Etsy Shop is Coming Back!

After being absent from Etsy for almost a year and a half, I have decided to re-open the ANiemanDesign shop.

There is nothing in there quite yet but will be filling up fast and soon. In the next couple weeks I hope to return some of my current inventory back to the shop. I realized I do not have time to work on custom orders so it will only be pre-made items.

I miss my creative outlet and want to work on more of my crocheting and photography on my down time. Look for more posts about when the items hit the store!

Stairway in Snow

Source: bistropetit.tumblr.com via A. Nieman Design on Pinterest

Big Cats Love to Play in Snow

Source: fabforgottennobility.tumblr.com via A. Nieman Design on Pinterest

Snow Covered Tree

Source: thebookofsecrets.tumblr.com via A. Nieman Design on Pinterest

Cool Stuff

Blue Door Photography - Santorini Greece - Photos of Doors - Mediterranean Home Decor - Blue and White - Wall Art

Yellow Love PIllow

The Moment Silke Meets Hugo- Limited Edition Print

Bright Citrus Crochet Cotton Washcloths or Dishcloths

More Garden Pictures

Guest Blog Series!

I am going to be starting a guest blogger series. I would like to invite anyone who enjoys blogging and would like to write an article for my blog to contact me. I am looking for people with similar interests as myself, including but not limited to interior design, fashion, etsy and crafting?


You can contact me via Etsy or twitter or email.


I am looking forward to your ideas!
Have a nice day!
Ali

Item of the Day 9.1.09

The Taller the Bamboo Grows, the Lower It Bends-Set of 4 Functional Fine Art Coasters

Photographers of Etsy

Today I was featured on the Photographers of Etsy Street team blog!

Please check out my photo along with some other very talented artist!

Photographers of Etsy

Have a wonderful Day!

Item of The Day 8.18.09

This piece of art would be a great jumping off point for an inspiring room!

Reflecting Branches

A Nieman Photography

Here are some images that can be found on my other Etsy shop:

A Nieman Photography

Some New Art

Last night I was working on my mini-portfolio for work and decided to have some fun with some of my photographs. Here is one of the pieces I worked on last night!

New Title, New Purpose

Today I changed the title of my blog. Since I have finally gotten a job in my field I have changed the main focus of my blog to Design. I will still have posts from time to time on my crocheting and photography but they will not be the main focus of my articles.

I believe that I am finally embracing my career and am going to use my blog to help aid it's growth. I plan to keep my readers informed of the sales, events, and new products at La-Z-Boy Furniture. I also plan on providing information on trends and news in the interior design world. I would like to try and use this blog as a marketing tool for my career and eventually start my own business through it( long term goal).

I will still update on my Etsy shop, as it is still a great hobby of mine, but I will not have the time to make it my main form of business. I had to choose between design full time and Etsy full time and I chose design.

I hope you enjoy and continue to follow my work.

Thank you!

ANiemanPhotography

Fourth of July on Etsy

A "Real" Artist not a "Cheap" Artist

I've been think about the pricing in my photography shop and wondering if I am selling myself short. Someone told me that I was in my crochet shop and that I should not settle for less that what the quality of my items demand. I don't want to be thought of as a "cheap" shop. I put a lot of hard work and effort into my items. So a little while ago I raised some of my prices so that my shop would not look "cheap."

I think of it this way. I want my shop (ANiemanCrochet) to look like a Sleek Contemporary Crochet Shop, as my tag line states. Look at it a month ago it did not resemble anything like what my tag line suggests. Over the past month I have put a lot of effort into cleaning up shop and I think it is coming together nicely.

The economy is difficult right now but I do not want to cheat myself. I could have a profitable, successful business if I make the right moves. Making cheap items and pricing them cheap is one thing. Making quality items and pricing them accordingly is another. I have a great deal of pride in my products.

In the beginning I was afraid of overpricing but after two years on Etsy I think I have seen what people list at and what people are willing to pay for things. My lack of business, I can safely say is not due to my pricing. It has everything to do with my marketing. This is a huge revelation and I am glad I have finally come to it.


This leads me to my other shop. Looking around at the other photographers on Etsy, I would have to say that my images are cheap. I believe that I am a great artist, although still learning a lot about photography and my skills. I am cheating myself of what my art is really worth. So therefore I no longer will be selling my at a such a cheap rate. My prices will increase by the end of this month.

So why and I announcing this? Why not just do it and hope no one notices? This is why:
I want people who do notice to understand why I am doing so. I also dislike companies that keep things from consumers. I also want people who do pay attention to my blog or shop to be able to have a last chance to purchase my art at the lower pricing. It is only fair to give you a chance to buy my art at a lower price and hopefully you will come back when they are at higher prices because you think that my art and customer service is worth it.

Thank you for your time!
Have a Great Day!
ali

Its Friday!

Well, I don't have too much to talk about today. Its been a pretty uneventful week as far as the shop are concerned. I have had another week of no sales. I really feel that I need to promote myself more, but with the lack of funds to do so it is quite hard.

I know I should be blogging more but I am drawing a blank for what I should be talking about. I need some topics. So I am calling for TOPICS!

Please leave some comments or feedback with some topics you would like me to cover.

Some things about me that you might need to know:
I have a degree in Textiles and Clothing focusing in Residential Design from OSU.
I work at Dillard's full time.
I am the owner of both ANiemanCrochet and ANiemanPhotography.

Thanks for your help!

A Great FREE Photo Editor

I've been having a dilemma ever since I graduated from college and could no longer use my school's Adobe Photoshop to edit my work. I absolutely loovvve Photoshop but boy is it expensive and on my hourly wage I cannot afford it. So I started looking for a new way to edit my photos.

For a while I had been using Google's Picasa2, which is great for basic editing and resizing, etc, but it lacks the advanced tools I used with Photoshop. My main goal was to find a program with which I could add my copyright to my photos that I sell on ANiemanPhotography. Since I sell my photo's as image files I did not want anyone to be able to copy paste my images onto their computer. Adding the copyright limits the use of these photos. I also resize the images to prevent theft as well.

The first thing I did was search the internet using one of my favorite sites Downloads.com This is a site that you can use to download programs for free, either free programs of free trails of programs. After some searching and reading of user ratings I found PhotoSccape.

Photoscrape is great to use for resizing, brightening, adjusting color and adding text. There are also some cool affects you can use to blurr unwanted company names. Like I did for my coffee cozy photo's, where I used a Leading coffee chain's coffee cup and blurred out any promotional type.

Another one of my favorite tools is the screen capture. This tool allows you to take a "picture" or screen shot of your computer. This can contain the either the full screen, the window or just a region of the page. I used it in my last post to put a picture of my hearts. I just updated it and they added some new tools such as splitter and layering. I have yet to play around with them but will soon.

I think this program would be great for Etsians who don't want to pay a ton for a photo editing program yet be able to edit their photos so they look wonderful in their shop.

I paid $50 to fill up my car

As many of you may be feeling the pain at the gas pump, I found myself to be as well. Just Saturday on my way home from work I stopped to fill up my gas tank as it was on E and paid $3.99 /gallon. I don't know what to say really. It literally hurts when I have to spend that much to get from here to there.

Luckily I don't have far to drive for work and can stretch my tank out pretty far. My car gets pretty bad gas mileage so we tend to take my boyfriends car when we drive anywhere of great distance. I would take the bus to work but there is no bus stop on my street or near my street. I live in a small township so there are no sidewalks and very few bus stops.

I would ride my bike if it was practical. I have to dress up for work and would work up quite a sweat riding to work. And frankly my bike sucks and I can't afford to buy a new one. (DO NOT go to Toys R US if you plan on actually using the bike you buy. It may be cheap, but it is cheap.)

I wish I could work support myself on my crocheting and photography. Working from home would be ideal! Thats my ultimate goal. I also have a degree in Interior Design and would love to do that as well from home. Unfortunately the economy is not the greatest for design firms and starting one right now is risky business.

If things do get better for me I will pursue these goals more vigorously. Right now is about saving money and surviving. With gas going up to potentially $9 / gallon, things are going to get tough. Its about making it through and being positive.

One WHOLE Day Spent on Etsy

Due to my spend to pay the bills, I have to work somewhere other than Etsy. I wish I could spend all my time and efforts on my crocheting and photography but many factors are preventing me from doing so.

So I finally had a full day to do nothing but Etsy. As I have said before in previous blog posts, I pulled out of the gift shop that I had been selling in and as a result have a large amount of inventory that I needed to post on my shop. Yesterday I finally went through a great deal of it.

Here is a list of the links to the items that I added yesterday:

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11928423
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11918736
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11917830
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11905465
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11904629
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11903682
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11902586
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11887029
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11886873

I think this is the most items I have posted in one day!

I also worked on my Flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aniemancrochet/. I haven't really done much with this site since starting but I figured out how to do certain things like add my photo's to group pages.

Also I put some more bids on ad space with Project Wonderful. I have definitely noticed my views increasing since I started using Project Wonderful. This is a site that if you put more money into your going to see more results. I will say though with my less than $5 a week budget I have been putting into it I think I have been getting my money's worth. I would definitely suggest this site to other Etsians.

As you can see I had a very productive day. OH! and almost forgot! I had my 1st international sale! The sale was to Japan. Despite the distance and not having a scale at home I did not under estimate my shipping. Having a good experience with selling international makes me more confident about doing it again.

The only thing I did not do yesterday was blog! Ha!
Thanks for reading!
Have a Nice Day!