If your store isn’t decorated yet for the Christmas selling season, you’d better get busy! Even though some complain every year that Christmas seems to come earlier and earlier, most of your customers are ready to start planning their holiday purchases. For many, that means seeing what new delights can be added to their own Christmas ornament collections this year. And while high-style, color-coordinated, themed “designer” trees do look great in a retail showroom, most regular folks decorate their Christmas trees at home with a hodge-podge of ornaments and other decorations that have been amassed over the years. The result is a familiar and old-fashioned look that’s loaded with nostalgia.
With competition from ‘big box’ stores being what it is, it’s important for other retailers to find a variety of sources for ornaments that are out of the ordinary and grab your customers’ attention. Fortunately, FGmarket.com has identified several vendors that can help you establish your store as the destination for unique and original ornaments. Ne’Qwa Art for example, creates extraordinarily beautiful ornaments in the centuries-old tradition of painting inside the glass ornament, giving the designs a wonderful luminosity. Their artists produce an appealing and diverse array of subject matter, from the whimsical to the dramatic. They can even create custom designs according to your own specifications. These ornaments are unique works of art that will surely become cherished family treasures for their buyers.
Fine, hand-made porcelain is what gives the ornaments from Piazza Ltd. their exquisite, delicate appearance. Using a labor-intensive “slip trailing” technique, these award-winning ornaments have a dimensional surface that’s embellished with lots of detail. They are manufactured from high-quality kaolin clay, which makes them very lightweight, translucent, and soft to the touch. Other beautiful bisque porcelain ornaments are produced by The Rhyn-Rivet Collection, Inc. These ornaments are hand-decorated using China paints, dimensional glazes, inlaid metals, and a fine dusting of diamond glitter, giving them a subtle shimmer. The vibrant colors and distinctive shapes give each of their diverse ornament collections a unique character.
When decorating a Christmas tree, whether it’s for display or for home use, it’s important to remember the design principle of depth, which helps give your completed tree a more dimensional appearance. Enhance the overall depth by placing some of the ornaments deep within the boughs of the tree, drawing the viewer’s eye inward. This is a good place to put inexpensive, solid-color, shiny glass balls, creating a backdrop for the finer ornaments that are placed in front of them.
Doing this also gives the tree the appearance of looking fuller and having more volume, while allowing the nicer, more expensive ornaments to be seen to full advantage. For good balance, hang larger ornaments near the bottom of the tree, placing smaller, more delicate ones closer to the top. If you’re using bead garlands, place them on the tree before the ornaments, so you can more easily control the shape and size of the swags. With the garland in place, you’ll have clearly-defined spaces in which to hang the ornaments.
The Barnhart Gallery has an original line of ornaments called Ornaphints & Yulery, created from thinly-sliced segments of ancient volcanic agates fitted with jewelry findings. These naturally-colorful ornaments are lustrous light catchers, and their porous outer edges can act as diffusers for scented oils. In the smaller sizes they’re also great to use as package ties or to hang on the neck of a bottle of wine. You might consider pairing these natural jewels with some of the beautiful leaf-shaped ornaments from Crafta.com. Available in different shapes and colors, the artificial leaves are decorated with beads and glitter to dress them up for the holiday season. In addition to a wide range of more traditional kinds of ornaments, Crafta.com also carries a distinctive pine cone petal ball in two sizes that will coordinate perfectly with a naturalistic decorating theme.
Some of the realistic nesting cardinals offered by Floraltrims.com would also complete this setting nicely. Both the male version (Harrison) and the female (Holly) are nestled into frosted grass nests, and Holly even has a couple of eggs in her nest. (Never mind that cardinals don’t actually lay eggs in winter… all fantasies are permitted at Christmastime.) If you prefer cardinals without nests, Floraltrims.com offers those, as well as many other birds in every size, shape, and wing span.
For a Christmas tree with plenty of personality, start with some of the ornaments produced by Bottman Design. Artist Paris Bottman has created an adorable line of hand-painted, resin Animal Angels collection ornaments – winged dogs, cats, pigs, bears, etc. – that could be matched up with the whimsical Chubby Cherubs collection (the name says it all) or the Real People Holiday Ornaments collection (for example, ‘More Chocolate Please’ – a “plump” woman with a box of chocolates, passed out on Santa’s lap), both designed by the talented Erika Oller.
Combine these ornaments with some of the clever Clay Dough Ornaments from Decorative Traditions. Be sure to check out their hand-painted Classic Tin Ornaments as well, featuring such motifs as dancing Santas and smiling snowmen. Then, hang some of the charming, handmade Christmas stocking ornaments from Christmas Cove Designs, are made of 100% virgin wool and available in several sizes. Hang a few of their beautiful, full-size traditional stockings nearby to promote add-on sales (also, check out their clever stocking hangers). The Heirloom Tree Skirts also offered by Christmas Cove would make a nice addition to any traditional holiday decor that endures in families for generations.
AE Wholesale is an excellent source of inexpensive ornaments, made with a variety of materials and in several themes, including sets of twelve snowmen, Santas, or angels packaged together in attractive hexagonal boxes. Another supplier, Kel-Toy, Inc. also offers a large selection of Ornaments online at http://www.keltoy.com. There you’ll find lots of unique baubles, bangles and beads with faceted surfaces, adding a touch of sparkle and light to any decorating scheme. Think of these ornaments as Christmas tree jewelry! Hanging several of these reflective ornaments within the interior of the tree will help carry light into the center and make the decorated tree more dazzling.
It can sometimes be challenging to exhibit Christmas ornaments in an attractive way, that’s also accessible for customers to purchase. One handy idea for displaying non-fragile items is to wire different-sized baskets directly onto the boughs of the tree. These baskets can then be filled with ornaments for customers to select. (Hang a few ornaments in nearby branches, too.) Baskets like this could also hold seasonal plush toys in assorted sizes. Another idea is to use display trees without needles, such as the ones offered by Christina’s World. You’ll find trees in a variety of sizes, styles and finishes, from freestanding, 6-ft. tall “rhinestone” trees to 42-in. high countertop models finished in matte gold.
While at Christina’s website, indulge yourself by viewing her slideshow and touring her entire selection of exquisitely-detailed blown-glass ornaments, featuring both traditional and out-of-the-ordinary images. These are the kinds of heirloom ornaments that are passed down through families and cherished for generations – and, they are infinitely collectible! Produced in a myriad of styles and price points, Christina’s ornaments give you the means to compete with some of the more well-known, “designer label” lines that require a deeper commitment of inventory. One look at these ornaments and you’ll see how well they live up to their slogan, “Poetry in Glass.”
Christmas ornaments are such wonderful, versatile gifts that they practically sell themselves. They’re good impulse items and they make excellent stocking stuffers. Perfect as hostess gifts for holiday parties, they’re also great for those office grab bags or as tokens of appreciation for favorite teachers. However, most of your ornament sales will probably come from customers as gifts for themselves, usually giving in to the urge to add a few new “special finds” to their own ornament collections each year. With the Christmas shopping days countdown soon to begin, visit all of FGmarket’s Christmas ornament, holiday, and special occasion vendors to see what we have collected… just for you!
Entries (RSS)
