Pricing Delimmas

I've been really struggling this year with how I want to price my inventory. The past 2 years I've streamlined everything into very narrow price points. I priced all of my scarves at $15 or $30. My soft wristcuffs were $7 and the wire wristcuffs were $11. Scarflettes were primarily $25 except for some lower end ones that were $15.

Last year at the Strange Folk Festival I started out like the year before with one quilt rack of $15 scarves and one of $30. Two years ago I sold more $15 ones but I sold a good number of $30 ones as well. Last year for the entire first day I didn't sell a single $30 scarf so I eventually took them down and put out all $15 ones. I sold some $30 ones at the Rock and Roll Show but I think with the economy in the state it was in, $30 was just too much of an investment for an accessory.

I'm seriously considering adding a third price point this year at $23. This is right in between the two and would give me more profit on those scarves that I don't feel comfortable selling at just $15. I will only have the top tiered scarves with the highest quality yarns at the $30 mark. They say it is good to have some items that are out of most people's price range to let them know that you are a quality vendor. Mike says that I should make it an even $20 since most people don't want to make change but I don't think there is enough of a difference between $15 and $20.

I'm even more confused by how I want to price my new scarf/hat sets and the single hats. I have used such a range of yarns and techniques on them that I really feel like I should individually price them as I see fit. I want to sell the sets with both pieces and I will probably connect them with twine. They will have the prices marked and I will have all of them on my table.
For example the scarf/hat set at the top of the post was made with a 100% wool, hand dyed yarn. My yarn cost were $8 but if I'd paid full price the yarn was worth much more than that. I used the exact same pattern for this second set and the time was approximately the same but the yarn is an acrylic that I only spent a few dollars on. I wouldn't feel comfortable asking for anything less than $40 for the first set but I would be happy with $25 for the second set.

I also have some individual hats with a wide range of yarn costs and time spent on them. Do you think it would be appropriate to price them all differently or would that be too confusing? I like it when vendors have some consistency in their pricing. When I'm looking at a display or rack I like to know that what I'm looking at is in my price range but I just don't feel comfortable putting the same price on such varying items. Any thoughts about either of my dilemmas would be greatly appreciated.

Strange Heads for Strange Folks

In between long stretches of good knitting time this weekend I think I got my Strange Folk Festival booth display ironed out. I am completely changing it from last year. I used those fold up shelves last year which were easy to transport but a total failure I'm afraid. People were unwilling to look through the piles of scarves on the shelves. Things just sat there until I moved them to the quilt racks. I will continue to use the 2 quilt racks on either side of the table which is where almost all of my sales came from last year.

So I've decided to retire the shelves and use only display items that are drapeable. I set up my table minus the knitwear on my back porch this weekend. I found the rack on the right at a Salvation Army for $7 and painted it tan but I think it probably needs another coat. It will hold a lot of scarves/scarflettes draped over it without being overwhelming like the shelves were. I already had the child coat rack on the far left which will be perfect for displaying hats. I gave it another coat of tan spray paint. I got the plant stand in the middle at an antique mall in Rolla for $10 and painted it a deeper beige.

I painted my Styrofoam heads which I bought at Sally's Beauty Supply for $4 a piece with a metallic copper acrylic paint. I had a failed attempt at spray painting them tan. Who knew that there was a chemical in spray paint that would turn a styrofoam head into a mutant creature? It started bubbling up but for some reason I kept spraying until the eye socket completely sunk in. Only then did I research what you should use to paint styrofoam. I obviously won't be using this one at Strange Folk. I will use the heads to display scarf/hat sets.

I will probably use 2 of the levels on the stand to hold mug racks that I got for a few dollars at Goodwill and painted the metallic color. I will hang some of my left over wrist cuffs from last year on them.

I got the table cloth at Goodwill for $4 and I really like the colors. I will probably put a cream sheet over the top and just show the print on the sides of my table but I haven't decided yet. I will use my banner from last year with my Lenox Knits logo on it.

So I spent around $40 including the paint this year on improvements to the booth which I think will pay for itself with more sales off of the table. What do you think? Do you like the tablecloth or do you think it will be too busy once I put all my colorful scarves on the table?