Blog - LadybirdCraftCentre

This is a strange time we now live in, with Covid 19 seeming to rule our lives. At every turn we have to remember to wear a mask, or consider if we'll need to queue to get into a shop, or remind ourselves to keep

Debs Decoupage

2 meters part from others, things that were alien to us only a few months ago.

With the local lockdowns popping up in many towns and cities now and advise being given to avoid travel, its not a surprize that customers numbers are again falling. So me and Deb sat down and came up with a plan, we'll reduce the opening hours of the shop to help concentrate visitors into the popular hours and therefore not be paying staff to do nothing, mean while we'll focus our downtime on making our popular items. Debs with her glass and slate decoupage in collections of Hedgehogs, Poppies, Highland cows, Cats and Butterflies, and me with slip trailing on pottery. This is a technique of piping liquid clay onto greenware (unfired pottery) to make patterns and designs that are usually then painted. This is the technique used by the Moorcroft pottery to achieve their revolutionary designs. Mine are by no means as good as Moorcroft pottery

Jos slip ware

which sells from £95 per item, but I love this technique and by using my own designs I hope that one day I might be known for the way I use the slip trailing on my pottery.

So keep an eye out for our work going on sale in the next couple of weeks, we'll be posting to mainland UK addresses (and possibility further). Why not kick start your Christmas shopping with some beautiful and unique craftwork. Jo

Ladybirds Log

Sunday 9th October 2016

It's so exciting to finally have something to update the public about the new shop in Caldicot. It's just a shame the update is that we're still waiting!

On Thursday I thought I would pop an update on my Fb page and it was received well :) So today I thought I would write in a little more depth about how we got this far.

In May I signed up to the website Startuploans.co.uk- they put me in touch with a company that would help me apply for a start up loan. Craig was assigned to me as my mentor and gave me templates and advise and sent me off to write my business plan. And then re-write my business plan. Then tweak my business plan. Then add a couple more bits to my business plan. And a cash flow forecast needed filling in for 2 years- well I still don't totally understand a cash flow, but I put numbers in boxes and somehow got it done.

Craig then asks "What evidence do you have to show that Caldicot wants this?"

Enjoying drinks and cakes outside Donnies Cafe, Magor

So I created a 10 question survey and with the super powers of Facebook I got 248 completed surveys in just a couple of days. Me and my husband had the hardship of visiting coffee shops and cafes in Chepstow, Caldicot and Magor to see what the competition was like and all this new info was added to my business plan and cash flow forecast.

By now it was the end of June and Craig advised me I had to apply for the Start up loan before my business turned 2 years old at the start of September.

Time was against me and it felt like everything else was against me as well. After filling in the application form for the loan Craig went on holiday and wanted to be back to work before the application went in as the process includes his company reviewing the application and Craig was needed to field any questions they had. Once the application was in some questions did come back and it involved me tweaking the business plan again. I then decided I needed a holiday- Well it had been booked 2 years previous and the timing now couldn't have been worse. I spent the week leading up to the holiday on the phone to Craig or the estate agent , sorting the Tintern shop ready for me to leave it in other peoples very capable hands and serving the Tintern customers as we were now in the first 2 weeks of the school holidays.

When I couldn't think straight anymore we went on holiday, and I did manage to relax and not think about the application for a while.

The day after we returned Craig phoned me and said my application had been accepted and the money would be in my account in the next few days. I said "Thank you". I'm not sure if it was the shock, the jet lag or the thought that now things are going to get very real, very quickly, but Thank you was all I could manage with no enthusiasm at all.

Craft Coffee Leaflet

A couple of weeks later, overflowing with enthusiasm, I made the finally decide on which unit on Caldicot High Street I was going to have and handed my notice in to my well paid care job.

Well that's the story as far. I'm petrified! .....and still waiting to get access to the unit- the landlords lawyers are doing ....something or other (probably nothing to do with my unit!) but it's them I'm waiting for.

I hope you enjoyed this first installment of Ladybird Log- keep watching this space for the most up to date info on our Caldicot and Tintern adventures.

New opening hours.

Road Closed.

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