Pick Up Sticks Retailers – Find Your Favorite

Just one example of the Pick Up Sticks necklaces jewelry you can create after locating your favorite Pick Up Sticks retailer.

We’re always telling you how much we love our Pick Up Sticks retailers, and we try to feature one of them in a blog post on a regular basis.  But have you found one near you?  Do you have a favorite Pick Up Sticks retailer of your own?

If you’re really going to go green and support your hometown economy, there’s nothing like shopping and buying locally.  Pick Up Sticks retailers already know how fabulous the line is, and they’ll show you their bestsellers as well as what’s new.

Probably one of the greatest advantages to buying from one of our retailers is that they’re happy to help you assemble your necklace and bracelets once you find the perfect combination of charms and trinkets.  They can keep you informed about when new designs arrive so that you can add to your collection.  Another benefit of buying from a local retailer is that  you don’t have to pay for shipping.

And if you are looking for a favorite charm from the past that might have been discontinued from our line, call around to a few brick and mortar Mom and Pop stores to see if they have it in stock. Often you can find special charms that aren’t available from an online store.

As you already know, getting your hands on Pick Up Sticks is a satisfying shopping experience – they’re even better in person than in these pictures!

You can always go to our website and find a store carrying Pick Up Sticks near you.  Or check out the links in the column on the left of this blog post – we’ve been pleased to link to several retailers who asked to be included here.

Happy shopping. If you already have a favorite Pick Up Sticks retail store, let us know who they are so we can give them a shout out on our Facebook page.

If all your best efforts to find a local retailer are unsuccessful, suggest to your favorite store owners that they carry the line.  And finally, if all else fails, or if you’re living in a remote area that only the UPS guy can find, you’re welcome to shop the Pick Up Sticks retail website.

Pick Up Sticks – Glena’s Favorites

When we started talking about favorite necklaces a few weeks ago, Glena, like Candace, was unable to narrow her choice to just one.  Like some of you out there, she wears Pick Up Sticks every day, mixing and matching various charms and trinkets.  But we did get photos of her favorite combinations – here’s what she had to say about them:

“My newest favorite charms is DT011. The saying on the front and back, “My child”, and “Born to Fly” is perfect for me since my son is a pilot. I wear the charm both front and back, with the Bali Spacers, PT167, and my son Cameron’s, initial, CWIOC.  This charm is ideal for all mothers to wear, because we all know that our children are born to fly and succeed – mine just choose to do it in a helicopter.  And of course I couldn’t be any prouder of him.”

“I love wearing a 36” stainless steel necklace with a collection of charms and trinkets added, because the long necklace goes perfectly with my winter sweaters.  My latest choice is ANO62, ANO64, PG147, PT185, and PT183.  I’m loving the bling of the new trinkets and the messages, “fly baby fly” and “it takes courage to become who you really are” remind me to do the best I can every day, and most of all—don’t sweat the small stuff. When I change my sweater and my mood, I use the “magical clip” and simply add different charms that match both.”

Like Glena, the rest of us find it tricky to narrow our Pick Up Sticks choices to just one or two necklaces, and given the versatility of our two-sided charms and the ease of using the magic clips, you don’t have to!

Pick Up Sticks Employee Favorites – Candace’s Choices

If you’re one of our retailers, we hope you’ve been fortunate enough to meet Candace, the Pick Up Sticks girl who enthusiastically greets you in the booth at market and takes your order when you phone or e-mail the office.  She’s indispensable as well as being our biggest fan.  We couldn’t do our job without her.

When we asked her to tell us about her favorite necklace, charm and trinket combination, she couldn’t limit her choice to just one.  So here are a couple. .

In Candace’s words:

“I love to wear the My Family charm (DT010) with the  You & Me 4 Ever (BB012). I wear the BB012 on the 4ever side because the wording on both of those charms side-by-side sums up the lifetime dream I have, which is that my family will be forever. Another great perk of wearing these two charms together is the fact that the colors match perfectly, and are sure to bring attention to them (just another excuse to brag about my family). I wear the Bee Necklace (NK004) with these two charms because it reminds me to always ‘Bee’ thankful for my family.”

And for her second choice, Candace says:

“Here is another favorite family-related combo. I am wearing the  Two In Love (LV050) with the Bubble “J” (BBIOJ) and a Magnifier trinket (PT182)  on a 36” Stainless chain (SS036). I really like the 36″ chain because of its simplicity and perfect length, which allows me to layer it with my other favorite necklaces. The LV050 means so much to me because I have the best little girl I could have ever prayed for due to my husband and me falling in love. The BBI0J is my new favorite initial because of its bright eye-grabbing colors, and because it describes my life perfectly with my little Jemma in it -Jubilant! Lastly, I chose the magnifying glass because it symbolizes my love for my family. It magnifies with every new day. . .”

Do you have a favorite necklace combo?  We’d love to hear about and see it. . .just e-mail a description and images to us at marketing@pickupsticks.net and we may feature it on Facebook or right here.

Pick Up Sticks – Valentine’s Day Ideas

We’re exactly a month out from Valentine’s Day, and if you’re like most of our retailers, you know that this holiday is a sales opportunity you don’t want to miss.  According to a 2012 study by the National Retail Federation, “Love may not cost a thing, but consumers this year are set to spoil their friends, family and loved ones this Valentine’s Day in a very big way. According to NRF’s 2012 Valentine’s Day Consumer Intentions and Actions survey, conducted by BIGinsight, the average person celebrating the holiday will shell out $126.03.”

To help you steer your customers in the right direction,we’ve put together a collection of great ideas for anyone on your Valentine gift list.  At Pick Up Sticks, we believe in showing your love to your best girlfriends as well as the women in your family.  Check out our favorite charms for best friends. . .

As well as Mom. . .

And Grandmother. . .

And Sisters. . .

February 14 is an especially good time to catch the impulse buyer, the last-minute shopper who runs in the door looking for inspiration. It’s our suggestion that if you haven’t already, you add a display near your cash register or check out area with a few necklaces put together, or have your employees wear a fun necklace or two reflecting a very personalized “love you” message.  One of our floral retailers offers an initial charm tied with a ribbon around each vase that goes out with a dozen roses.

We’d love to hear your ideas for Valentine’s Day sales as well.  Feel free to comment here or send your photos to marketing@pickupsticks.net.

And of course, Happy Valentine’s Day from Pick Up Sticks Jewelry!

Pick Up Sticks Retailer of the Month – Blackbird Art

This month’s Retailer of the Month, Blackbird Art located at Ocean & San Carlos in Carmel, California (831-624-8688), gets the prize for being the place we’d like to visit most this month. With winter creeping into New Mexico, spending a few days in Carmel definitely sounds like something that would make us smile.

Deborah Vielle of Blackbird Art (aka Doud Craft Studios) says that Pick Up Sticks Jewelry is something that makes her smile. “When I think of Pick Up Sticks,” she says, “I think of a quality, affordable product that really sells itself! The simplicity of the styles makes it appealing to a wide variety of customers.”

Carmel is a unique location that attracts people from all over the world and Deborah says its great to see people of all backgrounds who really enjoy shopping at Blackbird. She’s noticed that Pick Up Sticks seems to bring people together. “Creating a personal necklace and finding a charm that is perfect for themselves or a friend just makes for friendly and often humorous exchanges it makes people laugh and feel good.”

When we asked her why she chose Pick Up Sticks over some other image-based jewelry, she had a quick answer:  “When something works as well as Pick Up Sticks, I don’t mess with it! I think what is unique to Pick Up Sticks is that there is a strong and winning combination of humor and heart and we appreciate that and need those reminders.”

“And the photo of Sabrina and Glena kind of says it all! It is the PUS attitude that really attracts and resonates with many, many women!”

Deborah has good advice for displaying and merchandising the line as well.  “Don’t be shy! Have a large selection and let your customers have access to it. I have it readily accessible so that my customers can turn over images and enjoy reading and begin to connect the message on the charm to themselves or a friend.”

“I find my customers just naturally begin to build a necklace and that it is important then to have a good selection, I try to keep up with the initials especially and frequently call Pick Up Sticks for fill-in on the four initial styles I carry.”

Yes, four.  That’s what she said. Like some of our other retailers, Deborah at Blackbird Art has found that having a variety of initial styles available makes for very happy customers.

We asked her what she sells the most:  “We sell lots of the queens, the word candy, several initial styles. I have just experimented and found strong sellers from several categories…we replace our inventory frequently.”

Deborah gets to work in a beautiful place, and we like that she is so positive about her Pick Up Sticks experience.  She tells us, “I really appreciate the great personal service I receive from everyone at Pick Up Sticks!”

We appreciate Deborah and Blackbird Art. We just wish we could fly in for a weekend of shopping this month.  Now wouldn’t that be perfect?

Pick Up Sticks and Pinterest – Part I: How We Do It

We don’t know about the rest of you, but if you had asked us a year ago whether we were on Pinterest, our response would have been a puzzled, “Huh?”. And I’m pretty sure we would have said, “Nah, we’re not getting involved in another social media platform.”

Today it’s a different story.   In January 2012, comScore reported that Pinterest had 11.7 million unique visitors, making it the fastest site ever to break through the 10 million user mark.  Crazy numbers like that combined with the fact that Pinterest users actually stay on the site longer than users of other social media sites got us to thinking.  Could Pick Up Sticks benefit from a Pinterest page?  And could our followers provide us with design inspiration?

Of course we weren’t the only ones thinking that way.  There are now hundreds of blog posts and articles and webinars about how small businesses can use Pinterest to drive traffic to their retail websites.

We’re doing this post in two parts:  this week we want to show you what Pick Up Sticks is doing on Pinterest so that you might be inspired to try something like this for your business.  Next week we’ll actually give you some concrete information and links on using Pinterest for small businesses so that you can research it further and decide whether a Pinterest board might work for you.

Here’s the link to our Pinterest page and boards:  http://pinterest.com/pickupsticksj/ .  Once the boards were created, we invited some of our faithful customers to become curators or contributors to our boards.  You can do the same – the instructions for letting other people contribute to your boards is in the Pinterest help menu, which is under the “About” button on your Pinterest page.

Once the potential contributors received the e-mail inviting them to pin to our boards, they were off!  Our contributors exceeded our wildest expectations.  Sabrina asked them for color ideas, “less than 7 words” quotations, vintage photos, and several other board topics.  As you can see from the page, these women found some great ideas.  And in the process they repinned Pick Up Sticks images so that buyers unfamiliar with our product might click through to our websie to get more info.

We’re really proud of our Pinterest page.  Our contributors have been so industrious that we sent them all a Pick Up Sticks surprise recently.  The process has opened up a dialogue with the contributors that allows them to show us what they like and what they want to see in the future. Because this is an ongoing process, having the page keeps both pinners and followers engaged and returning for another look.  All of which adds up to our being better able to keep the customer happy.

That’s what it’s all about when you have a small business, we think. The very best thing about social media is that it has given us a way to interact with our fans and find out what they like best and want most.

Stay tuned for next week’s post when we’ll share ideas other businesses are using on Pinterest.  And if you’re so inclined, feel free to visit our Pinterest boards and repin some of our images.  We’d be happy to do the same for you – just comment below with your Pinterest page URL.

And Happy Pinning!

Pick Up Sticks heads to London!

Black cabs, double-decker buses, Harrod’s, Buckingham Palace, fish and chips, Westminster Abbey, and from what we hear, warm beer.  All symbols of London, and just part of what we plan to experience when we travel across the pond in September to our very first European market experience at Earl’s Court Exhibition Center in Olympia, London.

The show is called “Top Drawer” (which we love), and from what we hear, ” Top Drawer is a unique retail buying event, giving your company unrivalled access to the most influential buyers in the UK. It combines the most stylish gift brands from the UK and Europe with high-end buyers.”  That’s the spiel on the website.

It all looks incredibly hip.  Sleek.  Very European.

Pick Up Sticks Booth – we think we’ll fit in perfectly with the very sleek and hip Europeans. . .

And it gives us a chance to see how Pick Up Sticks will fare in an international market.

We already have a great following in Canada, and we’re hoping this trip will give us an excuse to travel to someplace like Paris or Dublin in a couple of years to meet more retailers!

All we know is that we’re excited and very anxious to meet folks in Europe who have never seen Pick Up Sticks. If you happen to be in the neighborhood, or if you know a European retailer who might like to carry Pick Up Sticks, we’ll be in Booth J80 at Earl’s Court Exhibition Center on September 16, 17 and 18.

If you’re a retailer in the UK who’s interested in ordering Pick Up Sticks before we arrive for the show, contact us now.  You could have the line established in your store and an exclusive for your area long before we arrive.

We can’t wait.  See you at Big Ben!

(London photos courtesy of Top Drawer website)

Pick Up Sticks and Mother’s Day

“Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” ~Elizabeth Stone

At Pick Up Sticks we love this quote.  It’s true that there is nothing in the world quite like being a mother.  The way we feel about our own mothers is another matter completely – they are the places where our heart first found itself.  Mother’s Day gives us the perfect opportunity to show them what they mean to us.

Beyond the sentiment of motherhood, there is the fact that as retailers, Mother’s Day give us a great way to honor the incredible women in our life.  But better than that, it’s an amazing retail opportunity.

Research shows that beyond the winter holidays (Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanza), Mother’s Day is the second largest consumer spending holiday.  According to the National Retail Foundation, the average person will spend $126.90 this year on Mother’s Day gifts.  Total spending is expected to exceed $14.6 million (www.nrf.com).  We love those numbers!

You’re a smart retailer.  You already know that Mother’s Day brings an entirely new (and frequently bewildered) crowd of buyers into your retail space – husbands with no clue, children with a pocketful of change, even teenagers in a hurry.

Ordering Pick Up Sticks charms geared specifically to Mother’s Day provides you with a quick and very affordable way to turn all those lookers into buyers.  Check out these designs and beef up your inventory with several of each.

If you can, create display space near your cash register with loose Mother’s Day charms for those buyers who simply can’t make a decision about how best to treat Mom.  Put together several necklaces for staff to wear to give your customers great buying ideas.

Tap into the national buying trend this Mother’s Day.  And give your customers a whimsical, sweet and sentimental way to honor the amazing Moms in their lives!

Pick Up Sticks Design Contest Winner – The Mole Hole of Somerset, KY

We thought holding a contest to find the best displays from Pick Up Sticks retailers would be great fun – give us some new ideas, show us how all of you out there do it. . .We just had no inkling how tough it would be to pick a winner.  But we have, and we’re pleased to announce The Mole Hole of Somerset has taken the cake, set the standard, seized the prize!  And won themselves $200 of wholesale jewelry by doing so.

Are these displays great or what?  We especially love the dog, which The Mole Hole calls Pick the Dog.  Their story is that they found him waiting outside the front door one morning and decided to let him in for a while.  He was so grateful that he chose to make himself useful, and has been displaying their Pick Up Sticks jewelry since day one.  He makes us laugh out loud. . .

And these framed, themed displays?  Rosa from The Mole Hole says, “One of our employees keeps a large supply of scrap-booking materials – vintage papers, stickers, quotes, decals, etc.  We thought the concept behind Pick Up Sticks would be enhanced by displaying similar subjects in a shadow box or frame. . .”

We agree.  Using vintage materials to display Pick Up Sticks, and doing it in such an appealing way (hmmmm – a frame within a frame?) is a great way to sell jewelry.  You make us proud, Mole Hole, and you’ve given us some great ideas so share with other retailers.

By the way, you can find The Mole Hole at 370 S. Hwy 27 in Somerset, Kentucky, or follow them on facebook.

Thanks to all of you who entered the contest – we posted the runners-up on Facebook, and may have space here to show you some of their amazing displays in the future.  It really was a daunting task to choose the winner – we’re blown away by how creative ou retailers have been with their Pick Up Sticks displays.  Can’t wait to see how you wow us next time!

March Retailer of the Month – Lancaster Jewelers of Lancaster SC

Want to know the top 5 reasons to visit Lancaster, South Carolina?  Well, here they are:

1.    It’s the boyhood home of our 7th president, Andrew Jackson.

2.   It’s nicknamed The Red Rose City.

3.   It’s the home of Lancaster Jewelers.

4.   It’s withstood 2 American wars – the Revolutionary and the Civil War.

5.   You can shop at Lancaster Jewelers!

Did we mention Lancaster Jewelers twice?  There’s a reason.  We think they’re fabulous, and they’re Pick Up Sticks Retailer of the Month for March.  You can find their very versatile jewelry and gift-filled retail store  at 1548 Great Falls Highway (803-289-1100, www.lancasterjewelersonline.com).  

Ginny Smith-Sistare of Lancaster Jewelers said she chose Pick Up Sticks because she feels “connected to the line. . .like the creators, family is my life and the story of the ‘small town cousins’ reminds me so much of my own family, working to build a business from scratch, always together.”  When someone says “Pick Up Sticks”, her immediate thought is “fun, enchanting, vintage and eclectic.” 

Lancaster Jewelers prides themselves on being unique and providing the best of the best merchandise and service.   They suggest that retailers treat Pick Up Sticks “just like they’re designed – sassy, vintage and fun!  Try displaying the charms in whimsical ways, such as laying them in an antique jewelry box, or hanging them on a funky mannequin.” 

And what do they think is the best way to sell Pick Up Sticks?  “Get customers involved.  Start by showing them a few popular pieces while you’re telling the unique story behind the line.  Feel the customer out and suggest charms that fit their style.” 

Since this is the South, and “southern women have plenty of attitude”, according to Lancaster Jewelers, the Queens and Women charms sell like hotcakes.  “Pick Up Sticks has added humor mixed with family love and personal confidence to many parts of our store. . .this is definitely an exciting line of jewelry that has intrigued and awed customers as well as our sales team.” 

So now you know.  Lancaster, South Carolina, is a great place to visit for a lot of reasons.  We think stopping in at Lancaster Jewelers should be the first activity on your list.  Be sure to tell them we sent you!