Bead and Button - 2014

Bead & Button Show
June 5 - 8
Open Thurs 4pm to 9pm
Friday 4pm to 8pm
Saturday 10am to 6pm
Sunday 10am to 4pm 
Bead & Button Show ~ Booth #343 & 344
400 W Wisconsin Ave
Milwaukee, WI

Hope to see you all there.
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June 5-
The show is on  and rocking & rollin. Buttons and beads are finding new homes. People are shopping and having fun, meeting up with their beading friends and making new contacts. Classes are happening and different hours of the days and many people signed up for fun. 

June 6- 

J-Me & Guy of Wild Things Beads, working hard at our booth.

 Virginia Blakelock showing off her new beaded projects.

 Bill & Jed at Pegasus Imports for silver beads.

 Bill & Ramsey at Hands of The Hills for exotic tribal beads.

 Peter at TA Pearls

 Dee Beads for rings to add your favorite beads onto.

 And the winner is…… 2nd Place of Bead Dreams for Handmade buttons & Beads- Vladislav & Kremena Of Golem Design Studios. Sponsored by Wild Things Beads.

 LaFaye of Rocks and Beads

 Jodie showing us her Vintage hat she just found. 

June 7-  and before the show starts today…..

 One very exhausted person taking a snooze.

 As customers come shopping the show…..

Sonja digging in the tubs of beads and loving it!

 Stacey dressed to the Nines- wow!

 J-ME busy helping two people at once.

 Guy having a very fun conversation with Freddie and Andrea of Perlen Poesie. (they came all the way from Germany to see the show).

 Guy & Raphael - two good looking men at the show.

Many of the wonderful beaded items on display:

And then there were some buttons also on display, after all it is a Bead & Button Show! 

June 8- last day of 2014 Bead & Button Show

The prize winners of Bead Dreams - Handmade Buttons or Beads, Sponsored by Wild Things Beads. A big Congratulations to all three of you!!!

1st Prize winner was Joan Miller - She got to pick out $300 worth of beads at our booth.

2nd Prize winner is Vladislav & Kremena Ivanov. They got to come pick out $200 worth of beads at our booth. 

3rd prize winner is Michela Verani. 

As of this time, she has not redeemed her gift certificate. If anyone of you know here, please remind she won and can pick out $100 worth of beads with Wild Things Beads.

Day 9 - Tucson Gem Show.

It is becoming a blur - and speeding by so fast. Monday, day 9 of the Gem Mall show. We survived the weekend with its hordes of local Tucson shoppers. Our booth was crowded and sales were brisk. Almost sold out of several different styles of product. Didn't bring enough.

Met last night with members of the Bead Collectors Network for dinner. Some are getting ready for leaving to go home.

Vendors from other shows are starting to come by the booth as their shows are over. Best Bead Show closed Sunday, as did To Be True Blue and Tucson Bead Show. Hopefully they will stop by to see us, tell us about their show experience, and if they made money buy some beads to restock.

We are now into the last 5 days of the show, and usually sales start to slow down. Most bead stores have come and gone. But with the weather that the East Coast and Mid West have been experiencing and with canceled or rescheduled flights many customers are still arriving. So it ain't over til its over!

We have been noticing that many large foreign booths are still heavily overstocked due to slow sales, so maybe the best deals are still to come as vendors lower prices to attract customers. J-Me is scared to leave the booth. (she might be tempted to spend money)

Day 6 of the Tucson Gem Mall show.

Its Thursday, February 6th, and day 6 of our show at the Gem Mall (G&LW). By now, almost all the shows around town have opened.
The Whole Bead Show at the Vicount Suites
 The Best Bead Show at the Kino Veterans Hall
 To Bead True Blue at the DoubleTree
 and The Tucson Bead Show at the Windmill.
The Holidome show opens today, also put on by G&LW, and traditionally empties all the other shows due to its huge draw. Luckily for us, everyone parks at the Gem Mall and walks or shuttles to the Holiday Inn which is 1 block away. Some customers will go immediately to the Holidome, then shop Gem Mall on the way back to their cars, others will shop Gem Mall first and then go on to Holidome when the morning crowds have subsided. Either way, we score!

Of course, all the other hotel shows along the I-10 freeway are open, some stay open until 11:30pm or even later, as long as customers are roaming around. Last night on our way back from dinner, we saw 3 vendors still selling in outside tents at Days Inn.

Lots of deals to be found, however, prices are higher than last year as China faces an economic slowdown and rising labor costs and environmental challenges. Same with India. Pearls seem to be very expensive. Hopefully as the show winds down prices will fall because the vendors want to sell and not ship their inventory back home or pay for storage.

Regardless of all that, new customers are flying in daily as cancelled flights from the East Coast and the Mid West are arriving, and it is good to see smiling, excited faces come by our booth to check out what we have to offer and scoop them up.

Our Show-
Feb. 1 - 14
Open Daily 10am to 6pm 
G&LW Wholesale
Tucson Gem Show
Gem Mall Booth #1132
4475 South Country
Club Road
Tucson, AZ
Guy & J-ME will be at the ONE Location Together this year! Stop by and see our new look!
Special showing of
Paula Radke beads will be at our booth

Tucson Gem Show at the Gem Mall 2014

Feb 2 thru Feb 4
The show is rocking, people are finding new goodies to take back to their stores and design with.

We have had little time to roam around the show, but while on trips to the rest room we were able to see some of the other vendor's booths and general activity at the show. Everyone seemed happy and busy; lots of new product on display and lots of excitement in the air. Gem Mall is the place to come shopping!

Everyday we see more customers rolling in and stopping by to say "Hi" and either begin shopping at our booth or saying they will be back later. Bead stashes begin to pile up under the back table.

By 4pm exhaustion begins to set in; by both us and our customers. Selling and buying beads is hard work. But think of all the great things you get to bring back to your customers....... it is endless.







Some of our new moon faces

Feb. 1 - 14
Open Daily 10am to 6pm 
G&LW Wholesale
Tucson Gem Show
Gem Mall Booth #1132
4475 South Country
Club Road
Tucson, AZ
Guy & J-ME will be at the ONE Location Together this year! Stop by and see our new look!
Special showing of
Paula Radke beads will be at our booth

Then sunday we had a lovely dinner with many of our friends in the Bead Collectors group. They come from all over the world and meet in Tucson to share ideas, beads, and history of both ancient and new beads. We all love beads!!

On Wednesday February 5th, J-Me was roaming the Gem Mall and stumbled on a Booth run by an Afghani antique bead collector who had a small booth he was sharing with someone. She picked out 2 strands of 3,000 year old beads.

 Then she told me to go look. BIG mistake! I picked out some absolutely fabulous silver Turkeman tribal beads and buttons that I just had to have. I'm not a bead collector. I'm not. Damn it!