that fabric. This leaves me feeling hopeful for the actual craft fair.

Of course this also means that I should really start a new stock of items for a potential craft fair in December, so I'm not scrambling at the last moment. I am starting to experiment with a few new designs and finished two rolled fabric pins last night:

Christmas Pin

Yellow and blue pin.

I really like how the Christmas pin turned out, and will probably add this one as a "made to order" (M20) item soon. I am contemplating adding a tiny pearl on the red rosette to hide the little bit of glue that is showing, but I forgot to do it before taking the photo. I really like how the red rosette looks by itself with the leaves and may make it into hair clips also.

The yellow and blue pin uses the "Sweet Aida", "Erica", "Allison", and "Kaylee" fabrics. I'm not too crazy about how this one turned out. In hindsight, I probably should have replaced one of the patterned fabrics with a solid, but too late now!

When I get a moment, or rather, remember to do it, I will take the measurements of the items, and also a photo of the pin on to get an idea of scale. But until then, opinions on these? Keep making or scrap? How would these look as headbands (in a different arrangement)?