This week Zibbet “flew” to Ireland to interview Kay’s delightful shop named Ruby Robin Boutique.Ruby Robin Boutique on Zibbet is like a breath of fresh air from Ireland. You can almost smell the wildflowers and feel the breeze blowing dandelion seeds through the crystal clean air.We think you’ll love this shop’s jewelry creations. Great holiday gifts for someone special you know.Please enjoy the interview, leave Kay a comment, and then use the Share Tools so others can read it, too. Please spread the Zibbet Love!
My name’s Kay and I’m the owner/maker behind Ruby Robin Boutique, a handmade jewellery business which I started just over a year ago. I hail from Cork City in the South of Ireland, where I make all sorts of whimsical, keepsake jewellery in my home studio. I live in a cosy little townhouse, in a peaceful old part of the city, with my boyfriend and our four mischievous cats.To most people’s surprise, I never studied art of design. I actually spent four years qualifying as a Nutritional Scientist at my local university. I graduated just as the recession hit really hard, and work prospects in my field were dismal, with most jobs just in food manufacturing. So I spent a year or two working in utterly unfulfilling jobs and trying to figure out what to do with my life. Gradually I realized that I needed to follow my roots (my parents have been craftspeople for over 40 years), and pursue a more creative path and I started experimenting with jewellery again. Within a few months of starting my business, I quit my day job to focus on it full time. Most of my business is done online, but I also do wholesale both in Ireland and abroad, as well as being a regular on the craft market circuit in Ireland.Being self-employed is incredibly tough, and I don’t get nearly enough days off to maintain a reasonable level of sanity, but the feeling of achievement you get from being truly independent is immense. The best days are when I can make an excuse to go to the beach or the woods to source new plants and flowers to make into jewellery.
As this is my full time job, I spend nearly every waking minute being creative in some form or another but when I have the occasional day off, we love to go away in our rusty old VW campervan for a night or two to recharge and reconnect with nature. We also like to spend time at our allotment garden and I’m a fairly notorious cat lady, so we do our fair share of kitten rescuing, fostering and rehoming.Initially Ruby Robin was inspired by a handful of pieces of Victorian jewellery my mum had in her dusty, old jewellery box growing up. I remember being utterly enchanted by a little oval brooch she had, which had some tiny little wildflowers encased in resin. I am also inspired by my childhood, spent in the rural countryside of Co. Kerry in the South of Ireland.
My sisters were a lot older than me growing up, so I spent an introverted childhood with my collie dog exploring the mountains and boglands, collecting quartz crystals and picking flowers. I was completely and utterly immersed in nature.I have always admired my mum, but since starting my own craft business I am even more in awe of what she has managed to do in life. I honestly don’t know how she managed to raise three children, run her ceramics business, grow all her own vegetables and still make fresh bread for my school sandwiches every week!
My other great passion is for food, nutrition, cooking and gardening. It’s something I hope to incorporate into my professional life again in the future, if I can find the timeI really respect the integrity of the site, the commitment to true handmade artists is incredibly important to me. Apart from that, I love the energy of the sellers there, there is a lot of positivity and excitement about what can be achieved as a community which I find really exciting.
I really like the feel of the site, I find it very intuitive. The one thing I really would like is to be able to list my prices in Euros, and have the conversions handled automatically by the site.I promote pretty much everywhere! I use blogspot and tumblr for a blog, I am also active on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Stumbleupon and Wanelo. This Christmas I have made posters to put up around my city, and will have friends handing out flyers on the street. I also do a lot of inadvertent promoting through meeting people at the weekly craft market I trade at.
Don’t just sit back and expect the sales to happen. Creating a strong presence online requires constant attention, whether it’s regularly photographing and listing new items for your Zibbet shop, or creating conversation over at your Facebook page, you need to nurture your shop every day. The internet is huge beyond comprehension, we are just drops in a vast ocean so you need to give people a really good reason to be interested in you!Doing what I do now with the time to take one or two days off a week!Tags: Featured Zibbeters, Ruby Robin Boutique
