Aqua Lollipops for Mermaid Birthdays

Earlier this year, we created a special aqua color for a mermaid-themed birthday party, which was designed and created by the TomKat Studio. By popular request, we've made one more batch of aqua lollipops, in two of our delightfully kid-friendly flavors: Bubble Gum and Blueberry Muffin.

{ party photos courtesy of The Tomkat Studio
and taken by Vicki Lynn Photography }

You, your little mermaid, and her mermaid buddies will love them! We probably won't have time to make another batch before the end of 2012, so once these are sold out, it'll be a while before they're available again.

Next Crafty Caravan: October 18th

Quick announcement for Seattle area folks - I’m part of a small group of local artists called Crafty Caravan. Most of us have shops on Etsy, and we have developed an intimate traveling craft show that will periodically do shows in a few local independent cafés.

The next edition of Crafty Caravan is Thursday Oct 18 from 9 am - 12 pm at the seriously awesome Wayward Coffeehouse in the Roosevelt neighborhood. Any shop that takes inspiration from Joss Whedon's Firefly is ok in my book.

I'll have all of This Charming Candy's lollipop variety packs with me, plus Greatest Hits 2012. If you've got something specific that you want to be sure I have with me, drop a comment below or send email to thischarmingcandy@gmail.com and it'll be packed up and waiting for you at the show.

Whether you're a parent looking for a bit of adult time or a regular haunter of coffee houses, we hope you'll join us for a morning of laid-back caffeinating (oxymoron?) and shopping.

What I've Been Reading

Two main topics worth sharing this time around, I think.

1) Etsy is the main selling channel for This Charming Candy, as you probably have noticed ;-) A large chunk of Etsy's original vision and mission is about enabling micro-businesses where the shop owner is the maker of the products that are for sale. Some of Etsy's growing pains deal with what they call having "production assistance".
Can Etsy Go Pro Without Losing Its Soul?

"While the site wants to remain an accessible entry point for newbies, it doesn’t want the narrative arc for successful sellers to arrive at the inevitable plot point: “And then I started a real business.”"

and

"A seller designing objects that others build is not an Etsy aberration—it’s a crucial part of Etsy’s envisioned future."

This Charming Candy currently has an Etsy-legal, properly disclosed, and I might add thoroughly kick-ass kitchen assistant. You can read a little blurb about her on the shop's About page.

2) A friend posted a pointer to an article about the importance of knowing under which conditions you might want to to say "no" to a customer's request for your business.
The Power of No

"It’s easy to feel like we need every single customer – but we don’t. We just need the right ones."

That article was written with product-based businesses in mind, but I think the principles apply to any company that cares about its brand. It reminded me of a similar post from about a year earlier, published by my friends at the
Dr. No: Embracing the most important word in business

"When you are truly hungry as a business owner, it can be tempting to see all food as nourishing. That project you would have turned down in the good ol’ days, suddenly looks pretty good. “Just this one time,” is what you tell yourself. But then another customer comes to you with a very similar request, inspired by the great work you did on that other project, and so you say “yes” again. Things start to feel a little better with a steady flow of work, and the money is coming in. But one day you wake up and realize that you aren’t doing the type of work that you really want to be doing, and you wonder how you got in this predicament. No amount of messaging can turn around perceptions, for your body of work has defined you."

Lots of food for thought.

Custom Label Service

Custom labels... they're not just for weddings anymore.

This summer we were chosen to create 2500 event favors for the Canadian Tourism Commission. Our Maple Sugar flavor was a natural fit for them, of course. They provided us with their logo design for the lollipop bag labels, and the final product looked great -- not that I'm biased or anything!

Canada: keep exploring
custom lollipop favors
photo by Heather Immoor

The turnaround time for custom projects such as this is approximately 5 weeks. This allows for time to update the designs to your specifications, and to get the labels printed and hand-applied to each individual bag before your candy is made to order. Otherwise, we'd be unwrapping and re-wrapping candy once the bags were ready - which would be not very efficient!

You needn't supply us with artwork if you prefer simply to update the text on our existing label designs. That's what the John Fluevog shoe company did, when they chose us to create favors for the opening of their company "Flueseum" in Calgary, AB. They selected Blueberry Muffin flavor, which they re-christened "Flueberry Muffin" for their party:

Photo by Heather Immoor

If you're planning an event for which you'd like to have custom lollipop favors, please contact us - thischarmingcandy@gmail.com - and we'd be delighted to work with you.

Halloween is Coming!

photo by Kevin Keeker

Boo! This cute little ghost is hanging on tightly to her Maple Sugar lollipop because Halloween is just around the corner, on Wednesday October 31st. Do you have your costume yet?

If you’re including lollipops at your party or for trick-or-treaters, the U.S. order deadline is Tuesday October 23rd.

• After the 23rd, you can take your chances, or choose expedited shipping when you place an order in our Etsy shop.
• Last-minute Seattle-based shoppers can also choose local pickup for Oct 28 or 29.

The international order deadline is nearly upon us: Monday October 8. And of course, earlier is always better for international shopping, because packages can take an unpredictable amount of time to clear your country’s customs/import procedures.

Thank you, and Happy Halloween! Seattle readers, stay tuned for news about our adult trick-or-treat event…

Etsy Gift Cards

Have you heard? Etsy recently announced some pretty cool news. This fall, they'll begin selling Gift Cards that customers can use in any shop that uses Etsy's credit card processing system -- which we do.

If there's an Etsy addict in your life --ahem, maybe that's you-- consider getting her an Etsy Gift Card so she can go on a shopping spree through her favorites. If it were me, I might nab this travel mug:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/78471884/mr-t-tea-travel-mug-double-walled

or maybe indulge my out-of-control handmade bath & body obsessions some more:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/76518855/peppermint-patty-creamy-body-butter

The point is, a gift card lets you "treat yo self"!

http://www.etsy.com/listing/93454081/treat-yo-self-embroidery-hoop-parks-and