flea marketing

I spent the morning shopping for china at the Pasadena City College flea market.
Perfect day for it, cool and cloudy. Such a welcome relief after our midweek heatwave. Apparently a lot of other people felt the same way, because the place was a seething mass of humanity, an extraordinary parade of bargain hunters of all shapes, sizes, cultures and creeds...

I'm growing my vintage china rental business, expanding the existing rental page on my website and stocking the already jam-packed storeroom with more beautiful china. I'm afraid it's becoming a bit of an obsession...Spending far too much time and money on ebay and Craigslist.

However, I have to say that the flea market is really not the place for bargains anymore. Full of horribly overpriced crap. Most vendors want around $25 for a not very attractive cup and saucer and really won't budge on their prices. Ten years ago when I first started going to that particular flea market there were bargains to be had, but not anymore.

I did pick up a few dinner plates from the same  crazy guy who's there every month. He looks like a huge bull frog and is probably totally  incapable of moving from the chair that his bulky form is spewing out of.  He's like an actor in his own, never ending, one man show,  making the same outrageous speech over and over again; "treasures galore, picked up from an exclusive estate sale in Beverly Hills, old lady was 99 years old, blah, blah, blah...!" You'd think he'd realize that people are onto him by now! But no....Hey, he obviously thinks it's a good sales pitch and that we're all idiotic enough to buy into his story. No harm done and he certainly adds color to the rainbow of characters that make up the flea market scene.

What I'm really looking forward to is February of next year when I'm off to the UK for a bonanza crockery buying spree. I make a bee line for the small towns in East Anglia where my parents live - the charity shops like Oxfam and Save the Children are always a good bet. Growing up in England and being dragged off to antique fairs as a child has left me an incurable vintage addict.

Believe it or not the English, famed for their afternoon teas, really don't give a toss about that tradition anymore, at least not in their own homes. They'd much rather meet up at Starbucks or Costa Coffee, such a shame. Apparently they now drink more coffee than tea.

Afternoon tea is  reserved for special occasions and generally served in the more upscale restaurants and hotels. So when Granny, the last of that generation of lace and doily tea sippers passes on to that tea-room in the sky, her family members don't know what to do with that precious tea set, so, they donate it to the local charity shop, which is where I swoop down and pick up the bargains. Most of the sets are hardly used, because the English have this thing about "saving things for best" - which means they were only used on high days and holidays

And here's where my obsession kicks  in: I just adore my collection of crockery! I remember where I purchased them and the stories the elderly ladies in the charity shops  told me about their past owners. I have to admit to  getting quietly upset when something gets broken and give each a little blessing before I carefully place it in its final resting place. Hey,  perhaps I should learn to make those crockery mosaic tables or something,and never have to actually throw any of them away...But I think not, I'm afraid I'm no Martha Stewart.

Maybe this is what happens when your child grows up and goes to college, you have to transfer your love somewhere else...Maybe it's time to get a dog!

Deconstructing the tea party...

I am on a one woman mission to remove the odious stigma that is associated with the phrase "tea party" - and I'm not talking about that flash in the pan political movement which is really buggering up my "tea party"  google searches! Don't get me going on that! That's a whole other posting in the making. 

Over the last nine years I've catered hundreds of tea parties - which have run the gamut from the traditional to the unconventional.  And believe me I love them all. But most people (especially men)  still tend to  think of tea parties as stuffy, estrogen fueled  social occasions. And that's fine, those occasions have their place on the social calendar. But tea parties can be so much more if  just given a chance to shine!

They don't have to be all doilies and tinkling of tea cups affairs. Think about it, weekend afternoons are usually unclaimed real estate on the social calendar - and unlike a dinner party, where you can only invite as many people as you have chairs for bottoms, you can invite as many people as you like. Plus you can invite people for a fixed time, say between 4-6pm, which leaves both you and your guests with time on their busy social  calendars for their dinner plans (or not).

And it really doesn't matter if baking is not your metier -  go on, cheat!  Use a packet scone mix and just buy jam & clotted cream (Cost Plus is brilliant for all three.)  As for sandwiches, well, really, how difficult is it to slap some filling between a couple of  pieces of bread and then cut the little the beggers into quarters - you don't even have to remove the crusts - tends to make chaps think they are not butch enough. 

Make several pots of fabulous tea, just so that you can call it a "tea party", and then break out the champagne or even better make some cocktails, Pimms cups in the summer or maybe some marteanis?

Music - up to you, vintage tunes from the 20s and 30s are great, Noel Coward is a favorite. I think we should put Brunch on notice,  let people sleep in on the weekends, afternoon Tea Parties are the next big thing!