Yup, you read that right.
Say goodbye to the pottery on www.Northstar-Treasures.com
It has been a roller coaster day. It all began when our Polish Pottery supplier contacted us around noon, and told us that she was closing her business the next day (Friday), and that she could not accept any orders after today. It came as a complete surprise to us.
SO...for those who do not know...here's the history...
When we opened our business in 2005, and we were primarily a Polish Pottery store. We had a Polish Pottery website, and gained a following for collecting the Polish Pottery. Next, we moved our physical location to the main shopping street in Skagway, and we learned fast that we needed more product selection than just Polish Pottery, in order to pay the bills. Therefore, our business grew, and our in-store Polish Pottery collection shrank to a small 8 square feet of our nearly 700 square foot store.
However, since we already had a following on our website, we kept our website as a Polish Pottery website. Our supplier on the East Coast actually drop-shipped all of the pottery ordered on our website, so that our customers could order year-round (whether we had the pottery in stock at our store or not).
We have very little pottery in our store nowadays, but we have had an excellent pottery selection on our website, with some dedicated customers. So, essentially, in one afternoon, this news has resulted in the need for us to practically shut down the website. We will no longer be able to sell Polish Pottery on it (like the old days).
The good side is that it allows us the opportunity to now change the website to reflect our actual store offerings better (for tourists coming to Alaska).
Besides being a bit disappointed about the sudden change in our business practices, we felt bad that we have customers who rely on us to build their pottery collections. We didn't want to leave everyone high and dry without warning, so we emailed about 600 or so of our past Polish Pottery customers, inviting them to enjoy one last little round on our website at a good discount. In response, we got about 20 orders--which makes for a busy day (on top of the typical 130+ sales we ring up in the store each weekday). Wow! We should "go out of business" more often!! :-)
And that was my day, in a nut shell. WOWEE....what a ride!
2 comments:
I learn a lot from you about operating your own business-it can be a rollercoaster. I am glad you are a optimistic person or the sudden changes would be so depressing.
Love the way you put flower pots under the pie plates to make flowers!
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