Busy busy today listing metal bronze sculptures and we have waited a while before adding these. There seemed to be a lot of disparity in quality and price for these items but have found some heavy iron composite with a great style and look to them. These have all been crafted with just a resin coat ( a lot of these on the market are half the weight and made entirely of resin ) but the heavier iron composite has allowed the sculptures to just be coated in resin on the surface for painting in antique bronze. Almost sounds like a dinner recipe. We particularly like the metal fisherman “Lucky Catch” but everything on the range has been carefully selected and we are confident that all will sell through 2018.
We like these, took a trip to Portsmouth this morning and have picked 3 from a range of a dozen that are our favourites! Lisa began chuckling at this one and I liked “I drink to make other people interesting”. “Annoying the cook will result in smaller portions” is probably in third place.
Some big boats along Poole Quay today and the Cape Verde makes a great prop for these beautiful Australian triton seashells ( syrinx auranus ). Probably our most eclectic shell and we are getting these right up as big as 50 cms now. Preparations for the nautical wedding season are upon us and post Christmas enquiries coming in today. We are considering renting out some of our larger seashells for wedding centrepieces again this year. Best dealt with locally though.
Well we can’t admit to having been particularly active on our blog in 2017. We don’t have a team working on social media suggesting nautical gifts for men with beards. We do have an occasional stab at Facebook and have been known to put a picture up on Instagram but 2018 is the year we would like our customers, friends and clients to call in on 01202 285163 or leave a message for us to call you back on 07711247762. The best bit for us in 2017 was “face to face” in the shop or a natter on the phone. It’s where we are at our best too ( we do sometimes have hangovers on Mondays ). January and February are trade show months, please let us know at info@dorsetgifts.com what you would have liked to buy but couldn’t find. We are working on more keenly priced brass maritime items. We have also been promising to introduce a section for nautical salvage items ( for several years! ). You just never know!
Our best selling yachts are probably the J Class Yachts, but there is usually a story surrounding purchases of the Canadian Bluenoses as noted today. Our buyer asked if the Bluenose could be gift wrapped and also if we could include the description of origin on a card in the packaging. In fact, we liked his suggested description more than anything we could write and it was along the following lines ………….”one for the die-hard salty seadogs of Canada where the boat originates. The Canadian Bluenose was a fishing and a racing boat built in 1921 and an important Canadian symbol in the 1930s. Bluenose was in fact a nickname for hardy Nova Scotians in the 18th century. We think their blue noses would have had more to do with the weather than the whisky”.
We thought we would get this in before Trading Standards visit. Just took a telephone order for seahorse wall art from a lovely chap, a commercial fisherman from Hastings. Before bidding farewell, he mentioned that he liked our silver resin sea life items, particularly the silver resin plaice, but it wasn’t a plaice. Nope, that’s a turbot and not any old turbot either. Our silver resin plaice is in fact a chicken turbot and I’m quite sure his description is correct so we shall get down to changing this. He recently caught a 23 pound one that sold for over £100 at market. We love these phone calls…..just taking the wolf ( I mean the dog ) for a walk….
Our brass mini tankards are great sellers as a Christmas present year in year out. Practical, beautifully crafted, in a presentation box and useful! We often wonder what is the most popular tipple going in to these. I’ve just put that thought out to everyone once again, and the consensus is………….”for display”. We think the smaller shot glasses ( very good sellers too ) get the rum. We are often asked if we can engrave the boxes and the online blog answer to this is “sorry but a humble no” due to past mistakes in the process, but on the lovely wooden box there is ample room for a small cooper or brass plate and the name of your choice to be engraved somewhere along your local high street.
We heard the Apprentice was showing Poole Quay last night as the location for one of the selling tasks. We thought we had better watch to see what all the fuss was about. We had heard that the production team had spent a lot of the day in the Poole Arms next door to us, as the weather was quite rotten for the Summer. One of the tasks was to sell polyester life like fish cushions and the team had a brilliant pitch on the waterfront managing to sell £180s worth in a day. We have been aware of these for a few years but not put them up on Dorset Gifts, until today………………
Still doing well with the 6 inch red glass floats seen here with some dandy 6 inch red starfish too. This seems to be the look for Christmas trees and the main colour this season. Greens also going well too, and the turquoise and jade greens. I promise not to go on and on about Christmas trees for the remainder of 2016, in fact – my final post!!
It’s that time of the year where we get a spike in orders for glass fishing floats, and reds are the least popular through the year. As Christmas approaches and the Christmas trees are unpacked, the nautical tree prefers greens and reds to blues and purples. We have lots of red glass floats ready to go. These actually cost a lot more to buy in and the reason we are given ( we never get this right! ) is there is some type of filament required to get the lovely deep red “required” colour. Of course, another great seller for nautical Christmas trees are the starfish and another tip….. best sellers are usually the white pointer starfish in the 10 cms up size.
