Off to the Mile High City

Next week I'm off to Denver for the International New Age Trade Show - http://www.inats.com/. I'm looking forward to the 8 days in the Mile High City, says the woman from below sea level. When we first arrive we'll give ourselves a day to acclimate and run some errands. Thursday night I'll be offering Angel Gemstone Oracle Sessions and Past Life Regressions at For Heaven's Sake.

Then Friday is the day to unpack the boxes, set up the booth and prepare to sell our merchandise to retailers. It's the first year that'll The Crystal Garden is represented at INATS West as a wholesaler. I made the decision to expand the wholesale division of the store when I saw how popular Smudge In Spray was becoming in my own store.

Friday is also a day of Pre-Show Seminars. I'll be leading the opening meditation at 9 am then co-facilitating a talk on Social Networking on the Internet at 10:45 with Caryn Colgan. Caryn and I have become friends through the Coalition of Visionary Resources of which I am now President. COVR is a national trade organization supporting vendors, retailers, publisher, authors, speakers, musicians and any business in the visionary industry. It's a very good organization providing many benefits.

Each year the COVR Visionary Awards are presented at the Saturday night evening banquet. Smudge in Spray is a finalist! I am so pleased.

Anyway, Saturday, June 27 - Monday, June 29 the show will go on at the Denver Merchandise Mart. I'll be wearing many hats. I'll be there as a wholesaler selling my Spoken Audio CDs, full line of Medical Grade Essential Oils and the wonderful aromatic Sprays. Chrissy and Vincent will be in the booth with me talking to retailers. We are giving retailers sample bottles of Lavender and have cool star shaped fans to put a drop of oil on for them to test a scent.

I'll also be a Retailer, there to buy, buy, buy in anticipation of the Holiday Season. I place a lot of orders at INATS. I've already pulled my purchase orders and I'll buy other merchandise that will be new to The Crystal Garden.

I'll also be there as a speaker because I'll be providing the pre-show seminar and introduce Loretta LaRoche at our COVR Opening Breakfast as well as provide Retailers with a seminar on Scent-sational Sales: Selling Aromatherapy on Sunday.

And, I'll be there as the President of COVR facilitating our Annual Convention Board Meeting bright and early on Monday. Whew!

I'm happy to be returning to For Heaven's Sake on Tuesday evening to offer my class on Crystal Consciousness.

It's a nice full schedule and it'll be good for me to step away from Florida for a little while. The stress of my dear Dad ailing in Hospice has been tearing me up. He's been my close friend as well as my Dad for my whole life. I'm going to miss him when he leaves the planet. At least he is resting peacefully with no pain. I feel grateful that my siblings will be nearby while I'm out of town.

So off to the Mile High City I go . . . my bags are packed!

Green Bags and Branding My Logo

I am so blessed to have Victoria Rose Martin, artist extraordinaire, as one of my good friends and angels. She happily created the logo for my store. I knew I needed to work on branding for marketing purposes.

It wasn't until my 19th year of The Crystal Garden that I established a very definitive logo and focused on branding.At the last International New Age Trade Show, INATS, one of the main themes for seminars and the show in general was "Going Green." I realized that it was time for The Crystal Garden to have a 'green bag.' I love how it turned out. When people participate in my special layaway program going on this year at The Crystal Garden til Dec 15, they get one of these with their purchase. Otherwise, they are available for sale. They are very big. I'm impressed on how many groceries fit in them. My cousin, Camille, has had great results with using it for grocery shopping.

Remembering to bring the bags with me into the store - all stores - is a new habit that I am still working on integrating. I usually remember when I run in for groceries. I am still working on remembering to bring my bag with me for other types of shopping. I've been a compost nut for years. Now that I have a lot of land, my yard is so happy to receive the nutrients from the remains of vegetable cuttings, coffee grounds, egg shells and so on.

How are you going green?