Changes are hard. For most people any way. They have a way of putting a person off balance, of feeling disoriented. We have enough things changing all.the.time with the internet. It’s discombobulating, often bringing new learning curves along with frustration.
During the past couple years I’ve spent more time than seems reasonable trying to sleuth a way to make spindles as effortlessly available as possible through the internet. I had thought this site would hold the answer but it’s chained to PayPal which, despite pleading phone calls and emails, doesn’t have coding in place to change a Buy Now button to show that a spindle has been sold. I’ve looked into various merchant accounts and websites that appear to have that capability. I even had a wonderful WordPress site ready to go except for one thing: there was no way to list one of a kind items. It was great for our hooks, needles and looms but not for spindles. We hired an IT person who helped set up the website but he too could not work around PayPal’s limitation. I know there must be some webhost/design place that has this feature but I haven’t yet found one that isn’t terribly expensive.
We tried Etsy several years ago and while it was okay until Etsy started wanting a bigger and bigger bite of their share for each item. I’ve threatened to return to posting on eBay. 😮 It’s where we started our online ventures in 2002.
During the past couple years I’ve spent more time than seems reasonable trying to sleuth a way to make spindles as effortlessly available as possible through the internet. I had thought this site would hold the answer but it’s chained to PayPal which, despite pleading phone calls and emails, doesn’t have coding in place to change a Buy Now button to show that a spindle has been sold. I’ve looked into various merchant accounts and websites that appear to have that capability. I even had a wonderful WordPress site ready to go except for one thing: there was no way to list one of a kind items. It was great for our hooks, needles and looms but not for spindles. We hired an IT person who helped set up the website but he too could not work around PayPal’s limitation. I know there must be some webhost/design place that has this feature but I haven’t yet found one that isn’t terribly expensive.
We tried Etsy several years ago and while it was okay until Etsy started wanting a bigger and bigger bite of their share for each item. I’ve threatened to return to posting on eBay. 😮 It’s where we started our online ventures in 2002.
Artfire is the place that seemed to be a pretty good fit for our needs though not perfect as we’ve found out.
Feeling the pressure to make more spindles available I opened up the website sooner than, in hindsight, I should have though it seemed to be working smoothly for those who were testers. The worst hurdle for customers is that apparently if you have a spindle in your cart it’s still fair game for another person to buy until that final PayPal payment click that removes it from action.
One thing that is helpful is to have an account with Artfire already set up and to be logged into PayPal to make your process as quick as possible.
I suspect when the spindles were made available on Wednesday and Thursday that there were a huge number of people all vying for the same spindles at the same time. The number of people trying to get one spindle is something that is out of our control. Stats on this site often showed that there would be close to 5000 hits within the opening minutes of having spindles available. It’s bound to be the same no matter what host we might choose to use.
I need to do a great deal more exploring and reading. Maybe I’ll yet come up with a solution that will enable me to use this website and have buttons/cart that will automatically remove the item as soon as it’s in the process of being purchased.
Until then, we deeply appreciate your patience and encouragement.
It will be Thursday before there will be any more spindles available. Sunday is filled with church, a baby shower then band practice for our gig next Sunday. Trying to fit some serious fiddling time this past week has been a real challenge. It needs is high priority next week. Crooked Finger Band was asked to play for the Homecoming picnic (an annual affair that’s very popular) only 3 weeks ago. With little playing on the violin all summer there’s lots of polishing to be done between mailing out spindles and catching up with the new ones Ed is making.
And if you have one of the types of spindles that’s being offered on the site – Aegeans coming up on Thursday – please sit back so those who don’t have one will have a better chance.
Feeling the pressure to make more spindles available I opened up the website sooner than, in hindsight, I should have though it seemed to be working smoothly for those who were testers. The worst hurdle for customers is that apparently if you have a spindle in your cart it’s still fair game for another person to buy until that final PayPal payment click that removes it from action.
One thing that is helpful is to have an account with Artfire already set up and to be logged into PayPal to make your process as quick as possible.
I suspect when the spindles were made available on Wednesday and Thursday that there were a huge number of people all vying for the same spindles at the same time. The number of people trying to get one spindle is something that is out of our control. Stats on this site often showed that there would be close to 5000 hits within the opening minutes of having spindles available. It’s bound to be the same no matter what host we might choose to use.
I need to do a great deal more exploring and reading. Maybe I’ll yet come up with a solution that will enable me to use this website and have buttons/cart that will automatically remove the item as soon as it’s in the process of being purchased.
Until then, we deeply appreciate your patience and encouragement.
It will be Thursday before there will be any more spindles available. Sunday is filled with church, a baby shower then band practice for our gig next Sunday. Trying to fit some serious fiddling time this past week has been a real challenge. It needs is high priority next week. Crooked Finger Band was asked to play for the Homecoming picnic (an annual affair that’s very popular) only 3 weeks ago. With little playing on the violin all summer there’s lots of polishing to be done between mailing out spindles and catching up with the new ones Ed is making.
And if you have one of the types of spindles that’s being offered on the site – Aegeans coming up on Thursday – please sit back so those who don’t have one will have a better chance.