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AWESOME!!!!! Congratulations, that is a way awesome opportunity, not just for showcasing your work and getting potential clients, but also to encourage more women to get into woodworking.
The question I have for you is how long will the demo be? Is it going to be just 1 hour, 4 hours, etc?? Tod is right about preparing your stock beforehand if you do not have time, that way you will feel more comfortable knowing everything is there and ready and all you have to do is XYZ.
Do a few practice runs beforehand so you can time yourself and make sure you have all the necessary equipment, accessories, parts, etc.
If you are having people do hands on stuff, then you should probably stick with basics (maybe no power tools) and at least do a safety lecture first before anyone gets on any tools. You'll need to provide safety glasses if the people coming are not prepared already and make sure they sign waivers beforehand :p
Oh oh , and don't forget your marketing stuff ;) print out all the nice pictures of your past work and put it into a portfolio for peope to look at. If you get a nice booth space, print some nice big pictures of some of your best work. And biz cards, brochures, etc.
shelley, thanks for saving kens "edit" finger....he would have been busy:rolleyes:
are ya` still going to talk to us common folk now that you`ll be a star?
do they have anything like a county extention center in canada? these are places that country folk can go to get information on anything from animal husbandry to logging... i`m thinking that if such a place exists up there they may be a good avenue for the type of folks i see being interested......just thoughts..tod
The message is gone, so am I
If you are really into this presentation stuff, you can record yourself doing a dry run at home and then play it later to see what can be changed. But I don't think a tool/WWing demo is going to be that formal. The picture that comes to my mind is that of cooking shows where the host shows how to mix and prepare the ingredients, and has a precooked dish already sitting in the oven which he/she pops out at the end.
With that in mind you can have a night stand all ready and cut for dry assembly as your "cooked" item, and during the demo you can make one of each. Such as: one side of a dovetailed/finger jointed drawser, mortice and tenon joins, top and sides. At the end you pull out all the precut componants and dry assemble them to give an idea of what the finished product will look like. Some how fighting with all the clamps at the end doesn't seem very attractive to me. Dry assembled with a rubber mallet should hold the structure in place.
The message is gone, so am I
Congrats!! You deserve this recognition...
Congratulations! Glad to hear the store has become more enlightened since you first started going there. :) Good luck!
Shelly, your husband and my wife would object if I dared to "bare" with you. :eek:
However, I am happy to bear with your concerns. :rolleyes:
As irresponsible and ignorant as it is of those salesmen to overlook you, it does happen the other way also. Try being a man buying cloth in a sewing shop. Practically can't be done without physically grabbing a sales clerk. I know. Been there, been the invisible customer many times.
Hang in there. Good luck.
Frank, I know what you're saying about the man in a fabric store. LOML sent me to buy makeup at the clinic counter. After being passed up in line a few times I finally had to demand service.
Shelley,
* how many women do you expect to actually be around to see the demo?
* Would it be better to demo projects that our wives more commonly do or do you want to demo projects that most beginner hobbyists do? for example, spindle turning, christmas ornaments, picture frames vs. bedside tables, coffee tables
Shelley, this is wonderful! Congratulations. Well-deserved.
You are right to offer mini-demos (of something). People get tired and their attention wanders, so anything longer than a hour or so--it will be hard to hold them (voice of experience here). You might want to alternate the "shop tools demo" with a "real project" demo. Some will come for both sessions. You know "shop demo at 10" "birdhouse building at 1:00", etc.:)
Go get 'em.:D
Shelley
Congrats - I haven't forgotten you - Just still doing too many 14 hour days:) .
This sounds like a great opportunity. I like tods idea but it is real important that you leave yourself the time to talk to folks about woodworking and about your own work. And i'm not talking about "selling" your work but about finding out what folks think and what they might want in the future. That said, the nightstand would be impressive and show a nice range of skills. Maybe break it up into a series of mini demos. So that at 11am you show making the drawer. Most of the components pre-made. you make the last couple of pieces and then assemble in a 30-45 min time slot. 1pm you do the same sort of thing but with a raised panel door? etc... Kinda takes the pressure off both you and the visitors and lets you show some skills and techniques with some "for the last several minutes I've been..." moments.
Be ambitious , but only as ambitious as allows you to be successful. And like tod says (by my inference) its good practice to need to work fairly swiftly.
I would be cautious of photos of your hand carnage. By all means talk about it but photos of a bloody mess will make a bigger impression in peoples minds than rational explanatiosn of the chain of events.
Once again - congratulations on well deserved recognition.
Shelley, Congratulations on your opportunity, both to showcase your work and to teach others. Your dilemma is one I’ve thought of but still haven’t found a solution. It’s easy to demonstrate turning – in a short period of time you can produce a bowl, or a set of candle sticks, or a number of other things. But when you try to produce “furniture” it’s tough to do it quickly.
One thing I thought of is to make a box. The project needs to be small and simple, and hopefully appeal to your audience. With a box, you could prepare the stock in advance and talk about the steps in that preparation. Maybe even do one step, like cutting the groove for the bottom.
Then, have the box in various states of completion. You could demonstrate sawing the box to create the top and bottom. Then another sample could be prepared for the hinges, and you could talk about how that’s done.
Basically, it would allow you to show a project from start to finish, without having to do each of the steps in real time.
Then, of course, have a couple of boxes completed so that people can see what they might create.
But no matter what you decide, I'm sure the people will enjoy it.
Mike
PS: I would not get into injuries. People will assume that injuries are a part of the hobby. While injuries are always a risk, many woodworkers are never injured, certainly not seriously.
one note i`ve not seen addressed yet;
the fellow who owns the store is selling high end equipment, per shelleys discription, and she`ll be on hand to show what can be built using the equipment available in the store. i honestly think that by appealing to the female gender that an even larger number of male woodworkers will show up. and i`ll stick to my original suggestion of a nightstand, in essence it`s only a box, with another box that slides in to it. in fact i`d suggest making them,(the night stands) as technically challanging as you`re comfortable assembling on site, that way folks of both genders will see first hand that cool stuff can be built at home and by a "woman" no less. just think if the present day t.v. icons tried to demo boyscout projects.......how long would their shows be aired? give folks something to strive for if only they had that new general tablesaw, or that floorstanding hollow chisel mortiser, that way the store owner will be more likely to invite you back and the spectators will be more likely to come see your next exibit and bring their friends/spouses.......more of my .02 tod
Shelley,
You could always make something like this.
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/attachme...2&d=1138492924
Simple to make, All of the parts would be precut and ready to assemble. You could demonstrate how to make various parts of it and it only requires a bandsaw, router and some hand tools. Sam knocks em out in half a day from scratch.
In terms of your accident, I would shy away from the grafics. You could talk about it but to me the pictures would be a turn off.
and it would be a nice piece to raffle off.