Bill Franz’s Buy Local Spotlight: Pink Moon Goods

This week’s Buy Local conversation is with Kathleen Hotmer of PinkMoonGoods. My wife suggested her. She likes the store’s unique items and likes being on the store’s email list. She said the emails don’t come too often and they are interesting to read.

Kathleen liked hearing this. “People say you need email marketing, but I get so annoyed with the flood of emails I get. I wait until I have something to say and then write a blog post for my website. Then I take part of that blog post and send it out as an email. Finally I make an even shorter version for a social media post. That keeps my workload manageable.”

“The blog increased traffic to our website, which helped us get some online sales. Most of our sales are from the local community, but on a cold day like this when people are bundled up at home it’s nice to be getting some online business.”

I asked how she would describe her store. “We sell home goods that are beautiful, practical and ethically manufactured. In fact this store location itself fits that same description. The owners took a building that had been abandoned for years and made it beautiful. It also works on a practical level and giving new life to a building built in 1900 is as ethical as it gets.”

I asked her to tell me about a few products. “The print in the window is by two sisters. All of their art deals with a love of nature and a rejection of a throw-away mentality. This print shows a poem that the two use as a prayer whenever they eat together.”

“Those are Iris Hantverk brushes on that shelf. Since the firm was first founded they have been handmade by visually impaired craftsmen.”

“The towels you looked at are Imbari towels. I’ve used them for years. They are the softest and most absorbent towels imaginable. When I opened this shop they made me their only distributor outside of Japan. The towels are a popular gift item. Then people often come back and buy one for themselves.”