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Reflections and Plans

So 2023 was…interesting.

I started the year with a day job and a sole-prop crochet business. I ended the year with no day job and an LLC crochet business.

I was in 7 shows in 2023, though I only made a profit in 4 shows. Overall, I ended the year just barely in the black. I did $1367.50 in total gross for in-person sales.

The economy was not on the side of small business owners in 2023. I have talked to over vendors, and not just fiber art ones, sales have been horrible for a lot of small business owners who rely mostly on markets for sales.

The local yarn store (LYS) to me has granted me a space in their shop to sell some of my amigurumi. If you are local to Hampton Roads, or anywhere near the Virginia Peninsula, you should check it out. The shop is The Village Knittery and it is located in Hilton Village on Warwick Blvd, Newport News, Va. I’ve also been invited to become a member of the local business group that gets together once a month to discuss upcoming events and collaborate. More on that in a future post.

I’m still looking for a day job to help cover bills while I work on turning this crochet business into a full time job. Losing my day job in August speed up my 5 year plan drastically. I was hoping to have found a job by Christmas, but that didn’t happen. I’m hoping for something this month.

I have plans for regular blogs Monday through Friday. The YouTube channel will get resurrected in February. The Twitch channel will have regular streams in the evenings starting sometime in January. The other social media platforms that I am on will also be having an overhaul in 2024. If you would like to follow me on those, you can find the link to my linktree here: https://linktr.ee/OctojellyCrochet

I also want to try designing my own patterns this year. I’m still in the research stages of that at the moment, so more news on that later.

For in-person shows in 2024, I only have 1 so far on the books, Convival 2024 in Williamsburg, Va. https://convivialva.com/ At the time of writing this, the vendor list has not yet been updated. I will hopefully have more shows scheduled by the end of February.

If you’ve read this far, thank you.

I have hopes that 2024 will be better for me than 2023 was. If you plan on joining me on this journey, thank you.

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Twitch Stream

I’m borrowing an idea from a couple of fellow streamers.

Every Sunday, I will be posting my upcoming stream schedule. I’ll be doing this because I know I won’t be able to stream the same day every single week. As of right now, these will all be night ( for me) streams. All times are Eastern Time Zone.

The streams will be on Twitch : twitch.tv/octojellycrochet

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English Breakfast – Ahmad Tea

Good morning, how are you today?

I opted for an old favorite this morning. This is a good tea when you have a lot of things are your mind and need a moment of mental silence.

I’ve had a few English Breakfast Blends over the years. This particular one is from Ahmad Tea of London. It is available as part of a set of teas from Lion Brand Yarns or individually from http://www.ahmadtea.com

It’s a black tea blend that can be drank with or without milk. I prefer it without milk.

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Stream Schedule Going Forward

So starting this Friday, I will have a new Twitch schedule.

Ypu can follow me at https://www.twitch.tv/octojellycrochet to get notified when I go live.

The schedule will be as follows:

Monday : No Stream

Tuesday: 9:30am Est to 1:30pm EST

Wednesday: No Stream

Thursday: No Stream

Friday: 10am EST to 1pm EST

Saturday: No Stream

Sunday: 5am EST to 7am EST (this is subject to end early if the kiddo wakes up early).

I may add 1 or 2 overnight streams around when I do last minute prep for Conventions/Shows.

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Quick Update

I made some changes to the website.

I think I finally found a layout that I am happy with.

I did simplify the site and made it, I feel easier to navigate.

I have extended the 25% off sales to December 8, 2023. This does include free shipping for those in the United States. The code is holidayoctojelly if you would like to make a purchase before then.

I have finished writing on general scripts for the YouTube channel that will restart in January and I’ll be back to regular Twitch streams starting Tuesday next week.

The blog will be on a regular posting schedule as on January 1, I just have a lot of this going on in my personal like right now that is taking up a lot of my writing time,

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Copyright: Part 2

So this is not how I expected to start my Thanksgiving, but since people don’t want to listen. I’m going to put this out there,

So way back in 2020, I wrote a broad overview about Copyright/Trademark and why it matters.

You can find that post here, https://octojellycrochetstudio.com/?p=224 .

Given the recent Shop Bans on TikTok, I figured it was time for another post on the subject.

I have a very well know policy when it comes to all things with a copyright and/or trademark. I avoid them with a million foot pole.

Companies like Disney do not play when it comes to anything to do with their brand. They will take your business, you house, anything of monetary value to make up for the money you made off their product that they didn’t get a cut of.

They’ve gone after schools for painting Disney images on the wall. Google it if you don’t believe me.

Anytime you are going to have a known trademarked character on you product, check the copyright/trademark/license for parent companies rules on the matter.

Disney will let you sell their product, for a cost, though that varies greatly depending on the product. Disney is considerate enough to have an entire website devoted to this topic. Here’s the link : https://www.disneystudiolicensing.com/

Most companies will let you sell their product for a fee, I just use Disney as an example because it’s one of the best well known.

Famous people, such as Taylor Swift, have trademarked themselves. Their images, lyrics, and their own products all fall under this umbrella. If you are interested in using them in your product, you will have to see if they’ve been trademarked first. This link is a good place to start: https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/search#:~:text=You%20may%20conduct%20a%20free,conduct%20searches%20for%20a%20fee.

Now, there are companies that have what’s call a Fan Content Policy. Wizards of the Coast has a fairly well known one, that’s to their attempt of reverse it earlier this year. You can view that here: https://company.wizards.com/en/legal/fancontentpolicy This policy lets you make product based on their products, as long as you follow their really basic rules. If you’re making DnD (Dungeons and Dragons) product, you’ll also want to read the OGL, that can be found here, https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1423-an-update-on-the-open-game-license-ogl

The point of this is that if you’re going to do this, without the proper research, without really considering the legal ramifications of doing this the right way, you DO NOT get to be upset when your shop/listing gets taken down.

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The Holiday Update

Greetings and Salutations.

So, over the last 24 hours, I have been updating the inventory in the shop.

All of the amigurumi options have been updated. I’m still debating adding baby blankets, scarves, and shawls. I may put those on the ko-fi portion of my business instead.

In December I will be adding a new category to my shop. This will cover all the DnD monsters out of the 5E Monster Manual.

I’ll be streaming on Twitch atleast 2 days during the day and early Sunday mornings starting the Monday after Thanksgiving.

All the blog series will restart on January 1, 2024. I have to much going on to be able to keep up with them at the moment. I do have a good portion of the Tea Series written and staged for January. The Crafts of the World Series is still in the research stages. I’m also working on a new pattern series.

I plan on turning the Granny Square series in to how-to YouTube videos in the new year, recording for those should start sometime next month.

I have finished the market season for 2023. I didn’t do as well as I would have liked, I had just about half the markets I did not even make back the table fee.

I have better hopes for 2024. My first event will be ConVival 2024. This will take place in Williamsburg, Virginia January 12-14, 2024. See https://convivialva.com for more details. As of this posting, they are still working on the vendor list.

I may try for the Smithfield Farmers Market for 2024 as well.

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Small Business and the Introvert

I’ve been trying to write this one for awhile.

Running a small business is already difficult. Running one as an introvert is just that much harder.

I’ve been an introvert since my teens. I learned to hide it in my 20s, and finally gave into it in my 30s, after I had my son.

There are still people who don’t believe that I’m an introvert, and think I’m actually a social butterfly. I’m really not.

Being a small business owner, you have to put yourself out there. Especially in the early days. If you can start right out the gate with a extrovert friend who is willing to be the face of the company – for free, that’s awesome. For the rest of us, we have to suck up dealing with people for a few hours during shows/conventions/markets, and putting ourselves on social media.

I had an event on Saturday, I talked to a lot of people. There’s a lot of things that I should be doing today. I haven’t done any of them. It’s been 25 hours since I got back from the event. I spent 10 hours of that asleep. My other half lest night already knew that I wasn’t going to be talkative. My social battery was empty, and I don’t mean, less than 2% of power left in it. I mean, in DnD terms, that my HP was at 0 and I had failed 2 of my 3 death saving throws, empty. I still wasn’t back to full health this morning, but I pulled it together enough to go get groceries and grab the kiddo from my mom’s.

I will probably not have a full social battery until later this week, thought I do need to leave the house tomorrow for appts and I plan on doing a stream tomorrow night since I won’t have to get up early on Tuesday.

I have another event this coming Saturday in Courtland, Virginia. It ill be my last show for 2023. My first event for 2024 will be ConVival 2024 in Williamsburg, Virginia. Follow me on any of my other social medias for more information on those.

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Post-Show Update

Greetings,

I know this is a few days late, but I’ve been lacking the mentally energy to get this done.

Over the next few days I’ll be updating inventory and product descriptions. I’ll also be adding new categories and removing some that will no longer be needed.

As I’ve been getting more serious about this business, I’ve realized that my prices do no reflect that this is an actually business and not just a hobby. As of Monday, just about everything will be set to higher prices.

I’ll have a better blog post/update once all the changes are made between tomorrow and Monday.