A couple of weeks ago I went to a bead show in Delaware for a little article research and female bonding. Some of you may recall that I purchased beads at a bead show I wrote about months ago. Confession time...those lovely turquoise  and quartz stones keep winking at me from the bag (as do all of other glass beads I picked up).

In Delaware I bought an amazing closure hand tooled in South Africa plus my filler beads. I now have the stuff to make some necklaces. Time to sit down and figure this out. I think my pal is going to nail my shoes to her floor as soon as her kids go to camp. I promise to have the necklace by CHA Summer!

Bead shows are so interesting. I love the cross-section of people. First the audience is much more diverse than a general craft show- more racially diverse and more age-diverse. On a Friday a lot of the folks are retailers or people who buy beads to make jewelry for resale. I noticed a couple of retailers filling in at the bargain table. Good for them, they'd get the beads for a song, re-bag them and get a good mark-up.

Beaders are great sharers and I love nothing more that chatting folks up- hearing about their beading activities, how they got into it, etc. etc. They think it is so neat that I work in the craft industry (little do they know they do  more beading than I do). I've been to three shows in different locations and I am starting to recognize people which is fun.

Sometimes it's a good idea to go to a consumer show and be a consumer. Chat with the people, they'll tell you what they like about a product, a store, a TV Show a website. For the $10 you pay to get in the door you'll get thousands of dollars worth of focus group info. Plus you'll refuel the inspiration tank. If that isn't worth ten bucks, I don't know what is-Beth