A Bummer

We got our deposit for a couple of shows returned with the following letter today. Seems the economic hard times have hit the local show promoters, which is really no surprise - a disappointment, for sure, but understandable. The note from Jeff reads in part:

"It is with my sincere regret to announce the cancellation of all 21st Century Shows scheduled in 2008 and 2009. The sluggish economy, reluctance of dealers to travel to shows, weak customer spending, and continuing increase in the costs of renting facilities, advertising, and energy costs, have forced us to make this decision which we feel is in the best interest in our dealers and customers."

Bummer, like I said. (Interesting to note, though, that it was just last week that we ran into this same person at the international airport in Atlanta, where he was returning home from making a purchase of 10,000 license plates. I know that you have to invest in your business in order to grow it, but maybe he could have managed to put on a few of the shows instead of canceling ALL of the them had he not decided to buy all those mother lovin' pieces of metal? Just a thought.)

So that freed up our calendar a bit, again - there's a show that we had rejected out of turn because it was immediately after one of the 21st Century Production ones, so we'll look into getting into that. And we've been able to book a spot in this fall's Antique Alley show on November 9th in Bellair Bluffs. This is one of those shows that we've faithfully attended as shoppers for years now and have had our eyes on as dealers. Last spring we failed to get called on the stand-by list; this time Bob was proactive and gave the organizer a call to see if any spots had opened up. (The squeaky wheel gets the grease!) And what do you know - she had a dealer cancel due to medical reasons, so in we've squeezed.

I think that we'll find other shows to cobble together the season, but perhaps they won't be what we originally planned to do - I'm not averse to some creative thinking :-)

A Jewelry Purchase

Here's a photograph of a jewelry lot purchase made this week in St. Petersburg. My magpie eye did the choosing, I'm afraid, and I probably passed over some other, perfectly wonderful pieces in favour of these that most definitely caught my fancy.

They range from an Austrian brass belt buckle that's inlaid with enamel and malachite; to a Peruvian stylized bird brooch of hand hammered, oxydized sterling with plain sterling silver overlay; A Taxco pin by Bernice Goodspeed; a figural brooch of sterling and mother of pearl; a Norwegian sterling and enamel bar pin; a German pendant of an Edelweiss flower; a Star Trek-like pin with an onyx stone; an old Mexican brooch of a flower basket with green turquoise stones; a cross-hatched rectangular sterling pin; a cast sterling bracelet with a lovely turqoise stone with fine spider veins - it doesn't show at all in this group photo, and a pair of Georg Jensen earrings that have been converted to clutch-back from screw-back type.

Quite a lovely collection, if I say so myself - and I sure have, haven't I?