Have you ever had to call a store owner by phone and felt a little stumped about what to say? This post is for you!

For the most part, when you're reaching out to stores that you don't have a previous connection to, we recommend using email. The main reason is that most store owners really want to be with their customers when they’re in the shop -- so they prefer not to have an in-person or telephone interruption. Plus, email has the added benefit of allowing you the time to craft your story, think through your email template, and attach a few beautiful photos of your work to make a good first impression.

If your Faire orders have dried up or dropped dramatically, it's almost certainly not about your products — here's exactly why it happens and what you can actually do about it.

The "set it and forget it" era on Faire is officially over — here's what changed, when it changed, and what it actually takes to succeed on the platform today.

Paris Woodhull is a Knoxville-based illustrator with 14+ years of retail experience, including running her own storefront. In this conversation, she gets into what stops great products from selling in stores, what makers consistently misunderstand about the store owner's reality, how to approach a shop in person without making it awkward, and the one thing she'd tell every maker to fix first.

The question goes like this:

“I’m curious about pitching when you’re in the midst of putting together a new line sheet for the next season. I plan on having a new line sheet with lots of new cards around mid August (that’s the theory anyway) and I wasn’t sure if I should wait to pitch to new retailers until it’s ready? Or should I pitch them my current line sheet and just not worry about that?

We’ve worked with entrepreneurs around the world and with makers at every stage of their businesses. We’ve advised people with multi-million dollar businesses and those who are down to their last pennies. So we’ve seen a lot of folks make a lot of crucial decisions. And we certainly face a lot of them, as business owners.

Arianne Foulks is the founder of Aeolidia, a design agency specializing in branding, email marketing, and Shopify sites for creative businesses. She's worked with over 700 brands, grown her team to twenty people, and has a lot of hard-won perspective on what actually makes a product land, or miss, with customers and buyers alike. We talked with her about brand strategy, packaging, photography, and what it really feels like to run a business right now.

An in-depth, experience-based review of Overjoy AI for wholesale makers covering its CRM, automations, Shopify and Faire integrations, lead generation potential, pricing, pros, cons, and practical alternatives.

A sharp, maker-first reminder that wholesale success starts on the shelf. How to ask and answer the one question every growing product business should be obsessed with: how your product sells itself, and why a customer will choose it.

Curiosity isn’t a luxury, it’s the practice that helps wholesale businesses move from survival toward something more resilient and human. That’s why we’re making 2026 the year of curious wholesale.

Some of the most important wholesale truths are things I don’t say out loud that often. But if I could sit down with you and tell you the real stuff that makes wholesale actually work — these are the five things I’d say.

Believe me when I tell you that this article is written by someone who does not have a natural affinity for AI. But here’s the thing: AI really is one of the most powerful tools humanity has ever created. As small business owners who want to make a living, express creativity, and build the world we want to live in, I don’t think avoiding AI serves us.