Feeling Charitable?

So last year I had this idea. I had some old brass shell casings rolling around in my junk drawer. I came up with the plan to make jewelry out of them. And then I decided that I would donate half of whatever they sold for to a program that help troops when they return home from deployment. It quickly took over a large portion of my heart. I was proud and happy with what I was working on. The jewelry came out well, and people liked it.

So when someone came by the booth to look at the jewelry, I would give them the spiel, I would talk about the materials and I would tell them that half of each item went to a program that helps our troops. People seemed to like that. but they didn't buy a whole lot. So I decided that I would try an experiment. I wouldn't tell them that half went to a charity, and I would see if that made a marked difference. It didn't seem to. So then I went onto the next logical thing. I opened a store on Etsy. Complete with a bio and what I was doing and the whole shebang.

That was back in April of this year. So about 8 months ago. So far I haven't had one sale. I have had lots of hits, but no sales. I can't seem to figure it out. I know that most of my friends who read this are local and buy from me at shows (thanks by the way), so I know they don't use Etsy, but come on. 8 months and not one taker. It's getting frustrating. So I think-how can I make this work better.

Facebook. I started a facebook page. I put up pictures, I sent out invites, I posted information on where I was going to be and where the next show was. I figured that I have over 200 people on my page alone, I should be able to get at least 100 people who were interested. Nope. I got 30. Now I realize that the 30 are the Die Hard facebookers who check on a regular basis. So okay, I can deal with that. But I thought, I still need to do more.

CraigsList. Those 2 little words that fill sane people with fear. I figured that I could maybe get a few more hits, maybe I could find more people who wanted to get rid of some old broken brass that they couldn't use. Hell, I thought that maybe I could squeak a sale or 2 out of it. Nope. What did I get? I got flaggers. I didn't even get those who wanted discounts because the economy sucks and they lost their job last week, and are still driving around in their Land Rovers. I was expecting at least a few of those. Nope. I got assholes.

Now for those of you who don't use Craigslist on a regular basis, flaggers are like the cops. Anyone can flag a post, and some of those do deserve it. I can even see why a few of mine got nailed. But when I went to the forum to find out why my posts were flagged, I learned that people on Craigslist are assholes. I went with a simple question, and got some good advice, then the 'Internet Gestapo' decided to show up. I was nice until someone accused me of scamming people for 'precious metals'. I was unaware that brass had moved that far up the scale. I was still under the 'brass is a base metal' thought pattern. Shit, maybe the economy is even further in the hole than I thought.

Now I did get a few people who want to trade some pieces that I made for used brass. And that is way cool. So I do have to say Thank You to those who want to help a good cause. You have made a very big difference. To those who had to be dicks, I say, have fun in your little playground. You can go be the self-imposed kings of the classifieds, just don't expect me to bow down when you decide to be an ass.