The damn machine broke!

This weekend was chaotic but fun! The art show went well. Considering we haven’t done this in 3 years, it all came together relatively easily with minimal stress. The show itself wasn’t spectacular but was a good show to do if you’re a local artist. The crowd was ok, but we weren’t expecting too much considering the current economy. We were able to sell a couple bigger pieces and honestly it was just great to be back on the art show “scene.” It was also good to see all of our art up again as well. I haven’t looked at it in awhile and it was good to see it wasn’t all crap, as I had previously felt after burning out doing the Renaissance Fair. There were definitely pieces that I don’t plan on printing anymore, but there were some that I felt had some artistic merit. So all is not lost!

Unfortunately, most of the large sales were on credit card which isn’t surprising… but what was surprising was that when we tried to upload our charges, the machine wouldn’t work. After hours on the phone with technical support, David was told that the machine is too old and isn’t supported by them anymore and we have to replace it for $700. Holy crap! That was not what we wanted to hear. Our original machine was only $250. They are trying to limit the use of the lower end models used by small retailers and sole proprietors and they are moving towards the bigger ones. We haven’t decided what we are going to do yet. We’re hoping that we may be able to buy the machine elsewhere and then have the bank connect to our new machine and upload the appropriate software…but we’ll see. The show was only ok, so we didn’t make enough to cover the cost of a $700 machine and break even. I would hate to have those customers get hundreds of dollars of artwork for free, and yet we’re unsure if we can swing a new machine right now. Considering our new line of art is no where near production and we won’t be doing art shows for awhile I’m sure, we would hate to invest in a machine that might be out-dated again by the time we’re back on the fair circuit. Ah, decisions…decisions…