In the demonstration area near the back of the Pumpkin Carriage, Michele Maxwell stamped a sheet of paper with a type of clear ink that stays wet for a few minutes.
Two customers watched closely.
"Best Witches!" the paper said.
The two customers nodded, asked about buying the materials, then browsed the selections of powder and paper.
"We've found our niche, and we're trying to stay true to it," said Pumpkin Carriage owner Linda Kaveshan. The store has been open 10 years, eight at 401 S. Orange St.
Yet a niche can be a hard thing to keep. The crunch is on in the crafts industry, in Missoula and across the nation. Memory Market, formerly on Stephens Avenue, closed its doors this summer, and Ben Franklin Crafts on Brooks Street went out of business in September.
In the stamp business in particular, the number of stores across the nation has decreased dramatically from about 500 in the late 1990s to fewer than 300 this year, said Roberta Sperling, editor and publisher of Rubber Stamp Madness Magazine in Corvallis, Ore. (Her pen name is "Rubberta.")
"Rubber stamping is a curious business," Sperling said. It is an industry built on whims, and, like all industries, it is sensitive to the impacts of the Internet, changing technology and national chains.
Back in the 1970s, Kaveshan and her husband, who worked at a printing store, ran a small business-stamp company out of their basement. Businesses and home offices had hundreds of uses for rubber stamps and those flat ink pads.
Kaveshan made cutesy stamps for her own use. It was fun.
In the 1980s, rubber stamping was almost an "underground movement," said Sperling, who chronicled the growth of the fad in her magazine.
Launched 25 years ago as a newsletter, Rubber Stamp Madness has since gone glossy and this year boasts a circulation of 45,000.
Rubber-stamp enthusiasts started gathering in increasingly large conventions, many in California. Quite a few of the enthusiasts, like Kaveshan, worked with business stamps, so it was natural that talk of fancy stamps went on at business- stamp wholesale shows.
That was where Kaveshan heard about her first rubber- stamp fair, in Chicago in 1992. She went, cradling in her mind the notion of a fancy rubber- stamp store of her own.
The convention convinced her a national stamp movement was afoot. She called her husband from Chicago.
"Oh yeah, we're doing this," she told him.
On the plane ride home, she brainstormed until she came up with the store's name.
"At that time stamping was more whimsical and cute. Over the years it has become art," Kaveshan said.
What started as a tiny operation quickly grew.
By 1996, Pumpkin Carriage filled 1,060 square feet of retail space and Kaveshan was renting hotel facilities for classes. Then she learned that the national arts-and-craft chain Michaels was coming to Missoula with a store at 2850 N. Reserve St.
"I lost 20 pounds," she said.
But Kaveshan didn't loiter. She built up her address list, stepped up her classes, expanded the selection of fancy papers, and kept listening to her customers and reading trade magazines.
It wasn't just Michaels. High-quality, inexpensive color and laser printers and the Internet had been cutting into her business and would continue to do so, and a new fad - scrapbooking - caught the attention of many of her customers.
But, Kaveshan reasoned, "If you print at home, you still need paper." Stamps work in scrapbooks, and then there's embossing powder. That can't be done with a laser printer.
Kaveshan and her staff exploited another strong suit. They love crafts, so there isn't anything in the store they haven't played with. They can give advice and, perhaps more importantly, can commiserate and talk shop with the customers.
So by 1999, when the rubber- stamp peak had passed, Kaveshan and Pumpkin Carriage had learned to roll with the market.
It's not a new strategy for the craft-and-hobby industry.
"We've added new things and expanded over the years," said Olive Seaholm, who owns the Treasure Chest at 1612 Benton Ave., with her husband. The store has been cluttered with hobbies and crafts since 1976.
"We've scrunched about as much as we can scrunch," Seaholm said.
That's how Treasure Chest has remained viable. Seaholm tries to add merchandise as fads come along, but she also tries not to get rid of anything. She knows that interest is a circular thing. What was fun five years ago will be fun again in five more.
She has been in business for almost 30 years. But the store, which Seaholm calls a "junkyard," won't close its doors anytime soon.
"I'm old enough to retire, but I'm not ready. It's still fun," she said.
For Kaveshan, of course, retirement isn't in the picture. She and Maxwell are amazed that 10 years have passed since the store opened.
"Most stores are gone in three years," Kaveshan said.
But with the help of her customers, Kaveshan hopes to ride another craft wave.
"Craft has a 10-year cycle," she said. "We hope we're on the bottom."
|
 |
 |
Add your comment now! Write your comment in the form below.
(Email address is for verification only. If you'd like to email a story, look for the link above)