Sell Your Work, Prevent Domestic Abuse & Empower Women

My name is Angie Spoto. I am the co-founder of a nonprofit online boutique called Uncovered Artistry Boutique (www.uncdoveredartistry.com). Our mission is to empower domestic abuse surivors emotionally and financially by selling their work in our store. We are hosting our Grand Opening this Friday the 23rd. Since we have just started a couple months ago, we ony currently have one artisan. In order to exapand our inventory and to promote our mission, we are asking certain Esty sellers to sell products on our site.

We are interested in any type of work that in some way is related to domestic abuse, sexual abuse, or the empowerment of women.

Here is how it would work:
1. We would post your products on our website in a very similar format to Etsy. We would like to use your photographs and, for the most part, your descriptions.
2. When a customer purchases your product through our website, will will email you a purchase order. (So for example, if after a week we receive three orders for a specific product, at the end of the week will will send you the purchase order requesting the three products.)
3. You will ship us the items, which Uncovered Artistry will purchase from you at the price you have posted on Etsy. Payment method is up to you. We are willing to use Paypal.
4. UA will ship the products directly to our customers. (With an okay from you, we'd like to use our own packaging for brand/consistency reasons. Of course, we would love to include your business cards and mention your Esty site both on our website and in the packaging)
4. All the proceeds from the selling of your product (UA will sell your product on our site at a higher price that what you sell it for on Etsy) UA will donate to a local domestic abuse shelter.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Angie Spoto
Co-founder Uncovered Artistry Boutique
www.uncoveredartistry.com
suavoce.etsy.com

Top 10 Most Useful Articles for Your Etsy Shop and Website

As an Etsy shop owner and founder of a new non-profit online boutique I’ve done hours upon hours of online research on just about every aspect of my businesses. Now I want to pass on this valuable information to you! Below is a list of my top ten most useful articles to help grow and develop your Etsy business. Above all though, the #1 best way to success is experience and A LOT of hard work!

Be sure to check out my blog for more useful articles and tips: http://uncoveredartistry.blogspot.com

Good luck!

Sarah

La SuaVoce Designs

Uncovered Artistry Boutique

www.uncoveredartistry.com

1. How to Make an Inexpensive Light Tent- Absolutely the best advice I can give anyone struggling with photos! I used to wait for the right light, the right day, and the right location to take my pictures. Now I just flip on the desk lamp over my light box and get going! And the pictures hardly need any editing. Did I mention I have a tiny, inexpensive digital camera too? See it to believe it! Look below for photographs I took with the new light box.

http://digital-photography-school.com/how-to-make-a-inexpensive-light-tent

2. Selling Your Work Wholesale: Tips, Resources, and Links- This is a forum post I wrote a few months back that features a compilation of useful tips and articles for the crafter who is ready to go wholesale. http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=6249261

3. Why Your Story is Everything- In the handmade sector, your story really is everything. You aren’t just selling your products, you are selling yourself! This podcast is a good reminder of this and gives its listeners some sound advice on creating and communicating your own unique story. To see an example of Uncovered Artistry’s story follow this link: http://www.uncoveredartistry.com/About_Us.html

http://www.craftypod.com/2010/07/02/craftypod-118-why-your-story-is-everything-with-tara-gentile/

4. 100 Blog Followers in One Month: Tips for Getting new Blog Followers- Written by a fellow Etsy seller, this forum post has great advice for getting followers to your blog. Plus you gotta love this author! Her blog is one of the most interesting I’ve ran across.

http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=6461436

5. Maintain Confidence in a Competitive Market- An inspiring article that helped me get out of a rut.

http://www.designspongeonline.com/2010/06/biz-ladies-maintain-confidence-in-a-competitive-market.html

To view the rest of this article, please visit our new blog at:

http://uncoveredartistry.blogspot.com/2010/07/top-10-most-useful-articles-for-your.html

Tips for Social Networking- Small Businesses

The first thing a start-up business can do is establish its social networking sites online. Social networking sites, like Facebook, Twitter, and Blogspot, provide small (and even large) business with effective free marketing tools. The first thing we did—before we received our grant—was create this blog. We’ve had blog experience with our previous business (La SuaVoce Designs suavoce.etsy.com). We found that by writing a helpful or interesting blog post once a week or so brought traffic to our blog and consequently to our online shop.


• We suggest using blogspot.com because they allow people to “follow” your blog. This means that when your followers sign into their blogspot.com accounts, the title and first few lines of your more recent blog post will appear on their home page...

Want to read on for more advice about social networking? Check out the rest of this article at our newest blog: http://uncoveredartistry.blogspot.com

Sarah
La SuaVoce Designs
Uncovered Artistry Boutique

Uncovered Artistry Boutique: Empowering Domestic Violence Survivors

We are dedicating the this summer to creating and establishing Uncovered Artistry Boutique. Uncovered Artistry Boutique, operating out of Hampton Falls, New Hampshire, is a non-profit online and catalog retailer that sells the finely crafted work of domestic violence survivors and distributes the products throughout the country. The business will has two main goals. First, it provides an outlet for domestic survivors in America to sell their artisan work, thereby providing them with financial independence and personal confidence. Second,Uncovered Artistry educates our customers about domestic violence in order to raise awareness and eliminate stereotypes.

Please visit our new blog at http://uncoveredartistry.blogspot.com

and our facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Hampton-Falls-NH/Uncovered-Artistry-Boutique/101220443257694?ref=mf


Angie and Sarah

Are you ready for this?

Welcome to the new and improved SuaVoce blog! My sister and I are happy to announce that we are giving this blog a serious makeover. The blog will now focus more on providing valuable resources to crafter-entrepreneurs like us. Below are some articles you can be on the look out for...

Marketing Toward College-Aged Women
The Perfect Banner...Simple and Direct
Think Like a Business...Think BIG
Are You a Socially Conscious Business?
Who Said You Can't be an Entrepreneur?

We are also happy to take suggestions about new articles.

Also, I wanted to mention a couple great sites that featured La SuaVoce's blog or products.

Gracie's Eggies' blog:
http://www.gracies-eggies.blogspot.com/

Visit her gorgeous Etsy site at:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/gracieseggies

Also, makingjewelrysupplies.com featured our blog. Check them out too!
Jewelry Making Beads

As usual, Happy Creating! And don't forget to check back for some great new articles and a new look!

Sarah
La SuaVoce Designs

Support Entrepreneurs All Over the World!

My church sent me a wonderful Valentine's gift. It was a gift certificate to Kiva.org, a site that allows you to lend micro-loans to struggling entrepreneurs all over the world. This isn't a charity. The loans help the entrepreneurs fund their businesses and the businesses help support these people. It's a beautiful cycle! Also, the money you lend will be returned to you eventually, and you can choose to keep it or lend it to another entrepreneur.

Happy Valentine's Day!
Sarah
La SuaVoce Designs

In Need of an Update!

Hi all,

SuaVoce's blog is need for an update! Since you've last heard from us college-student-business-owners-sisters (yikes!) we were just heading back home for our winter vacation. Well, we are back at school now and, as usual, life is crazy.

Some things we've been preoccupied with...
-Creating new Jane Austen greeting cards (in time for Valentine's Day). Check them out here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/SuaVoce?section_id=6276613

-Planning a possible new business (non-profit this time) that supports artisan work of domestic violence survivors. Updates coming!

-Learning some invaluable information in our accounting and financing classes. I seriously recommend that all Etsy-sellers learn a bit (or a lot!) about accounting. You'd be surprised how organized the information will make you.

Till next time... Happy Creating!

Sarah
La SuaVoce Designs
http://suavoce.etsy.com