Tuesday, September 29, 2015

I Actually Have A Real Job

I actually have a real job - an eight-to-five (well, closer to a 7:30 am to 6:15 pm) job and it keeps me busy, puts food on the table, and does all of the other important things that a job is supposed to do. Since I own my own business (see previous sentence), I usually can count on myself for deadlines, activities, store ideas, product placement and packaging. But not right now and it's driving me a bit crazy.


At least I knew what charm I wanted to give out this year. We were
able to use a charm we had in stock instead of ordering something
in specifically for the Hop. 


In two days, the third annual Minnesota Bead Shops Hop will begin. This little walk on the wild side began a little more than two years ago when one of the local stores decided to convince a group of us to join together in a fall challenge for our customers. We would provide game boards, stickers, each store would give a charm to each "hopper", and we would each contribute money towards supplies and a winner's package, and promote the affair through our own social media and mailings. It actually went rather well, for a first year, and we had more than 100 people come through our doors for the "Hop" within the two weeks that it ran.


I had a large number of matched hands charms that I had ordered
for a religious organization several years ago. The person ordering
them no longer is living, so I have an overstock of these. They're
rather cute, actually. 


Last year was a similar time frame, but more stores joined us, so we had a total of 18 stores for the two weeks. The stores themselves were located throughout the state and apparently the organizers got feedback that it was too far and the "hoppers" didn't have enough time to get to all of the stores.


The game board (page two is here with my store in the middle)
gets presented at each shop. Each shop puts a sticker on their
store's square and presents the "hopper" with their charm and
any additional 'prizes' they may be giving out. We'll have
a bag of goodies for each hopper, at least for the first 100. 


So this year, they extended the Hop for an additional weekend. I'm less than pleased about that, but was outvoted. The entire event starts on Thursday and I'm still waiting to get final approval on this year's game board, put together my store's door prizes, and get the store organized and clean - well ... cleaner at any rate.


I still have to mop the floor. I hate doing that! The windows
probably won't get done because I'm running out of time. 


Argh. Just ... argh! What a mess! Have a great Tuesday - I'll be scrambling to get all of the associated things finished on time. *sigh*


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