Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

beautifulpetunia… you appear to me to be a person who skillfully ties things together and keeps the conversation rolling. I love it!

Like sheamama, I have learned a lot through my struggle of starting an online store. Not only about how to operate and grow a business, but also about myself.

From one woman`s inspiration, Elusive Treasures was born.
..."I found this at the flea market. It looks great. Do you know anyone who would want it? I don`t want it to be thrown away. It looks new."

Without a real business name, we (my wife & I) started procuring decorative items by request for family, friends, and friends of friends. Eventually, we were collecting items people didn’t specifically ask for, and distributing them online. In the beginning, the purpose was to kind of “recycle” great looking, second-hand, or "Once Loved" items. It wasn’t long before we started buying product from local artists from time to time. It has been interesting finding our “voice” on the Internet. We love reselling Once Loved items. We also love being able to support the high quality, low production artists of the world.

Currently, Elusive Treasures provides mostly pottery, wood flowers, and a few easy to grow houseplants. We are continually updating and adding new items, while keeping the “human touch” element intact. We are a small operation now, but have plans to help set standards for recognizing quality artwork, outside the normal, mass production, distribution channels. Elusive Treasures strives to provide artistic, useful, earthborn & handmade products from professional, quality, artist’s.


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Vincent Wilcox (a.k.a. KRAKR)
Drummer
My band: Letters Make Words

Welcome Vincent & Wife!

Thank you much for the kind compliments!

I love your thinking with re-purposing "once loved" items!  On man`s trash is another man treasure as they say. I have to admit, I half-expected dusty knick-knacks in the "once loved" area, but BOY oh BOY your wares look Fantastic!

You have lots of great products on your site, I was digging (no pun intended) your ancient Egyptian wall art, heirogliphs are COOL!

I am glad you`re here and I look forward to hearing more fom you, from all of you!

Onward with our Green Ideas!

 

I agree.  I`m going to collect my thoughts & report back in the next few days.

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Christine Trice
Founder & President
Brown Bag Botanicals
877-SHEA NUT (743-2688)
www.brownbagbotanicals.com

Voted MOST POPULAR INSTRUCTOR at Borders Live Classes. visit www.bordersliveclasses.com & search Green Beauty Queen for class schedule.

Hi Vincent!

Birds of a feather....I also support local artists by participating in our city`s Second Saturday Artwalk.  It`s a year-round event that happens every 2nd Saturday of the month & brings local businesses together to support the local art scene. It`s been apart of Sacramento for years.  I`ve really enjoyed supporting other entrepreneurs trying to get the word out about their works while getting the word out about my products.  There are literally grids of town that participate, from spas & salons to boutiques, coffee shops & ofcourse the art galleries.  The entire midtown/downtown area is transformed into one huge artshow.

Anywho, I`m absolutely slammed with Christmas right around the corner.  The media has been very kind to my products & that always helps conversion.  But I`ve never been very skilled with my web presence.  My site looks great & serves as both a selling & informational site, but I dont market on the internet as agressively as I could.  I find that it even distracts me from other avenues of marketing & because I`m not overly savvy w/my technical skills, I think I have an aversion to really delving into that arena.  I`ve been VERY tempted to partner with a company or individual who`s genius it is to generate qualified traffic as well as sales to my site & give them a piece of the backend as long as we have a working relationship.  I`ve found that I`ve wasted thousands of dollars on various contractors who make lots of claims & dont supply the deliverables.

Do any of you have challenges w/internet marketing w/your products?  Do you handle this on your own or do you contract out for all your internet store needs?  I really appreciate your feedback!

Best,

Christine

 

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Christine Trice
Founder & President
Brown Bag Botanicals
877-SHEA NUT (743-2688)
www.brownbagbotanicals.com

Voted MOST POPULAR INSTRUCTOR at Borders Live Classes. visit www.bordersliveclasses.com & search Green Beauty Queen for class schedule.

Hi everyone!

I`d love to explore the option of creatinga green virtual shopping mall & maybe also integrate affiliate programs w/some of our sites where it makes sense to link exchange.

A fellow entrepreneur started a green community of entrepreneur products that`s web based.  I will look for his contact info & maybe we can create a joint venture.

Peace!
Christine


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Christine Trice
Founder & President
Brown Bag Botanicals
877-SHEA NUT (743-2688)
www.brownbagbotanicals.com

Voted MOST POPULAR INSTRUCTOR at Borders Live Classes. visit www.bordersliveclasses.com & search Green Beauty Queen for class schedule.

Me again!  Here`s the link to the site I mentioned about a minute ago:

www.greensociety.org

We met at a CEO retreat last winter & we chat a little bit about his concept.  Honestly, I forgot about our introduction until this discussion began.  Let`s check it out!

Best,
Christine




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Christine Trice
Founder & President
Brown Bag Botanicals
877-SHEA NUT (743-2688)
www.brownbagbotanicals.com

Voted MOST POPULAR INSTRUCTOR at Borders Live Classes. visit www.bordersliveclasses.com & search Green Beauty Queen for class schedule.

I know there are systems out there already, but I would love to team up with other entrepreneurs. I would like more earthborn & handmade products and to support the smaller manufacturers of those types of products. The problem is that I am not looking to turn my store into a link farm. I want first hand knowledge if I am representing or suggesting to do business with another “green” business.


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Vincent Wilcox (a.k.a. KRAKR)
Drummer
My band: Letters Make Words

Hello and Happy Friday!

Christine, I was checking out that link but nothing on the site seems clickable, is this just a placeholder for now?

As you great folks in California has extensive policies on recyling electronics, I am proud to report that us New Yorkers are catching a hint too! Mayor Bloomberg announced that we are implementing  mandatory recyling of rechargable lithium-ion and Nickle Cadium batteries!  Hooray! One small step!

Katt, I really like your idea! I have done some research on "green" malls in the past, and some of the biggest issues sellers seem to confront in this platform are: nickle and diming, lack of proper exposure, lack of local presence, lack of monitoring "greenability" (meaning sellers that are misrpresenting products as green, often at a lower price than the real Mccoy) I am sure there are other issues as well that I am not addressing...

I am working with a few companies now that appear to be pioneering some great efforts in keeping "green" sellers honest. I have a bit more homework to do on this, and them,  but as soon I can give my total vote of conifdence, I will update you folks with some recommendations.

In this marketplace it seems that you are either shelling out a few pints of blood for proper certification, or you are doing your own homework to ensure the "greenness" (probably not a word :) ) of your products. There is a middle ground here, there is a better way!

Your thoughts?