Wire Wrapped Jewelry

In the past week, two customers inquired about metals. One was concerned about the soaring price of Sterling Silver and the other curious about how much wire you get per Troy Ounce.

This is based upon a spot price of sterling at $14.52 a Troy Ounce.

Here is the length of of wire per Troy Ounce for various gauges:
21 Ga Square Sterling Silver has 20 feet per ounce, around $1.08 per foot
21 Ga Square 14kt Gold Filled has 22.2 feet per ounce, around $2.48 per foot

16 Ga Half Round Sterling Silver has 15.4 feet per ounce, around $1.39 per foot
16 Ga Half Round 12kt Gold Filled has 17.9 feet per ounce, around $2.73 per foot

22 Ga Half Round Sterling Silver has 55.6 feet per ounce, around $ .39 per foot
22 Ga Half Round 12kt Gold Filled has 69.9 feet per ounce, around $ .70 per foot

monsterslayer.com

Remember that Monsterslayer and Rio Grande repurchase any scrap metal. They pay 75% of the Spot price of the metal towards a metal purchase. The price you pay for Sterling and Gold filled is a combination of the Spot price plus the fabrication cost of the metal. This morning the spot price of sterling was $14.52 and 21 Square wire was $21.52, so there is a $7 fabrication cost.

A ring with 8 bundle wrap wires in Sterling Silver would cost around $7.50 to make. That would include two bundle wrap wires and the wire to cover the shank.

Say you get it finished and it is terrible, just cut out the cabochon and add it to your scrap container. When you get a bit in the container, send it back for trade to Monsterslayer:
Scrap

They give you 75% of the Spot price of the metal as trade for new wire. 75% of the spot price is $10.89 an ounce. It only takes about 1/3 ounce to make a ring, or about $7.50 worth of sterling. The trade in value of that .33 ounces is around $3.60. So for $7.50 you have a sterling ring, or you spent $3.90 practicing if you wreck it.

Steve

If you have an online business, I would recommend you do as we have done and start accepting credit cards via PayPal. We have done this for several reasons.

First, a merchants account where you accept credit cards, is expensive. They charge a monthly fee, plus transaction fees. The transaction fees are usually about what PayPal charges without the monthly fees.

Secondly, we did not want anything to do with dealing with handling customer’s credit cards. One of our favorite online retailers was hacked and hundreds of customers’ credit cards were compromised. It was a nightmare for them, and they still feel the aftermath of that horror story.

PayPal lets you easily print a shipping label and packing slip. We use two-up Avery Labels so addressing packages is painless. The shipping label includes postage, so no need for a trip to the Post Office. The postage is deducted from your PayPal balance as a separate transaction, so shipping costs are easily tracked for tax purposes. PayPal can be set up to notify the buyer of the shipment.

We use Mals eCommerce, a free shopping cart. They have an easy interface to PayPal.

We use USPS Priority Mail, so the boxes are provided for free by the USPS. PayPal also has a link so we can schedule a USPS carrier pickup.

Get your account and start today:

Steve

We finally decided to join the show circuit (circa 1996) which required, among other things, a Show Tent. So we started going to shows to see what different vendors used. There seemed to be two general classes of tent, easy to put up and not so easy, so we figured there must be some trade-offs. This turned out to be the case, with several trade-offs to consider.

If it is easy to put up:
Pros:
Light weight
Usually can be erected by one person.
Inexpensive
Setup and tear-down can be done quickly

Cons:
Big wind can move them more easily.
If anchored against big wind, it can be more easily destroyed.

If harder to put up:
Pros:
Less likely to blow away in a big wind.
It will take big winds if anchored properly.

Cons:
Heavy
Expensive
Will likely require more than one person for at least part of the setup
Setup and tear-down a bigger effort

After talking with several vendors we decided to go with an Archtop. We got the side screens, top window and side flaps. Total cost around $1000. We used it for dozens of shows where we sold wire wrapped jewelry and my beads. We also, during our 5 years on the road in an RV, erected it in front of our bus to use as a studio for the summer. It worked great for that. When I was working on developing a signature bead, we rented a tank of liquid oxygen to run my torch. The tent was a great studio for the RV park. We used it every day for the months we were in Duluth. We anchored it down with ground augers, the kind you screw into your back lawn to keep Fido confined to an area.

I was listening to the radio one day and the weather bulletin advised of a rapidly moving front approaching with 80 MPH winds. Yikes, I called the RV park owner and went to my tent where I tied the 700 pound liquid oxygen tank to the tent structure for a little extra support. Good thing, the 80 MPH winds hit and our tent strained but stayed save and in place. The RV down wind was not confident that it would and moved. He had a $600,000 rig with a paint job that had to be $50k, so I was a bit relieved to see him move too.

Shows are a better test of what you need in a tent. Either way you go, it needs to be white. Some shows require white, but on a practical note, get white just because of problems from the color cast given off by blue tents. Inside of a blue tent you can not properly judge colors, and if customers try on an item and look in a mirror, the blue cast will suck the life out of their skin tone. Nobody like looking like Morticia from the Addams Family.

The side screens were wonderful for allowing air flow while controlling access to the space.  They also come with canvas covers that Velcro on the inside so you have a secure tent at night or to control the sun or wind.  Our front flap was divided in three pieces that zip and each could be rolled up to the top.  This allowed you to control traffic flow.  The one part we never used was the back awning.  This gives you extra covered backspace for processing and storage.

We were caught up in several situations where big winds hit our show. One danger of having a flimsy or unanchored tent is having it do damage to others property. If your tent rips through a booth stuffed with expensive art, you could run up quite a tab.

There are several ways to anchor tents, we have seen some clever systems. Most of the time you will not be able to use ground anchors, you will be in a street or parking lot. If you are on turf, use the Fido ground augers.

We used 4′ long pieces of 6″ PVC pipe filled with concrete with an Eye Bolt stuck in the top. These weighed a lot and served us well. One cleaver system involved water tanks that were filled on the show grounds and emptied as the show ended.

You are going to need to learn a knot or two. You will need to use a Tautline Hitch. Learn it and it will come in handy for the rest of your life. Google up ‘Tent Knots’

We have seen a few horror stories regarding show tents. You can push around a big sailboat with a 100 square foot sail. The wind gets under the tent and up it goes. I forget where we were, but I’ll never forget an unanchored tent getting about 200 feet in the air before disappearing into a body of water a few hundred yards away, not before doing thousands of dollars damage to other booths.

We got to where we could set up our Archtop in about 20 minutes, but that won’t happen the first time you try with any but the easiest tents.

We have quit doing shows and sell our wirewrapped jewelry through galleries and online. Shows are great fun and we met a lot of nice people, but they are a bit of work.

Susie and Steve
(Please leave comments and your thoughts below)

A customer asked the other day about our “Practice Wire.” I first started offering it so customers could practice on relatively inexpensive wire. When Silver got up to $17 an ounce, people started getting a little gun shy about wrecking an ounce or two as a beginner.

The truth is that it makes nice wire wrapped jewelry in it’s own right. Here is a photo of a piece Susie designed and Wrapped using copper wire. So if you are a jewelry designer and want to use copper, great. It also looks good with sterling bundle wraps.

Steve

Earlier today Susie picked up our inventory at the Gallery of Rockport. They will be closing their doors at the end of the year. It was a beautiful gallery with an emphasis on quality and high-end art. It was also good for a nice income every month. We will miss them, nice people with a true love of things of beauty.

Our agreement with them prevented online sales of our wirewrap jewelry, and the art glass jewelry that we make. That was gladly agreed to, to be included in this fine gallery.

I will spend the next few weeks updating our web site to include our jewelry.

Steve

If you use a WYSIWYG style web page builder, or need one, here is Google’s Free version:
Click Here

Steve

Corina has several video tutorials at Google.

Click Here to start with a Frog tutorial.

Steve

Selling Artisan Jewelry Online
By Louise Coulson

http://www.ezinearticles.com/?Selling-Artisan-Jewelry-Online&id=616272

Here is an interesting article from a webmaster on how to sell artisan jewelry online:
She points out:
“Your potential online artisan jewelry customer is a savvy individual who can easily access a wide range of jewelry artisans’ work and compare them. She will understand that artisan jewelry is designed and made by an artisan and will be unique. This customer expects the best in craftsmanship, quality materials and service for her money.”

Then she lists here primary areas of difficulty:
“Here are some other difficulties for those of us who sell our artisan jewelry online.

1. Of course, getting traffic to your site is the first hurdle for the online jewelry artisan.

2. The site should offer something of value to the visitor beyond just an advertisement.

3. It is difficult to present an accurate impression of color, size and detail when buying a piece of jewelry online.

4. The site visitor needs to trust your credibility to buy from you.

5. Payment security is a big issue for online buyers.

6. The buyer will want to see your guarantee, returns and privacy policies.”

Our latest, and longest lasting passion, is making wire wrapped jewelry. It is a learned skill that we
teach both with online free tutorials and through our DVDs. We started by taking personal lessons many years ago from a gifted wire wrap artist. Since then we have adapted our own style and are sharing this with anyone who is interested in learning.

Wire Wrapped Jewelry has provided us with a sense of pride in our own craftsmanship as well as income to supplement our retirement.

Susie and I retired from our first careers in 1996. We have my pension, income from our investments and the money generated from things we enjoy doing. For Susie it is wire wrapped cabochons, and for me it is wire wrapped rings. I also enjoy lampwork bead making, but here in the summer it is too hot to fire up the torch.

Join us in this passion. Visit our web site, at the link to the right, then look over our free Wire Wrapped Cabochon tutorial. Then get the materials and join in the fun. In addition to the potential of marketing the wire wrapped jewelry, it makes great gifts for friends and family. You can wear your art work with pride, we are frequently stopped on the street and asked where we bought the piece we are wearing.

Steve