Last week’s column featured Pat Wagner, a Marinette artist, who is building her stone art business by taking part in art and craft shows throughout the region. It can be a hard way to build a business, but for those who love art, it is the one of the best ways to sell their creations and develop a following.
These shows also have a huge, positive impact on tourism and the local economy. For the participants, it means checking dates and locations, applying to juried shows, and dealing with an often-frenzied schedule.
Kimberly Moon Young, an art teacher at Doty and King Elementary schools in Green Bay, is one of those artists feeling the stress of working full time and then spending hours creating art. It can be overwhelming.
“My entire house, pretty much the whole thing, is a studio,” she said. “I have two rooms in the lower part of my house dedicated to craft fair inventory. I have a jewelry room, a room for three kilns, and a room for ceramics. My garage is a summer studio and I set up a tent in front of it because I like being outside in the fresh air. My neighbors probably roll their eyes when I take it out every year.”
That use of space amounts to an assortment of items that number in the thousands. It includes mosaics, stained glass, fused glass, small ceramics, and clay. Adding to that, Young recently began to experiment with a product called metal clay that has fine silver metal in it.
“I have a hard time picking out one thing to focus on,” she said. “I like being able to do what I want to do. I have a variety of mixed media items and I fit everything into my style, but mosaics and small ceramics are the core of what I do.”
If it’s art, there is a good chance that Young is interested. She loves art, both her own and others’ crafts, and doesn’t remember a time when it wasn’t part of her life. From mastering screen printing and print-making in middle school, to moving on to a distinctive style in ceramics, she’s been on a quest to learn new techniques and create more art. The more skills she acquires, the more items she is able to feature at the sales.
Raised in Barron, she moved to Green Bay in the mid-1990s to pursue a degree in studio art at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.
“I graduated in 2003,” she said. “It took seven years because I was trying out a number of different areas for a minor. I didn’t know what to do, but I got talked into education and surprised myself. I didn’t think it would be something I would enjoy, but that changed when I started teaching elementary students.”
It was love at first class. In teaching grades kindergarten to five, Young enjoyed the younger students’ creativity, imagination, and lack of fear in making a mistake. By choosing that as a career, she has benefitted from both the joy of teaching and the added bonus of having time to participate in art and crafts fairs during the summer months.
Deciding on what shows to attend has been a learning process. Her mom encouraged her to try a first show about 14 years ago.
“That year, I had decided to make birdhouses for my family for Christmas, and taught myself to do the mosaic part of it.” Young said. “I took some of those and some clay things like pendants and rings to the show (held at Gateway Technical College in Kenosha). I made $200 and was pretty excited about it.”
That small success had her seeking out other shows, and after signing up for “a bunch of them,” she began to make note of those that worked and those that didn’t.
“You can go to one and sell a lot of something, and go to another and sell almost none,” Young said. “You need to make sure that whatever you’re making, it is something that brings you joy. If I was only making things to sell them, I wouldn’t do it.”
As part of the learning curve, she also concluded that there are limits to how many shows she can attend. Every show means diagraming a layout, building inventory, setting up and taking down, and spending a day or two sitting at a booth. When her mom, who frequently helps her at shows, isn’t there, it is difficult to even walk away for a bathroom or lunch break.
To make her life more manageable, she is trying to become more organized and run the business as a business.
“It would have been nice to take a business class when I was in college instead of feeling like I’m winging it on my own,” she said. “I’m not the greatest business person; that isn’t my strong point. At times, I feel like I’m kind of hit or miss and something might escape me until it’s too late.”
But that is understandable when reviewing Young’s schedule. During the week, she not only has to prepare projects for her elementary art classes, she also spends up to 20 hours on her business. Part of that time is dedicated to filling orders on her flourishing Etsy site, kimberlymoon.etsy.com.
“With Etsy, I have had the greatest success selling made to order things like bird
houses, mosaic switch plates, and components that I make out of clay,” she said. :I have a few jewelry items, but in the world of Etsy, it is easy to get lost so I sell things that fewer people sell.”
The Etsy orders follow a schedule that starts on Sundays. Projects are started, and step by step, progress throughout the week with details like planning, designing, grouting, drying, and layering. By the end of the week, the special orders are ready for shipping.
“Then, it starts all over again,” she added.
In between, she is building inventory for shows; the first of the season will be at the Jacksonport Maifest in Door County on the Saturday and Sunday of Memorial Day weekend. Then she plans about 10 more shows this year including ArtFest on July 20-21 in Green Bay (she has applied and is awaiting approval) and Art at the Park in Appleton on July 27-28. If followers miss her at one of those events, she plans on doing the Southwest High School Holiday Fair on Nov. 23.
Her business name is Kimberly Moon Young, and it is her real name. She says her dad was kind of a “hippy” and picked Moon over Sun (his other choice) as a middle name. She thinks it has an arty sound, and says that in addition to giving her a fitting name for an artist, her parents have also been her biggest supporters.
“My parents inspire me,” she said. “They are very good at figuring things out. I will tell them my problem like how to hang birdhouses or display jewelry and they help come up with a solution. When I was younger and became interested in art, they bought me special materials to create it and then gave me the space to do it.”
Tina Dettman-Bielefeldt is co-owner of DB Commercial Real Estate in Green Bay and past district director for SCORE, Wisconsin.
