10% discount for Twitter followers

If you are one of my Twitter followers, as a thank you, you get a 10% discount from my jewelry at Dawanda. All you need to do is enter 'Twitter - your username' in the check-out message to me. (your username is your Twitter username).
Of course, FREE shipping all over the world also applies.

My jewelry at Dawanda

Well after some discussions with friends and some deep thinking, I've decided to keep my jewelry at Dawanda. Any new jewelry I make, I will post directly on my blog, however while existing stock lasts, I leave them at Dawanda. Once I sold out, I will close shop. This will give me the time to open the shop under my own domain, which will feature only jewelry created in 2009.

Now that I came to the decision, I feel relieved :) Sometimes it's not which decision you take, but you take a decision is the important part.

On another note, I've been asked what type of jewelry was my best seller in 2008. On the quick, I'd say herringbone jewelry and border wrapped cabs. But I will check my stats from the database and post back here the results, with some pictures of what has sold.
It's funny because I thought that chainmail jewelry would be the best seller, and border wrapping is a thing of the past. I guess the truth proved me wrong :)

Dawanda is finally introducing listing and sold items fees

I've just received today a pre-invoice from Dawanda. This is two fold:
1. We are to pay for all sold items starting from June 08 a 5% fee
3. Dawanda is introducing new listing fees (it was free until now), which is depending on the price of the item.

This is the new scheme for the listing fees (separately of the 5% commision on each sold item).

Items up to value 10.00 EUR cost 0.10 EUR per item listed
Items of value 10.01 EUR - 20.00 EUR cost 0.20 EUR per item listed
Items of value 20.01 EUR and above cost 0.30 EUR per item listed
Listings are now running on a limited time of 120 days, starting on the day of listing.

Now I don't mind paying, we all knew it was coming, however I find that being less known than Etsy, and having much less traffic and sales, Dawanda is introducing a very steep pricing structure.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Etsy has 3.5% commision and a flat fee of $0.2 for each listed item.

Dawanda, has a 5% commision, and depending on the item listed, it can cost you up to 0.3 Euros (which is approximately $0.4 - double than the Etsy listing).

Also I think most of us were under the impression that the fees will be introduced from 'now on', not going back to mid last year. A couple of us have been just hit with a major fee that we have to pay by Feb. 23, which we didn't count on.

I guess what I've always preached but never really put into place, I will have to actually do: start my own shop under my own name and domain, so I can control exactly what I'm paying and when.

If you have a shop at Dawanda right now, what do you think of these new listing fees? You might just convice me to keep my items there for a bit longer if you have the best argument...or to open my own shop :-)

What's new?

I've been a bit quiet lately on my blog, however I did a few more things that I added to my shop.
A small sterling silver pendant with purple freshwater pearls, done in freeform wire wrapping style. It's reall too cute :)
Modified version of the original Vita pendant with adding some gorgeous freshwater pearls around the frame, I feel it fills the whole pendant quite nicely now.
Listed a double spiral turquoise chainmail bracelet I made a while ago and never got to list until now. Sterling silver, as usual.
And if you are making greeting cards with stamps, I have a whole bunch of unmounted stamps that I need to destash. Haven't made greeting cards in at least 5 years, so I'm afraid I won't be returning to parchment and to stamping anymore, I'm too much wrapped in making jewelry :)
So you can get the whole batch for only 25 Euros here. I might list some other cardmaking supplies later on, once these stamps are gone.

Burdafashion and Dawanda

You know Burda, the big (online) fashion magazine in Europe? As of this year Burdafashion and Dawanda joined forces, and now you can access the Dawanda shops directly within the Burda website. How cool is that? Additional market for our sales!!!
If you're reading Burda fashions online, you can access my shop directly from there, through this link:
http://marketplace.burdafashion.com/shop/MarikaJewelry

Free shipping in my shop

I was working yesterday on my online shop, and reduced prices on many items, plus I now offer FREE shipping all over the world on everything.
If you were looking at my jewelry but found that shipping added to your costs, now you can look again and even buy some, it's worth it :)
Not sure for how long this offer will last, but definitely for the entire March, as an offering to a new beginning, of spring.

Cloisonne silver pendant

I bought recently this gorgeous cloissonne heart from Etsy and I was dying to do something with it.So I've wrapped it lightly in sterling silver and added two little Bali style cloissone beads hanging from it.
The colors are really strong and vibrating, I really love this one. Simple but beautiful.
If interested, you can find it in my shop.

My Dawanda vs my Esy shop - jewelry vs supplies and books

I've been playing with the idea for a while now, and I think I will implement it afteral. I've noticed that on my Etsy shop mostly my beading and jewelry supplies are bought, while on Dawanda, the jewelry flies off 'the shelves' so to speak. So I will split my shops into a jewelry supplies on Etsy and handmade finished pieces on Dawanda.

I received a lot of brand new (not only new as in not used, but also new as in brand new on the market) Russian beading books. I will start listing them on Etsy. For all the beaders out there, you know how sought after are the Russian books :) Well, now is your chance to grab some. I am combining shipping on multiple books.
I have created a new section in my Etsy shop, Craft books, keep checking it, as I am adding books quite often until I sold off all the batch I received in February directly from Russia. I might then order more if I see that they are really wanted :)

Cute little silver chainmail earrings

I have some rings from my previous cut, which are not enough to make a bracelet, so I used the two size rings to make two pairs of earrings. One is a moebius flower attached to sterling silver earstuds, and the second pair is a 2 in 2 chain with some interesting ear wires that I made yesterday. I have added them to my Dawanda shop very reasonably priced for chainmail.

Learning to border wrap a pendant

I am learning wire sculpture and in all the pieces at least the main stone needs to be wrapped secured around. I've played around already with Remy's style of setting, and now I decided to try the 'other' border wrap, where the wires have a nice slits in the middle, I like this style so much better. Plus it used much less square (of half-square) wire, of which I hardly have, as I have to order this type of wire from the internet. Expensive!
Stone is turquoise jasper, a very soft stone as I've sadly noticed today. Wire is all sterling silver. I've found that setting the stone this way is so much more secure and it gets shaped somehow easier too. I will do more like this and then attempt again the wire sculpture pendants.

If interested, you can find it in my shop. Looks like it's one of the most viewed, pinned and added as fan items in my shop :)