Updating all of these social media tools proves to be nothing short of stressful. CRAZY. I wish they could all combine into one epic site. It would save everyone tons of trouble, but I suppose some of the fun would be taken away.
E-mailing is the easiest. Check your Inbox, Delete or Reply accordingly. Simple. Done!
Websites, well I guess our website is the easiest for me, because I have absolutely no idea how to do anything with it. Thanks Mom & Jim!
Facebook is my favorite. I began using it when I enrolled in college and got a .edu e-mail. Back when Facebook was exclusive. Now I'm friends with everybody and their mother (literally). As a business woman this is great, it allows me to keep in touch with so many people, past and present, all in one place. I do my best to try and keep my personal page personal, BUT not SUPER personal, where I am spouting about my drama and pissing people off. This works well for me because when I decide to do a little business advertising, my currently 1,382 Facebook give me quite a possible audience for advertising.
Making a Facebook business page was an obvious step for me. I hate it when you look up a business and they don't have a Facebook page, UGH, now I have to look up their website. I'm not sure what is worse though, not having a Facebook page, or having one and not updating it for years. Get out in the real (cyber) world folks! Now that I got one of those fancy smart phones (of course just for business purposes) I had to figure out a way I can update the shop page more often. Facebook Page Manager it is! Boy, it really limits the functions one can do as a business, but my phone keeps doing some updates, I hope it improves ASAP.
LinkedIn - is that how its typed? This is all a new thing for me. It took me HOURS to create a profile, filling all of the tiny little details that would never fit on a proper one page resume. The hardest part for me? Finding a "professional" photo! I think that other people have the same problem, I notice a bunch of blank LinkedIn versions of "profile pictures" - is that what it is called? So similar to Facebook, but somehow much more intrusive, which makes it more professional? I feel like some identity thieves would LOVE LinkedIn as a tool. I'm finding that I only updated my status once, not sure what is appropriate to be saying. I'm just slowly collecting friends and creeping along, maybe someday I will be as proficient as I am with Facebook.
Twitter. OVERWHELMING. We took a class "What the Heck is Twitter and Why Should I Care?". I was left caring about Twitter, but still very uncomfortable with the whole process. I think I need to spend some time grouping the pages that I'm following, into pages that I might like to "Retweet" their posts. Right now I am overwhelmed with news twitter updates, which is great for my personal knowledge, but news and politics are not something a glassblowing studio should bring into their business. (We may lose some friends)
Instagram. Easy-ish. It's annoying how I can't take photos on my good camera and upload them on the Instagram. My fancy phone is a terrible photo taker. I like the cool effects that you can make the photos, pretty awesome to check out. We actually have some followers on Instagram, which is cool to see. Basically I spend a total of 5 minutes on Instagram a day, posting a few photos, putting some weird hash-tags and linking it to my Twitter. Two points for Dom.
Blogger. Do you remember when you were in college and you used to get "writers block" over these short little page papers. You build it up in your mind to be the end of the world, oh so much time and effort. When you sit down you find that you actually enjoy writing and it isn't that difficult in the slightest. That is how blogging has become to me. To be described as a rewarding burden. Slightly difficult because the whole time you're typing you're wondering - "Do people really care about this? Does anyone care about what I have to say?" OH WELL. Read, don't read, poke fun, at least I snatched a minimum of a second of your brain power. MWUAHAHA
Etsy. Oh Etsy. Etsy is an amazing site, it really is. It is a LOT of work. Everyone wants to know if our stuff is available for sale online, complaining if its not. When we only have a couple things on our Etsy site we get complaints. When we have a bunch of stuff on our Etsy site, we get no sales. I know that we really need to establish an Etsy presence, connecting with other artists there. We need to build a regular customer base and hold strong. It is hard when my mom, Jim, Josh and I are trying to run a pretty monstrous studio, attempting to sell stuff out of the shop, and constantly updating/deleting our glass on Etsy. Also, the cost to keep our stuff up there is a small hindrance on our Etsy money-making progress.
Now you know my "educated" opinion - feeling smart yet?
Have a lovely Saturday!
Saturday, September 21, 2013
Thursday, September 19, 2013
1,005 Facebook "likes"
Today is a small celebratory day, we have hit 1,000 Facebook "likes" and even gone 5 more over!
Boy 1,005 is a beautiful number. Soooo proud!
Like most fall days, today was a day of pumpkin making
What a workout!
We then went on an adventure to J.P. Stephen's Restaurant and Tavern in Rindge, NH to bring some more glass for display. It is such a beautiful location, and an honor to be represented there
Oh wait, wait, it DOESN'T END THERE
We went off to the Shattuck Golf Club, right at the base of Mt. Monadnock. I think I mentioned before, they are letting local businesses make a little fall set-up. Great advertising. They let us take a golf cart tour around the whole course!
Boy 1,005 is a beautiful number. Soooo proud!
Like most fall days, today was a day of pumpkin making
What a workout!
We then went on an adventure to J.P. Stephen's Restaurant and Tavern in Rindge, NH to bring some more glass for display. It is such a beautiful location, and an honor to be represented there
Oh wait, wait, it DOESN'T END THERE
We went off to the Shattuck Golf Club, right at the base of Mt. Monadnock. I think I mentioned before, they are letting local businesses make a little fall set-up. Great advertising. They let us take a golf cart tour around the whole course!
Exciting, exciting, exciting. Look at that beautiful landscape. I love New Hampshire.
The last photo is of our little setup. We are going to go back tomorrow and tie our sign up between the two trees, up nice and high. We also want to buy some bales of straw and put some of our glass pumpkins around the area.
Jaffrey
I will blame the couple day lapse in my blogging to productivity.
I would now like to discuss how much I love our new community.
It is great to feel proud of the place I both live and work. There
is nothing more satisfying.
I grew up 20 minutes away from here with "Massholes". Immediately upon driving over the boarder into New Hampshire the attitude changes.
Imagine walking down the sidewalk and having someone stop every time you simply glace at a crosswalk. WHAT!
My first time trying to pull out of a parking spot in downtown Keene, someone let me go!!
I just couldn't understand it!
After being transplanted here, I have finally found that there is hope for this cruel world. There are individuals in this community that actually care about you. People that actually want to help, without the sole purpose of benefiting themselves. Seeing the bigger picture, we can all be successful together.
Free time is nonexistent to me, especially with a new/very old house and a brand new business. Of course I am the type of person that isn't satisfied without completely overbooking my time and working myself into the ground.
With this in mind, you can understand why I joined TEAM Jaffrey. I had high hopes for this organization, having an opportunity to be directly involved in community activities. My mindset was; if it isn't what I expected, its only three year commitment. I enjoy all time I spend working my house and on my business, if meetings and events are the only drudgery work I do in my young life, it won't kill me.
I love it. I am at loss for words to truly express how proud I am to be a part of an organization with such an amazing purpose.
I promise to tell you a little about the upcoming ideas and events TEAM Jaffrey has in mind. NEXT TIME on "Behind the Scenes at Terrapin Glass" - from the viewpoint of Dom... duh duh duh
I promise to tell you a little about the upcoming ideas and events TEAM Jaffrey has in mind. NEXT TIME on "Behind the Scenes at Terrapin Glass" - from the viewpoint of Dom... duh duh duh
Well, I promise to write more often. I also promise that I won't have to make this promise again.
I will reach out and see if we can get Jim on here as well. Give us some words of wisdom Jim!
Monday, September 16, 2013
Cheryl
This blog post is going to be dedicated to our student Cheryl who was in yesterday. Cheryl started blowing glass by taking a weekend glass at Snow Farm. For those of you wondering what Snow Farm is, check this link out http://www.snowfarm.org/ . Cheryl has probably been taking classes with us for over a year now and her work is an inspiration for all. She doesn't come every week, sometimes she only comes once a month. When she does come to glass class, she kicks some serious butt, regardless of what is going on in her outside life. Yesterday she came in and worked with weird shoulder injury. Throughout the summer she continued to come in, facing the heat, even after having surgery. Cheryl's work yesterday was bigger than she has ever worked, with cane, and every single piece made it to the box. The look on her face after those two incredibly successful hours was priceless. GO CHERYL!
Sunday, September 15, 2013
Sunday Funday
I can already tell, making interesting titles for my posts will pose great difficulty. I have the same problem with our facebook page, creating different albums every day for our different class photos.
We teach so many classes, and I like to put up pictures of all the different people that come and learn in the studio. I think it is also great because then our students can find photos of themselves blowing glass.
But, back to the original topic, creative titles. Difficult! I have now gone to a standard, date of class, what they wish to learn, people in the class type of title system. I suppose this will make it easier for our students to find photos of themselves in the future, but it is boring!
Back in my good old college days at Frankie P, we used to do what we called - "Sunday Funday". Today's title will be a testament to my younger days and how much I have grown up in the adult world (ha!).
Sundays are a great day at the studio. We often get a lot of visitors, we always have a renter, and the weekends are a favorite for students to schedule lessons.
Today's agenda is as follows -
Our friend/renter Mark & his doggy Lela are up visiting from CT. He is working by himself today practicing pumpkins and whatever he feels like working on. He began working today at 9, and will conclude whenever he feels as though his leisurely day of glass is over. Mark is lucky enough to have a wonderful full-time job down in CT that supports his glassblowing addiction. We keep trying to convince him to move to New Hampshire anyway, so much better than Connecticut.
We then have our student Barbara in for a two hour class and our other student Cheryl for a two hour class. 10 to 12 and 12 to 2. These two ladies are awesome. We offer a bulk class deal, 12 hours of private lessons, we are ecstatic when people sign up for it. Teaching beginner lessons is fun, giving everyone a taste of glass and watching them leave with such an appreciation for glasswork. But, to actually watch an individual grow and progress, ah, its amazing. Glass addicts everywhere!
After that, we have a woman named Angela coming in with 4 other people and we will teach them a beginner class. It is always fun to watch a group of people, that already know each other, learn together. It leaves leeway to laugh, joke, poke fun, and congratulate, all in good spirits.
One last thing to talk about, Colleen's work party yesterday! Awesome! What a great group of people! They got through clear flowers, colored flowers, and a colored ornament. Colleen also had time to do a pumpkin demo for everyone to see. Hopefully we will see some of those great people back for another class. I think it was amazing for Colleen to be able to show the people that she works with, her private weekend obsession, GLASS! <3
We teach so many classes, and I like to put up pictures of all the different people that come and learn in the studio. I think it is also great because then our students can find photos of themselves blowing glass.
But, back to the original topic, creative titles. Difficult! I have now gone to a standard, date of class, what they wish to learn, people in the class type of title system. I suppose this will make it easier for our students to find photos of themselves in the future, but it is boring!
Back in my good old college days at Frankie P, we used to do what we called - "Sunday Funday". Today's title will be a testament to my younger days and how much I have grown up in the adult world (ha!).
Sundays are a great day at the studio. We often get a lot of visitors, we always have a renter, and the weekends are a favorite for students to schedule lessons.
Today's agenda is as follows -
Our friend/renter Mark & his doggy Lela are up visiting from CT. He is working by himself today practicing pumpkins and whatever he feels like working on. He began working today at 9, and will conclude whenever he feels as though his leisurely day of glass is over. Mark is lucky enough to have a wonderful full-time job down in CT that supports his glassblowing addiction. We keep trying to convince him to move to New Hampshire anyway, so much better than Connecticut.
We then have our student Barbara in for a two hour class and our other student Cheryl for a two hour class. 10 to 12 and 12 to 2. These two ladies are awesome. We offer a bulk class deal, 12 hours of private lessons, we are ecstatic when people sign up for it. Teaching beginner lessons is fun, giving everyone a taste of glass and watching them leave with such an appreciation for glasswork. But, to actually watch an individual grow and progress, ah, its amazing. Glass addicts everywhere!
After that, we have a woman named Angela coming in with 4 other people and we will teach them a beginner class. It is always fun to watch a group of people, that already know each other, learn together. It leaves leeway to laugh, joke, poke fun, and congratulate, all in good spirits.
One last thing to talk about, Colleen's work party yesterday! Awesome! What a great group of people! They got through clear flowers, colored flowers, and a colored ornament. Colleen also had time to do a pumpkin demo for everyone to see. Hopefully we will see some of those great people back for another class. I think it was amazing for Colleen to be able to show the people that she works with, her private weekend obsession, GLASS! <3
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Its the weekend!
The weekend for us = our busy time.
Yesterday was actually a very busy day as well. I met the owner of the Inn at the Tartan Fox in Keene, as well as the owner of the Benjamin Prescott Inn literally two minutes down the road from us in Jaffrey.
I love this area. The more people I meet, the more I love it. These two individuals have great things going on in their businesses, and they wish to extend it out to other local businesses like us! Both of these inn's brought home some glass to put on display and for sale on a consignment basis. Works great for everyone! Hopefully we can continue meeting people, making these connections, and helping everybody out!
Yesterday was also exciting on the topic of our interns. We are always trying to reach out and help students in the area. We do this by giving them experience helping us in the hot shop and teaching them what we know. It is very much a work/learn exchange. We get some much needed help, and they get to experience the wonders of glass. It is also a great resume builder.
Over the summer we had an art student named Haley who came in to help us. Haley turned out to be so reliable, loved glass, and is transferring to Keene State. Keene state is only about 25 minutes from us and she only has three hours left on her internship. Therefore, Haley has agreed to come on as an employee to help us sporadically throughout the school year. She is also going to be representing us at our booth during Keene Pumpkin Fest, which is our biggest event of the year. Thanks Haley, great job!
Yesterday we met a new volunteer intern, Abbi. Abbi took a glassblowing class over the summer and wrote us a letter requesting to do an apprenticeship with us. We aren't comfortable with the word apprenticeship because we are nowhere near master glassblowers, but we could use some help! Abbi will be coming in to help us in exchange for being able to hangout in the studio and learn about glass. Boy, we love being surrounded by people that think glass is cool! Yesterday was Abbi's first day and she did great. Very excited to see more of her. See you next Friday Abbi!
Boy, so much happened yesterday! In the middle of all these appointments, we also managed to make almost an annealer full of pumpkins. I injured my jaw and have been out of commission for over a month now. Yesterday was my first day of actually blowing glass. Time to commence PUMPKIN MANIA in preparation for all of our fall events.
So the Shattuck Golf course has opened up free "vending" for local businesses. They have a bunch of visitors throughout the fall, leaf peepers. We are working on a setup to represent us. It has to be outside, and it has to last safely throughout one whole fall month. Yesterday I spray painted a trash barrel black on the outside, and orange on the inside. I also spray painted a stool black. This will be my representation of a glory hole. Josh and Abbi helped me begin a glassblower scarecrow. Hopefully I will have some time this weekend to continue working on it
Sad news for us is that today we were supposed to be attending the Antrim Home and Harvest Festival, which we will not be able to do. Anne Marie is sick, and we have our wonderful friend Colleen bringing all of her coworkers into the studio for a team building workshop.
I will let you know how the workshop goes though, very excited!
Thanks for reading!
-Dom
Yesterday was actually a very busy day as well. I met the owner of the Inn at the Tartan Fox in Keene, as well as the owner of the Benjamin Prescott Inn literally two minutes down the road from us in Jaffrey.
I love this area. The more people I meet, the more I love it. These two individuals have great things going on in their businesses, and they wish to extend it out to other local businesses like us! Both of these inn's brought home some glass to put on display and for sale on a consignment basis. Works great for everyone! Hopefully we can continue meeting people, making these connections, and helping everybody out!
Yesterday was also exciting on the topic of our interns. We are always trying to reach out and help students in the area. We do this by giving them experience helping us in the hot shop and teaching them what we know. It is very much a work/learn exchange. We get some much needed help, and they get to experience the wonders of glass. It is also a great resume builder.
Over the summer we had an art student named Haley who came in to help us. Haley turned out to be so reliable, loved glass, and is transferring to Keene State. Keene state is only about 25 minutes from us and she only has three hours left on her internship. Therefore, Haley has agreed to come on as an employee to help us sporadically throughout the school year. She is also going to be representing us at our booth during Keene Pumpkin Fest, which is our biggest event of the year. Thanks Haley, great job!
Yesterday we met a new volunteer intern, Abbi. Abbi took a glassblowing class over the summer and wrote us a letter requesting to do an apprenticeship with us. We aren't comfortable with the word apprenticeship because we are nowhere near master glassblowers, but we could use some help! Abbi will be coming in to help us in exchange for being able to hangout in the studio and learn about glass. Boy, we love being surrounded by people that think glass is cool! Yesterday was Abbi's first day and she did great. Very excited to see more of her. See you next Friday Abbi!
Boy, so much happened yesterday! In the middle of all these appointments, we also managed to make almost an annealer full of pumpkins. I injured my jaw and have been out of commission for over a month now. Yesterday was my first day of actually blowing glass. Time to commence PUMPKIN MANIA in preparation for all of our fall events.
So the Shattuck Golf course has opened up free "vending" for local businesses. They have a bunch of visitors throughout the fall, leaf peepers. We are working on a setup to represent us. It has to be outside, and it has to last safely throughout one whole fall month. Yesterday I spray painted a trash barrel black on the outside, and orange on the inside. I also spray painted a stool black. This will be my representation of a glory hole. Josh and Abbi helped me begin a glassblower scarecrow. Hopefully I will have some time this weekend to continue working on it
Sad news for us is that today we were supposed to be attending the Antrim Home and Harvest Festival, which we will not be able to do. Anne Marie is sick, and we have our wonderful friend Colleen bringing all of her coworkers into the studio for a team building workshop.
I will let you know how the workshop goes though, very excited!
Thanks for reading!
-Dom
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Jaffrey Chamber of Commerce Breakfast with Annie Card Creative Services
This morning Jim and Dominique went on an adventure to the Woodbound Inn to have breakfast with the Jaffrey Chamber of Commerce.
This blog post is written through the perspective of Dom. I plan on having everyone take their turn to write blog posts, hopefully this will be successful and interesting to all.
I have not explored much of the Woodbound Inn, and today we got to experience a whole new little building around the back. We ate some breakfast and spoke with our neighbors for a bit before our speaker began. Today the speaker was Annie Card, who also helped our business when we were first starting up. She did a "Marketing Fitness Test" to help your business increase awareness and increase visibility. We are proud to say that we did very well on our test, a small reward for all of our hard work. One of the things that we lost points on was not maintaining a business blog. Here we are now, giving it a try!
At the end of the meeting a representative from the Shattuck Golf Course handed out fliers asking for vendors at "Shattuckfest". A vendor sets up a business display with a sign for free to decorate the golf course. Apparently the golf course does some very exciting activities in the fall including golf cart rides showing the foliage! Time to start brainstorming the kind of setup we may like to do! ... hmmm.... Glass pumpkins, a bale of straw, a glassblower scare crow! Oooo the possibilities. Maybe a "glory hole" and a bent blow pipe display. We need to have it figured out, and set up by September 20th.
Today will be a good day at the studio. I am still fighting a jaw injury, so first I will go to my physical therapist. While I have my appointment, Josh will be teaching our regular student Christine. What she wants to work on, I'm not sure. Christine is an amazing student, always present and focused throughout class. Every time she is in the studio she makes huge strides of improvement, it is wonderful to watch.
After Christine's class we have one basic intro class with two woman. Then we will begin working on making more small pumpkins. Today we are letting the furnace get really low, basically emptying out the pot.
For those of you that don't know what I'm talking about - We have one large furnace that runs at 2075 degrees all the time. Inside the furnace is a ceramic pot that holds 135 pounds of glass when it is full. After almost every work day we "charge" the furnace; we throw more glass inside. Overnight the glass melts down and the bubbles that got trapped between the nuggets of glass floats to the top.
Today we are letting the furnace get low for two reasons -
1. We keep finding little rocks in our glass and we want to make sure there aren't a bunch of them floating around in the furnace. If there are we may need to address an issue with the "crown", the ceramic chunks that sit over the top of the furnace. We also want to clean out as much of the rock chunks as possible so that they don't interfere with our work, our renters work, and our students work.
2. It is time that we start with some fresh glass. My comparison for this is as though you are constantly cooking a pot of chili. Everyday you add fresh ingredients on top of the chili. Eventually you want to empty that pot and start fresh. If you don't you will have chewy, stringy, overcooked chili. There is some glass in our furnace that is overcooked and it is time to start anew.
Well, I'm off to check e-mails and get settled before today's "real" work begins!
This blog post is written through the perspective of Dom. I plan on having everyone take their turn to write blog posts, hopefully this will be successful and interesting to all.
I have not explored much of the Woodbound Inn, and today we got to experience a whole new little building around the back. We ate some breakfast and spoke with our neighbors for a bit before our speaker began. Today the speaker was Annie Card, who also helped our business when we were first starting up. She did a "Marketing Fitness Test" to help your business increase awareness and increase visibility. We are proud to say that we did very well on our test, a small reward for all of our hard work. One of the things that we lost points on was not maintaining a business blog. Here we are now, giving it a try!
At the end of the meeting a representative from the Shattuck Golf Course handed out fliers asking for vendors at "Shattuckfest". A vendor sets up a business display with a sign for free to decorate the golf course. Apparently the golf course does some very exciting activities in the fall including golf cart rides showing the foliage! Time to start brainstorming the kind of setup we may like to do! ... hmmm.... Glass pumpkins, a bale of straw, a glassblower scare crow! Oooo the possibilities. Maybe a "glory hole" and a bent blow pipe display. We need to have it figured out, and set up by September 20th.
Today will be a good day at the studio. I am still fighting a jaw injury, so first I will go to my physical therapist. While I have my appointment, Josh will be teaching our regular student Christine. What she wants to work on, I'm not sure. Christine is an amazing student, always present and focused throughout class. Every time she is in the studio she makes huge strides of improvement, it is wonderful to watch.
After Christine's class we have one basic intro class with two woman. Then we will begin working on making more small pumpkins. Today we are letting the furnace get really low, basically emptying out the pot.
For those of you that don't know what I'm talking about - We have one large furnace that runs at 2075 degrees all the time. Inside the furnace is a ceramic pot that holds 135 pounds of glass when it is full. After almost every work day we "charge" the furnace; we throw more glass inside. Overnight the glass melts down and the bubbles that got trapped between the nuggets of glass floats to the top.
Today we are letting the furnace get low for two reasons -
1. We keep finding little rocks in our glass and we want to make sure there aren't a bunch of them floating around in the furnace. If there are we may need to address an issue with the "crown", the ceramic chunks that sit over the top of the furnace. We also want to clean out as much of the rock chunks as possible so that they don't interfere with our work, our renters work, and our students work.
2. It is time that we start with some fresh glass. My comparison for this is as though you are constantly cooking a pot of chili. Everyday you add fresh ingredients on top of the chili. Eventually you want to empty that pot and start fresh. If you don't you will have chewy, stringy, overcooked chili. There is some glass in our furnace that is overcooked and it is time to start anew.
Well, I'm off to check e-mails and get settled before today's "real" work begins!
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