Business wise I have achieved my goal, which was to raise funds to go and visit my brother in Australia. Hoorah. I was hoping it would be through clothing sales mostly, but alas, I have still not found my niche market, and made it mostly through alterations.
I decided 2019, I was going to be 'kinder' to myself (excuse this over used phrase), which meant focusing on my business and my well being, and to put campaigning to one side, for a while. It was to be a year of exploring and spiritualism. This, I did not achieve, as the student climate strikes and Extinction Rebellion took off (oh and 2 elections). However, I held myself back, and did not get as distracted as I would have done in previous years.
Here are the highlights of my year, which is an exercise I would recommend any one to do, as I was quite surprised, at actually how much I had achieved!
January 2019
Pandoras Box
I started trading in Pandoras Box Emporium a new retail outlet in Newbury. Pandoras has doubled in size since they opened, and is getting more well known in the area. Currently my head scarves being the most popular item I sell, so recently I did a blog, encouraging people to come and buy clothes from there, as we now have quite a few clothing retailers in store.
February
Pizza Oven
We started the process of making a pizza oven from cob, (made with messy slimy and heavy clay) not my idea of fun in the bitter days of winter. However when it was ready for action a couple of months later we made the best pizzas ever, stone baked using home made fresh dough.
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| Home made bread from our cob pizza oven |
March
Sustainable Living Market and Sooty
The first Eco market in our area, which was a resounding success for some, but not so for myself. Other people had bees wax wraps and other households sustainable products too, which probably looked a bit more appealing than mine, as this is all the focused on (as I do bits of everything) and the fact their products looked prettier as mine are all genuinely made from scraps, so I do not have a 'uniform' look for marketing purposes. Hey ho. I will just focus on my clothes from now on.
The highlight fro this month though was getting to meet Sooty.
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| Me and Mia with Sooty and Richard |
April
Visit to a Muslim country
I went on holiday to the middle East, which was a first for me. I visited my friend and her family that are residents in Qatar, it was a fun time, but not a place that suits Foxy Lady. I couldn't even have a wine in an Italian restaurant, and my clothes were certainly unsuitable, although I did try and adhere as best I could to the customs and values of their nation.
May
Eating insects, Richards 40th and The Isle of Wight
In the Spring we experimented with eating dried insects, then we had Richards epic 40th birthday bash, with at least 60 guests, and a hundred pizzas cooked (mostly without insects). We pulled off a day to remember, which included a few speeches from me and fire eating (not me)
Later that month, my daughter and I had short holiday together on the Isle of Wight, and we visited the wonderful Osborne House, which I found quite inspiring. In particular the art and soft furnishings, so colourful and bold.
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| Me and Rich cutting his Cob birthday cake |
June
Disco Orchestra and Avebury
As per last year I went to a Nocturn event at the beautiful Blenheim palace in Woodstock, and stayed in a lovely hotel. I danced the night away to Gabrielle, Sister Sledge and Gladys Knight. The following day was summer solstice, and we headed to Avebury for some chill time and shamanic drumming, quite a contrast to the night before. Had a picnic with some friends by the stones.
July
Cruising
We started cruising towards the Thames and its the first summer I embarked on some tow path trading, which admittedly wasn't very successful, probably due to the locations we chose to moor.
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| My giant XR banner taken through the centre of Reading |
August
The Thames and friends
I spent time out, trying not to think about the business too much, I felt like I was stuck, and didn't know what to do next to improve sales. I guess I needed the rest.
We hung out with different friends and families that we see every summer on their moorings. We also had some lovely family time in the remote Dorchester on Thames for a few days, where I switched my internet of for the whole duration. A few days of yoga, wildlife and jigsaws.
SEPTEMBER
All systems go
September is in bold because it was a crazy month.
Back to the moorings, back to school, Mias birthday and I embarked on another project, which involved doing events again, with a new group of people that had continued on from the Sustainable living market in March.
I had a brain wave on the way to the first one, 'why don't I take my machine and tools to these markets, and offer my alterations as a service to those wanting to make their clothes last. etc?'
So thats what occurred after that, twice monthly markets, one in Thatcham and one in Hungerford.
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| Mias birthday dinner with all of the kids from our moorings |
October
The SustainHUBle Collective and #BuyReMade
I did a few events and started actively promoting it and made Facebook accounts for it. From this more alteration projects started to come my way.
I also campaigned during October and through to November for people to buy clothes and accessories made from reclaimed textiles. For a whole month a group of us posted daily on social media, about our businesses to promote the hashtag Buy Re Made.
The Re-Makers FB group
The SustainHUBle Collective FB Page
November
Clothes Swap event and Pop Up Shop
I participated in a clothes swap event in Hungerford, which was really successful. I feel that more and more people are getting the message about the problems with fast fashion, and are prepared to wear second hand clothes.
Hungerford clothes swap 2020
The SustainHUBle Collective had a space in a new temporary pop up shop in Hungerford in the run up to Christmas
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| Me and my stand ready for action at the clothes swap |
December
Busiest ever..
Lots of alterations to do this month, and I'm pleased to say that my monthly income has been increasing over the year. I have a whole house to do soft furnishings for, which will continue into the New Year.
I did 2 corporate Christmas events, one of which was at Vodafone, I am pleased that the rest of the SustainHUBle team did their best sales yet, bit alas, Foxy Lady had none.
To end the year on a high, I had a very good month financially and I was also featured in the inland waterways newspaper the Towpath Talk. We pick them up from marinas, and its the leading form of communication (after social media) for boaters. So when I was approached by Alice Griffin, to be her first feature for the paper I was really chuffed to say the least.
Me in Tow Path Talk
Finally, we lost 3 guinea pigs this year, so RIP Coaly, Cinnamon and Alphie
2020
I plan to get more exposure, get back into doing some really creative clothes, and perhaps widening my geography for markets. I will also continue to campaign for the environment and encourage folk to get into slow fashion.
Watch this space.
Fantastic blog I think I'll take some time to reflect over the last year, it's a good exercise to do been an exciting one on the whole
ReplyDeleteThanks. Yes, I just looked through all my photos from the last year. It was surprising how much stuff I had forgotten
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