GetCrafty Craft Facts

Q: Jig - The Olympus - for making professional wire jewelry designs. Transfer any paper design to wire using a clear acrylic jig with 481 holes. Just insert the removable pegs, and create your own unique designs. See lots of pictures and check out our special pricing through February. Full retail price ($49.94) on the Olympus starts March 1st.

A: This is to share with you my extreme distress over a web site I just visited. On this web site, there is a carefully worded statment made that implies retailers use tubes and hanks to deceive their customers about the quantity of beads. The implication is that they are the ONLY honest retailer, and they know this: "because we wholesale". AND, while I agree that bags are certainly less expensive, and easier for the retailer to handle, members of this news group, of the "Bead-List" and my "earthly" customers have often let me know they much prefer tubes to bags, mostly because those bags often split after a few months - thus fine for the short shelf life in the shop, and horrid for you, the beader. The cost of a tube is about 10 times the cost of a 'ziplock' baggie. Either way, I pack one way for the shop, and another for when I am on the road, and as a result of your opinions expressed here, I am moving all of my stock into tubes without increasing the cost to you. I am appalled by this - FIRST because it implies you, the consumer are so easily fooled (not my experience) and SECOND, it insults the many honest retailers - the ones who sell by the PIECE, or by WEIGHT - not by bag, tube, or hank. It is my hope that when you see such statements, you will use your intelligence and realize that such a blanket statement serves no purpose, and let these folks know that they are unfair to the MANY, MANY honest retailers you have known, and dealt with - both online and on earth. I wish I were within driving distance of your studio. What this world can use is more honest retailers, such as yourself. It is my experience that quality usually wins out, and the best do the best. Your shop is probably busy most of time. One thing to remember: Never attribute malice to a thing that can be easily explained as stupidity. My assumption was that they wanted to lift themselves up by means of putting others down. Never a good thing. Consumers learn quickly who is honest, and who is not, and vote with their feet. When I lived where I had a choice of beadshops, I ALWAYS chose the one who put beads in tubes, because it saved me from having to buy beads, look for tubes, bottles, etc., and transfer the beads. I hate having them in baggies, because I always spill (yes, I'm clumsy). I long for a bead shop like yours where the desires of the customer comes first. Hang in there, and don't let the bastards wear you down.