I have so much to say about Hello Etsy PDX!  I don’t even know where to begin.  First and foremost I’m still so honored and grateful to have been asked to co-chair the event along with Rebecca Kerr.  It’s hard to have perspective when you organize an event in some ways because there are so many steps required to see any one aspect through to fruition.   The role of event planner keeps you so busy it can be hard to gauge at times what the response is from the public was.  This was not one of those times.  You could feel the energy in the air.  Ideas were flying all around the room and you could see people lighting up with enthusiasm.  There’s too much to really say, so I thought I’d share the part of the day that I feel was very successful – the keynote address.

I love how things come together.  One person has an idea and then it grows and other people add to the idea, which grows and becomes something else that’s better and bigger than any one person could make.  On the back end this is my perspective of the Hello Etsy PDX conference.  It started like this, I had this idea for the Keynote . . . it was born out of a Facebook post from months ago in which I posted about Stumptown Coffee procuring investors.  I was surprised how many people were coming down on Stumptown and it was Rebecca Pearcy of Queen Bee who said in Facebook thread, “Growth isn’t always a bad thing.  Business people have to weigh out many different scenarios  to sustain their businesses and growth is some times the answer.”  When Rebecca, Isaac and I were in the early planning stages of the event we were looking for a dynamic keynote address and I thought of this Facebook post.  From there we thought it would be incredible if we presented a few different ideas around intentional business growth. One where we profiled a business that chose to grow large and one that felt they could be more viable by staying small.  We really wanted the bigger business to be represented by Stumptown and the smaller  by Queen Bee.  The idea seemed too crazy to happen for real.  How could we get Duane Sorenson from Stumptown to even pay attention to us?  None of us had a connection to him.  And would Rebecca Pearcy want to talk about staying small?  We had a few businesses in mind to represent the big and small businesses and cast our net wide.  Surprisingly we heard back from almost everyone, including Duane Sorenson!  Next we needed to talk with Duane and explain our vision for the conversation.  I have to admit that after doing some reading online I had a sense of a message I was hoping to send.  I felt as though Duane Sorenson was being raked over the coals for bringing in investors to Stumptown Coffee and selling out, but I really didn’t feel he was a sell out after reading how well he was taking care of his employees and the coffee farmers he works with.  I think it was at least part of the reason he decided to do the Keynote, because he could tell we were interested setting aside biases and presenting the whole picture.

Next we needed a moderator for the keynote and we were lucky to have Diane Gilleland who did an amazing job!  I had some insider information on both Duane and Rebecca because I had researched Duane and spoken with him on the phone.  Rebecca and I are friends, so I wrote up questions and sent them to Diane.  Diane did her own research about Duane and came to the same conclusion I’d had.  She felt that Duane was being accused of something that he wasn’t, a sell out.  In her graceful style, Diane tailored the questions, but kept the underlying message:

Bigger local businesses and small local business are a matter
of choice and equally necessary in a local economy.

A small business isn’t doomed to fail if they choose to stay smaller
and a large business isn’t necessarily selling out
if they choose to grow larger by taking on investors.

Just to give you a sense of the amount of work it took to schedule a meeting to review the questions that would be discussed during the keynote between Duane, Rebecca and Diane,  I believe it took 2 phone calls, 5 emails and 2 texts to set up that meeting.  Duane is a really busy guy.  More busy than I knew.  I learned that he has a wife and 4 kids!  Not to mention the 200 employees and all of the coffee shops he has sprinkled around Portland, Seattle and New York.  Phew!  That’s a lot to juggle.

I felt Isaac would do the best job introducing the keynote and in typical Isaac B Watson style he totally exceeded my expectations.  I really enjoyed this part of Hello Etsy PDX so much because it was informative, funny, it shed light on some iconic Portland businesses as well as it helped dispel some myths about bigger businesses by telling a different story.  One of making the best choices for the business and employees, like Stumptown Coffee.  It also reminded all of us about the incredible viability and success possible for small business, like Queen Bee.

The keynote for Hello Etsy  is really a microcosm of the overall event.  It took a lot of people, specifically, it took the I Heart Art Leadership Council members and some pretty amazing volunteers all really pulling together along with Etsy who footed the entire bill.  The fact that Etsy had this vision for this incredible conference alone is HUGE.  People have asked me, “Why do you think Etsy wanted to have this international business conference for makers with such a big picture, educational perspective?”  I know it wasn’t any type of monetary gain, because they spent more than they earned from the conferences.  I think they must have had a vision for international good will and an education revolution for the universal maker community.  The internet adoration was their payment.     I received an email from Kimm Alfonso who works at Etsy in NYC.  She told me that there were over 4,000 tweets with the Hello Etsy hashtag.   I think this conference was truly beneficial for all involved.   Thank you, Etsy for making this day possible!

by: jen

Have you heard about Hello Etsy yet?  It’s a series of conferences that are happening in Berlin, Germany and a number of satellite location across the country including Portland, Oregon.  The Portland Hello Etsy is a one day conference for creative business people that I’m really excited to tell you about.  What’s unique about this event is that it’s tailored to fit the needs of a new business person, while offering useful information for the seasoned pros as well.  It’s also for any creative business person, not just people who sell on Etsy.

On September 17th from 9:00am-6pm we’ll converge on the PNCA campus for a day of learning, sharing and networking.   Best of all the whole shebang only costs $20 to attend!  We’re fortunate to have an amazing list of speakers including our keynote speakers, Duane Sorenson of Stumptown Coffee and Rebecca Pearcy of Queen Bee, who will be discussing their business growth.

Here’s the list of workshops that will be happening at the Hello Etsy.  You can find everything from how to have a toxin free workplace on a micro-business scale, to learning how to make peace with your finances, or learn to make your own website in an hour and so much more.  Not to mention all of the little extras that will be supplied at the event like stab bound journals (with supplied donated by collage) that attendees will get to make during the conference to keep notes in, subsidized lunches, snacks and even free moo cards to attendees who sign up early.  Sign up today!

How do I know about this event you might be wondering?  I am the co-chair with the help of Rebecca Kerr from I Heart Art: Portland.  I am also fortunate to be working on this project with the rest of the I Heart Art Leadership Council and  with the folks from Etsy.

WHEN: Saturday, September 17th, 9:00 am to 6:00 pm
WHERE: Pacific Northwest College of Art, Swigert Commons, 1241 NW, Johnson St, PDX 97209
Tickets: $20 RSVP today. Limited space available.

For all of the up-to-the-minute announcements on speakers and workshops, follow us on Twitter and look for the #helloetsy hashtag.

by: jen

Here’s a little flipbook that I put together for I Heart Art: Portland.  All of the photos and audio recordings were taken at the Mixer Match, 2011, which was housed in the Designs Within Reach location in downtown Portland.  This is the second round of Mixer Match, the first round was for crafters and boutiques.  This Mixer Match was the inaugural Mixer Match for artists, galleries and curators.  Check out this video to learn more about Mixer Match and you can learn more at the I Heart Art website.

by: jen

Have you heard the rumors too?  Etsy and I Heart Art are hosting a one-day business conference in Portland called the Hello Etsy PDX Satellite Conference.  This is an affordable, creative business conference happening Saturday, September 17th, 2011, at PNCA.  Some of the workshops will be streamed via Ety’s Livestream channel in conjunction with the larger flag-ship conference Hello Etsy Berlin, happening in Berlin, Germany.

I am co-chairing the PDX portion of this event with Rebecca Kerr, along with tons of help from Isaac Watson.  We are currently opening a call for proposals for instructors to lead 50 minute workshops on the subjects of:

The Big Picture
The Product
The Business
The Market

If you are interesting in leading a workshop check out our request for proposals for more information.  The deadline for proposals is August 5th, 2011.  One quick tip: this is a business conference that will have a broad appeal and will be useful to all creative business people – the focus of this conference is on business, not really arts or crafts.

We’ll have lots of information available about this event in the next few weeks, but in the meantime, tickets are currently available here.  Get your tickets while you can because at the low price of $20 they’ll go quickly!

More on this conference soon!

by: jen

Last Wednesday night was the Rebel Craft Rumble, hosted by Scrap.  In case you aren’t familiar with what the Rebel Craft Rumble is all about, think Iron Chef with crafts.  Like Iron Chef, competitors have specific items that they must work with and then they compete side by side to see who will become the winner or in this case the “Craft Master.”  Sister Diane was the champion last year so I was excited to see what sort of “craft muscle” the other contestants would bring to this year’s competition.   Alyssa Kail did a great job as “The Ringleader of Reuse.”   Richard and I were asked to be judges along with Julie Sabatier, from Destination DIY and Lindsey Newkirk, from Junk to Funk and oh, what fun we had!  The contestants were amazing!  There was Bridget Benton, Miss Demeanor, Sister Diane, Aurora Owen and Chelsea Badding.  The last two contestants I wasn’t familiar with, but they were great crafters and totally entertaining.

There were a few different bouts: such as detailing and tricking out a chair from a thrift store.  In the next round they made puppets.   Chelsea created superior puppets, but Aurora did voices and named her puppets in an excited 5 year old kinda way so she totally won that leg of the competition.

Photo by Mike Harper

Aurora had a huge fan club at the event.  Even, Isaac B. Watson from I Heart Art was getting in on her fan club by waving a huge sign that said, “show us your cleavage.”  If you know Isaac you know how funny and out of character holding a sign like that is for him.

Photo by Mike Harper

One of the many fun elements of this event were the bribes that contestants brought for the judges.  Here you can see Richard and Julie fighting over who will get the hand altered “Hans Solo” created by Aurora.  I’m pretty sure Richard was screaming something like, “I’ll cut a bitch for Hans Solo!”  But that’s what happens when you go to a rumble.  Things can get pretty ugly.

Photo by mike Harper

Another cool element of the Rebel Craft Rumble  was that contestants could have secret weapons.  Miss Demeanor had caution tape, which she used to weave a chair.  She also did sexy, yet almost threatening dance moves that were totally entertaining.  Check out the picture above and you’ll see what I mean.

Photo by Mike Harper

Here you can see Isaac in “jail” again.  Throughout the night many people spent time in jail.  Sometimes for running around and acting like a nut, as in Isaac’s case, others were jailed for not bringing the craft cop a beer or other acts of “doing nothing,” but no one spent as much time in jail as Isaac.  He was so rowdy.  Screaming and waving signs to Sister Diane that said things like, “Marry me!”  It was pretty awesome!

Photo by Mike Harper

I think this guy was jailed for doing nothing.

Photo by Mike Harper

As the night began we were legit judges as you can see in the photo below.  We were carefully thinking it through and weighing out our options.  But we kept getting drinks from contestants and from the audience, after awhile it became more and more challenging to judge people based on their projects.  The bribes, booze and entertainment of each contestant began to weigh more heavily.

Photo by Mike Harper

Here’s a link to a quick iphone video of a drink that was delivered to me.  Diane didn’t purchase this drink it was purchased by an audience member on Diane’s behalf.  I couldn’t get a good photo of it because it had been written on all the way around the cup, so a video seemed like the best idea.    Notice in the photo below the water has barely been touched but the beer cups are getting stacked up in the middle of the table.  We are also being presented with the whiskey shots at this time.

Photo by Mike Harper

Here are Bridget and Diane competing in the chandelier redux portion of the evening.  Bridget’s hot glue gun died, but Sister D was kind enough to share hers.

Photo by Mike Harper

Crafters came and competed hard!  After a few black eyes and copious amounts of hot glue Sister Diane came out victorious once again.  It’s hard to beat divine crafting.  Even the Chinook Book sign couldn’t handle the intensity of the rumble.  Look at it, trying to fall down for mercy and crying for it’s mama.

Photo by Mike Harper

All in all this is one of the most fun events I’ve been to in some time.  I highly recommend it to anyone who likes crafts, supports reuse, is a fan of friendly competition or really anyone who likes affordable fun!

by: jen

I thought it might be interesting if I posted a week in the life of Jen Neitzel.  When people say to me, what are you working on right now?  Most of the time I want to answer, “What am I not working on?”  I have a tendency to jump head on into projects and worry with details like time later when I’m knee deep in a project.  I always get the job done if it’s within my power, but I can really struggle at times because I have too many plates in the air at one time.  Sometimes I think that I shouldn’t commit to as many projects as I do, but ultimately I really like to be working on new and challenging projects and I don’t think I have as much of a need for down-time as the average person does.  I came out of the womb with an insatiable curiosity.  Learning and growing is way more interesting to me than down-time.  Not to say I don’t get any down-time, just maybe not as others require.

The biggest thing I’m spending my time doing at the moment is sewing and sewing and sewing.  I am a sewing machine.  Good thing I love to sew.  It’s very relaxing to me generally, but recently I’ve been so busy that it’s hard to feel that relaxing, meditative feeling that sewing usually brings me.  I thought it would be interesting or perhaps maddening to list the things I’m working on right now so it’s more obvious what I spend my time doing.

1. Sewing: I have been sewing tons of skirts with my friend Jocelyn.  We’ve started a line of skirts that are now available online on our Etsy shop.  If you want to see photos or learn more about us check out our blog on Tumblr.

2. Branding: Jocelyn and I have been working on branding for the new skirt line.  We order 3×5 postcards which we are using as hangtags on our skirts and as business cards/flyers at the moment.  We are making a sign for our booth and having a logo designed so we can incorporate it into business cards, letter heads and more.

3. Production Schedule: Jocelyn and I put together a production schedule for our sale so that we would be able to produce skirts in a timely fashion for our next sale at First Thursday happening June 2nd  from 5pm-10pm.

Jocelyn laying out our tree skirt design

4. Sponsors: I’ve been working on creating a sponsorship form for Bargain Hunting, so that we can offer businesses sponsorship packages in exchange for great online and print material marketing.  The form is really a collaborative project I’m working on with Angie Heiney and Julz Nally the other two organizers of Bargain Hunting.

5. Bargain Hunting Systems Management: I put together a graphics standard for us to use so that we’d all know the font, color, etc to use when creating graphic for Bargain Hunting.  I gathered all have the information and put it into a Google Doc. {Google docs are magical.  I don’t know how I ever worked with a team before them.}  We also created a Flickr page for Bargain Hunting.  I’ll be adding photos soon.

6.  Marketing: I’ve been working on stepping up my marketing knowledge for my various businesses and projects.  It has occurred to me recently that although I know a lot about marketing there is more that I could learn and should learn so that I can be as knowledgeable as possible.  The other reason I’m stepping up my knowledge around marketing is that there is always a new format, new information, new tricks out there, so staying up to date on what the new trends are is really important.   I’m working on adding a section to my website so that people could receive support from me around marketing or event planning, which are areas I have a lot of experience in.  Also, I really like helping people.  It’s sorta my thing.

7. World Domination Summit: I’ve been helping Chris Guillebeau, who writes for the blog The Art of Non Conformity with various aspects of his event, the World Domination Summit.  It looks incredibly amazingly cool and I can’t wait to attend!  Just recently I helped Chris line up a venue for the after party and next I’ll work on the Alberta Craft Crawl.

8. Video Editing: I’ll admit I haven’t had enough time to really work all that much on the encaustic video.  I am hoping to get back to work on it this week, but I have been working on some fun editing projects for friends and family to continue growing my editing skills.

9. Competitive Craft TV Show:  As if I wasn’t already busy enough, I was contacted by a company, I’m not going to mention them yet, because it might be a little early, but they are working on a competitive craft TV show and asked me to be involved.   I’ll just say I’ve been doing some things to help them out.   More on this soon, but I’m pretty excited about it.

10. I Heart Art – Mixer Match: I am in charge of all the food for the I Heart Art Mixer Match this Wednesday.  Mixer Match is basically like speed dating for artist/crafters and galleries/boutiques.  I’ll be prepping the food tomorrow and setting it up in the evening.  As if that weren’t enough I am also planning to make a digital flipbook for the Mixer Match, which involves me taking tons of photos at the event and this time I’ll bring an audio recorder too.  I’ll add some of the audio tracks and music and other sound effects to the photos (I will be shooting continuously/rapid fire) so that the video captures the event in a sort of artistic, moody way.

Kirsten Moore of Piper Ewan who is a member of the I Heart Art Leadership Counsel.

11. Fashion Show? I’m applying to have some of my work in an awesome fashion show that’s happening this summer and is hosted by 33rd Alley.  I can’t say for sure if the Jen and Jocelyn line of skirts will be a good fit for this fashion show, but I was encouraged to send in photos by one of the board members so what the heck.  Why not?

There are about a million other things I could mention that I’m working on, but they are to do with my son, house, husband, friends, dog and actually there are probably a few other business related things that I forgot to mention.  There are so many other projects that I’d love to start, like taking more photos, learning more about my camera, taking a woodworking class, reupholstering my couch and making some cushions for my basement benches and wow, I could really go on, but I’ll stop here.  OK, just one more, I’ve been thinking about piano lessons recently, but I know this isn’t realistic right now. (Do you see how my brain works?  Stopping is hard for me.)

DIY baby, gotta keep learnin’ and growing my skills. So this is a quick snapshot of what I’m up to professionally.  What are you working on?  I think it’s interesting to know what other people are working on as well.  What do you want to learn?  What do you hope to fit into your schedule soon?  Give me a moment of your time and tell me what you are learning, working on or want to learn.  Talk soon!

by: jen

Saturday, the 7th of May was the Crafty Wonderland Spring Sale and it was great!  I was working the I Heart Art booth, because I am one of the members of the I Heart Art Leadership Counsel.  All of the members take turns volunteering for this program.

If you’re not familiar with I Heart Art let me tell you a little about it.  I Heart Art is a collaborative project between PNCA, the Museum of Contemporary Craft, Etsy and the PDX Etsy Team.  This program is all about offering professional development in the form of workshops and events for Portland’s artists and makers.  These workshops and events are very affordable, as in $10 or free, which makes them accessible for everyone.  I helped set up the booth at Crafty Wonderland and also worked the first hour of the sale from 11-12.  We offered a coloring contest at the I Heart Art booth as well as information about the program.   I was surprised by how many people didn’t know about this amazing program.  All were really excited about I Heart Art once I filled them in on the program.

If you’re a maker and you’re anywhere near Portland
you should really consider getting involved with I Heart Art.

OK, back to Crafty Wonderland . . . usually I sell at Crafty, but this time I didn’t have enough time to build my inventory so I decided I’d wait and do the next sale (that is, if I’m juried into it).    After I finished my shift at the I Heart Art booth I was able to walk around and talk to people – vendors, customers and friends, which was wonderful! I got to see  Susan Beal and check out her new book, World of Geekcraft, which are available online or you can find them locally at collage.  I chatted with my friend Kirsten Moore of Piper Ewan and Cynthia Lucas of Bella Sisters.

The community of makers in Portland are a special breed of awesome!

Here’s a picture of the I Heart Art booth.  One of Portland’s special breeds of awesome is my friend Shawn Collins, who makes Fuzzy Lamps.  He agreed to help me with my volunteer shift at the I Heart Art booth.

Cathy and Torie do a great job organizing Crafty Wonderland sales.  The Convention Center was packed with cool art and crafts and tons of shoppers!  When I think of community, cool and creativity I think of Crafty Wonderland.  Hooray for Cathy Pitters and Torie Nguyen and the hard work they do putting on such a great sale!

After Crafty Wonderland  I went to a Kentucky Derby Party.  Overall it was a wonderful day!

by: jen

Eight years ago when I decided to start a small creative business there was one regular craft show that happened a couple of times a year.  If you wanted to get your wares into stores through either consigning or wholesale accounts you had to do all the leg work yourself.  First, you researched which stores might be a good fit for your product, pounded the pavement, set up appointments, hoped the store owner was available and best of all, they would want to carry your work.

That is why last night’s I Heart Art Mixer Match was so incredibly cool.  Think speed dating for artists, except instead of trying to get a date the artists were attempting to woo wholesale accounts with local store owners.

Artist (left) receiving feedback from local business owner Nicole Prevost, owner of Union Rose (right).

The event was put on by I Heart Art, which is a group devoted to advocacy, education and support for Portland’s vibrant community of makers.  This is a collaborative group between Etsy, Pacific Northwest College of Art, Museum of Contemporary Craft, and the Portland Etsy Team.

Store owner (left) meeting with Lea of LeaK Arts (right)

One thing that I thought was really interesting about this event was that there was a wide assortment of artists all looking to pitch their products to stores.  There were many new faces and many people who have been making and selling their product in stores for years.

New faces that are unknown to me.

Ordinarily pitching your work to anyone, especially a stranger, is a nerve-wracking experience.  As you can see this was practically a party.  I’m sure there were butterflies in the stomachs of some of the artists and yet this was an incredible opportunity for artists to connect with store owners, practice their pitch and grow their businesses.  This is one of the things I LOVE about Portland’s Crafty/DIY community – unique ideas and collaborations turning potentially painful situations into a good time.

More new faces.  I liked this shot because you can see the frenzy of store owners digging through this artist’s product.

In a perfect world artist walked away from this event with new stores to sell their wares, but in many cases it was just an initial contact.  A great way for stores to see what new locally handmade products are out there and for artist to have the opportunity to receive feedback about their work, their pitch and their overall presentation.

Left to right, Torie and Cathy owners of Crafty Wonderland meeting with the owners of Burdy Fly Away.

Not every artist had product that was a fit for every store owner.  In some cases when the store owner wasn’t interested in the product offered by the artist, so store owners gave constructive criticism with the goal of helping artists land that next wholesale account.  You could think of this as an opportunity for artists to have many informational interviews and brush up on their pitching skills.

Devi (standing) makes necklaces with bread tabs for charms, which are made of gold and silver.

In case you are wondering why the atmosphere is so unbelievably cool at this event, it was held at the Design Within Reach, which has some incredibly cool furniture.

Owner of  Moxie , (left) a local boutique in Portland, meeting with an artist looking to find some wholesale account love.

If you want to read more about this event check out  The Etsy Storque, Handmade in Portland, or The Garden of Leah.

by: Jen

So Richard gave you all the facts of the event, but I wanted to add my own two cents . . . two words:

Super fun!

When we walked in we were shocked at how many people were there.  At first we saw lots of people that we didn’t know, but looked very familiar  – possibly other artists that we don’t know, customers or craft fans.  Then all the crafty peeps we know started to appear.  It was nice to chat with people and talk about creativity.  Richard and I passed out a ton of biz cards.  It was so crowded that I lost Richard and it took me a while to find him again, but I didn’t mind I had plenty of other folks to catch up with.  When I did find him he was making crafty love to a crowd of women (this is what he does).  I tried to make it through the crowd to visit with my friend Cathy Pitters.  She was working the craft table and was gocco-ing her little heart out with a crowd of people waiting for their turn to make a gocco print.  On two or three occasions I tried to make it over to her, but swarms of people around her and her project made it impossible.

Richard and I were there to see the happs and to promoting our new TV show concept that we are working on with Patrick Cummings. We found some great artists who we want to feature in future episodes.  One of them is Rachel of Lucky Looloo who also moonlights as an art therapist.  Here she is pictured with Richard Fox.

I had to leave early due to prior commitments, but when I did Richard makin’ crafty love to all the ladies again and passing out more cards.  He was in his element – all smiles and charm.  What a fun night!  As if it weren’t enough to see all the craft kids, talk about common goals with the I Heart Art group and generally just hanging out, I must say that beer that costs the price of  a smile was pretty rad too!  It sorta felt like a crafty gala or something.  Everyone was dressed in their crafty best.  I am looking forward to more opportunities to participate in these types of events.  I would say that not only was this a productive gathering, but the I Heart Art event was a good time was had by all!

by: Jen

There’s nothing like a good mixer, especially one with great people, interesting and dynamic content and free beer.  Did I just say that?

Jen and I attended I Heart Art: Portland, a collaborative effort between Etsy,  PNCA ( Pacific Northwest College of the Arts), Museum of Contemporary Craft, and the Portland Etsy Team on Friday, February 26th. This was a meet and greet affair introducing this collaboration to the denizens of the Portland Arts and Craft scene.

To me this seemed to be measurably different from many of these events.  You felt a strong sense that the goal was to bring together the myriad amount of makers that navigate in this creative and crazy city.  Many faces familiar to me were in attendance but so many that I had never met were also there.  It was a great excuse to break out of the box that we often find ourselves in our respective communities as well as a way to increase my growing business card collection.

I’d be hard pressed to shed any new light on their goals which include some amazing workshops at PNCA as well as more events yet to come.  Please spend a little time visiting their respective sites to find out more about this amazing collaboration.

Cheers,

Richard