12:18 PM on Monday, August 3. 2009
The secret life of...
I've been in this huge bead kick for maybe a week or two now. I'm not sure what spurred it on, but all of a sudden I had this huge urge to create earrings. They're simple, easy to make, beautiful, and I could easily sell them super cheap and still make a profit. The first thing I did was to scrounge up all the beads I had collected since I was like 12. I had thousands of beads! But unfortunately, most of them were pretty gaudy and, you know, the kind of thing a 12-year-old would wear.
After attacking Walmant and Joann's and not finding too much in either of those places, I took my searching online. I was thrilled by the variety, but disappointed by the prices. You want how much for what??!!? I thought, "Ok, this is silly. Let's check Ebay."
I was hoping that I'd find some chick who got into beading and decided she didn't like doing it and was selling off her stash of beads, right? That's what Ebay's about, isn't it? Well, I had a huge surprise in for me once I got there. I mean, I found a couple of estate sales with huge lots of beads, but they were still freakin' expensive. But everywhere I looked, I found things that were really unexpected.
Take, for instance, this auction. In case it's no longer there when you go to look, it's an auction for 400 gold plated 3-leaf bead caps, a very popular style. Ok, so that's not so surprising, right? It's a large amount, certainly, but nothing to go crazy over. Until you realize that the winner, a very beautiful woman with great taste, only paid $1.29 for them. Oh, and did I forget to mention that they came with free shipping?
400 at $1.29 means that each bead cap is less than half a penny each. $0.003225 to be exact. What's wrong with this picture? Considering I just bought the EXACT SAME ITEM in silver plated version at Michael's this weekend for $3 FOR 25!!! Ok, so I can understand that! I honestly can! Big stores like that have huge overhead, not to mention they're just buying the item from a company who bought them from the guys in China who made them.
But when did Ebay become a place for cheapskate Americans to buy cheap wares from Chinese manufacturers? What happened to the little old ladies selling off the junk from their attics, or the guy who bought a bunch of crap from a yard sale and wants to get a bit of a profit? I won't deny that finding such huge deals is kind of thrilling, but it also leaves me feeling dirty.
More disturbing is the thought that we Americans no longer manufacture anything anymore. I mean, we make a few things here and there, but even those things usually stay in this country. Do we export anything? How do we make money? All we're doing is consuming from other countries. Eventually, we're going to collapse from the huge amounts of crap and dept we've collected.
Until then, I'll be surfing Ebay to see what else I can find.
(This space intentionally left blank. I don't think any Etsy sellers want to be connected with this post.)
After attacking Walmant and Joann's and not finding too much in either of those places, I took my searching online. I was thrilled by the variety, but disappointed by the prices. You want how much for what??!!? I thought, "Ok, this is silly. Let's check Ebay."
I was hoping that I'd find some chick who got into beading and decided she didn't like doing it and was selling off her stash of beads, right? That's what Ebay's about, isn't it? Well, I had a huge surprise in for me once I got there. I mean, I found a couple of estate sales with huge lots of beads, but they were still freakin' expensive. But everywhere I looked, I found things that were really unexpected.
Take, for instance, this auction. In case it's no longer there when you go to look, it's an auction for 400 gold plated 3-leaf bead caps, a very popular style. Ok, so that's not so surprising, right? It's a large amount, certainly, but nothing to go crazy over. Until you realize that the winner, a very beautiful woman with great taste, only paid $1.29 for them. Oh, and did I forget to mention that they came with free shipping?
400 at $1.29 means that each bead cap is less than half a penny each. $0.003225 to be exact. What's wrong with this picture? Considering I just bought the EXACT SAME ITEM in silver plated version at Michael's this weekend for $3 FOR 25!!! Ok, so I can understand that! I honestly can! Big stores like that have huge overhead, not to mention they're just buying the item from a company who bought them from the guys in China who made them.
But when did Ebay become a place for cheapskate Americans to buy cheap wares from Chinese manufacturers? What happened to the little old ladies selling off the junk from their attics, or the guy who bought a bunch of crap from a yard sale and wants to get a bit of a profit? I won't deny that finding such huge deals is kind of thrilling, but it also leaves me feeling dirty.
More disturbing is the thought that we Americans no longer manufacture anything anymore. I mean, we make a few things here and there, but even those things usually stay in this country. Do we export anything? How do we make money? All we're doing is consuming from other countries. Eventually, we're going to collapse from the huge amounts of crap and dept we've collected.
Until then, I'll be surfing Ebay to see what else I can find.
(This space intentionally left blank. I don't think any Etsy sellers want to be connected with this post.)
My life is art. When I dream, my imagination flies, and when I wake, it tells its story on paper with pen. And when I look out a window, I see endless possibilities. But I have a long way to go still on my journey through the clouds of art and imagination. Won't you join me?
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