Cha-cha-cha-changes

Today we’re saying good-bye to two inaugural design team members, Amber and Merry. They have both been with me since Day One and I’m so thankful they helped me get things off the ground. Please stop by and wish them well as they move on to other crafty journeys. Bye girls!!!

This is the first of some upcoming changes here at IHP. I did make one change to the store, based on some of the survey feedback. Now, instead of alphabetically, items are listed reverse chronologically with the newest items/items recently changed being listed first. This way when you look at the sale and new pages, the top items are the most recently added items.

There is still the search function, manufacturer drop down (on the homepage) and under the category Open Stock you can view By Collection Name, in case you’re having a hard time finding something specific.

Perhaps the most major change is that beginning tomorrow, Feb. 1, the free shipping threshold will now be $50. I’ve always prided myself on offering the lowest free shipping around but honestly, with the postal increases I just can’t keep it this low any longer.

There were two postal increase in 2009 and I DID NOT raise my prices or up my threshold at all. But this recent one at the beginning of January was too much for me to absorb. Even raising my threshold to $50, I am still the lowest around to offer free shipping and to not have any restrictions on what “qualifies” or to charge extra for Priority shipping. I don’t have any restrictions or limitations on what you can order to qualify – it is just a set dollar amount.

Before I made this decision I looked at our competition because it was important to me to remain at the top in customer service and to definitely stay competitive. I did some comparisons to our top competitors and this is what I found:

Competitor #1	Free with $75 of qualifying items (12x12 paper does not qualify),
Competitor #2	Free with $85 order, ($3.95-$9.25 for less than threshold)
Competitor #3	Free with $100 of qualifying items (sale items do not qualify), $4.95 for less than threshold
Competitor #4	Free with $150 order, $4.95-$8.80 for less than threshold
Competitor #5	No free shipping option, $5 for all orders
Competitor #6	No free shipping option, minimum charge $6.30
Competitor #7	Free with $75 of qualifying items, must pay upgrade fee of $2.50 for Priority Mail
Competitor #8	Free with $55, $6.95 flat rate for lower than the threshold

See that? We’re still lower than everyone on this list! I hope you understand! And of course there’s still our great prices (almost ALWAYS below MSRP), super duper speedy shipping and stellar customer service/response.

I’ll be back tomorrow with a crafty post for you. Thanks for popping in today and for your understanding!

Survey winner! AND my first CHA delivery!

First, thank you to each and every one of you who completed the survey. I got a lot of really great feedback and think that these occasional surveys are something I may do again in the future. Of course, you’re always welcome to email me feedback if you’ve got something to say. A few of you did send me extra comments when you replied and I really appreciate that. I want to make the store as easy to use as possible (I got some feedback about the organization of the new and sale items and I’m checking to see if that can be sorted by date rather than alphabetically) and offer the best products with the best customer service. I can only do this with your feedback about what you’d like to see and how I’m doing. So please, don’t hesitate to ever email or call me if you have comments!

And now…congratulations to CAMMY WALL! She is our random winner of the $25 gift certificate. I’ll be emailing you your gift certificate code later today.

Thanks to everyone…and I truly mean that, who participated. Have a great weekend. I hope to get some stamping in but first I need to unpack from CHA!

ETA: HOLY COW! My first CHA delivery just showed up. All the new ultra fine Flower Soft. And I thought I had the fastest shipping around! :) It'll be up on the store later today.

Five Minute Friday: Ornament Thanks, again!

Happy Friday!  Are you tired of my cards yet?  I told you I made a bunch of them!

I used a scrap of Ivory cs and embossed it with my A2 Snowflake folder.  Then I wrapped a scrap of red faux suede ruffled edge ribbon, finished it off with a die-cut ornament from the Good Cheer line and stamped my Chelsea Sentiments in Palette Noir.  The DP is also from the Good Cheer line. 

Have a great weekend!  Thanks for stopping by today!

There's No Place Like Home!

I had the most fantastic week with my girls and with SO many new people that I'm proud to call my friends. I can't wait to see them all again!

I've got a lot of things to do to catch up so please be patient for a little while so I can get back on track. The survey response has been amazingly overwhelming and I am itching to read each and every one and digest your feedback. My goal is to still have a random winner picked for Friday.

I'll pop back in once I adjust to regular life again and get some stamping done!

Thanks for visiting!

Doggie Treats and Christmas card

Oops! I found another lost project that I never posted.

Back when I was baking all of my Christmas cookies and making cookie platters like these, I decided I needed to make some doggie cookies (from my favorite doggie cookbook, Better Food for Dogs) too! So…I did! And then I needed a way to package them!

So I used one of the great Lauren Meader’s templates and made these cutie little boxes using some Heidi Grace paper and a little strip of Shawl paper for the edge. I used my Circle Nesties to cut the window and the tags on both the box and the card. The sheer red polka dot ribbon and metallic gold string on the box was my finishing touch.

The box is held together with i {stick} papers, of course. The greeting is from Jolly Christmas and is stamped in Palette Noir. Our vet, our poop lady (the BEST $10 I spend every week!), our obedience school classmates & teacher and a few friends got these.

Sorry I forgot to share this earlier but isn’t it nice to remember Christmas now that it is all over? *wink*

Oh…speaking of Nesties…don’t forget that all of the new ones being released at CHA are on PREORDER right now. Don’t wait – Spellbinders is ALWAYS backordered almost immediately after CHA so to ensure that you get yours, be sure to preorder today! I will be basing my CHA purchasing on these preorders.

Thanks for stopping by today! I leave bright and early on Saturday to head to California for CHA and meet up with a few of the design team for our DT dinner on Saturday night. YAY! I’m so excited to see my girls!

Have a great day!

Amazing day!!

I just got in from a great night with some amazing new and old friends. I can't even begin to tell you how much we all laughed.

But, first we had a lot of drama today when Lynn's bag (purse and all) was stolen on the floor. Thankfully it was recovered intact about 2 hours later in the Martha booth.

So to celebrate Susanna, me, Lynn, Lori, Deb and my two new buddies Kim (Burmeister) and Sankari all went out for delicious food (and alcohol!) At Fire and Ice. YUMMO. We were there for three and a half hours brainstorming, sharing, laughing uncontrollably and just generally having a fantastic time. This is the best part of CHA for me. All the new stuff is awesome but I love all the peeps!!

I got LOTS more goodies today and I'll have some *very* exciting news to share soon.

Some shopping highlights from today:

- stamps, stamps and more stamps! Stampendous, Hero Arts, Stampavie, Our Craft Lounge
- the new Scor-Pal buddy (a cuter, smaller, more portable, perfect for cardmakers, improved version of the original)
- Pink Paislee
- new fine Flower Soft
- Maya Road
- Spellbinders (shipping early-mid March)

There's some more but I've got to keep some secrets, right??

Thanks for popping in!

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Deb is fabulous!