Consignment shops vary widely. Once Susan suggested this little used clothing shop in a nearby town for me to put our cards into. She had scoped it out (Susan loves driving around … it helps her balance herself and feel free). We put our goods into the car, loading up boxes and baskets of cards and prints. Then we went off on an adventure!

Sebastian in Butterflies, Digital © Diane Clancy

I went in and poked around for a few minutes to get the vibe of the place to make sure that it didn’t feel awful or totally inappropriate for out work. I wasn’t real enthused, but Susan had taken the time to check it out and I want to support her choices. So, I introduced myself as I was spreading a sample of our cards.

Intuitively I realized that letting my paintings speak for themselves is a powerful marketing tool. So I keep a sampling in a plastic bag to be able to spread them out like one would spread a deck of cards. Most people, not all, find something they like from my sample of cards. That doesn’t mean they will buy, but they enjoy looking at them … and that is a good first step I think. (I need to figure out how to get to the next step better).

She agreed to have our work there on consignment. She mentioned that most people came for tanning and not to buy the clothes … but it seemed worth a try since we were there and had the merchandise right there. I put out a basket or two of our cards with a price sign. We agreed I would call periodically and see if there were any sales … and we wrote up an informal agreement.

It was several months later that we went for another adventure (with many more in between I am sure) and stopped by the shop again. Since nothing at all had moved, I went in and told her I wanted to remove the cards. I had the paper work with me and made sure I counted all the cards to make sure they were there.

One of the issues that needs to get worked out as we drop off our cards, is who takes the responsibility if things are stolen. I was just as glad to take out our cards from there. The people were nice enough but it didn’t feel like a good match.

But some people had be exposed to our work (lots of people did look she said) and we learned more about marketing. Since Susan felt inclined, it was certainly worth trying … but in the future we would pass on a similar [tag[venue[/tag]- especially one that we had to spend time and gas to get there. But it was part of our learning experience.

About Sebastian … here he is in butterflies instead of flowers. Here he is in flowers. I want to let you know that when I get a photo of your animal, all that matters is that the photo of your special friend is a good quality of your animal. I cut your pet out of the background and insert them into a file I have with about 50 layers. So, incidental backgrounds are not important.

Of course, the higher the contrast between your friend and the background, the easier and cleaner it is to cut them out. Also, remember I have to put them into a field, so how much of them you give me … or how they are standing or lying, is what I have to work with. But I have quite a bit of experience with being flexible with all this at this point … I have worked with many images!

Thank you for following y journey!! I am always glad to hear about yours!

~ Diane Clancy

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