If you had to go on vacation in December....

[Former_Member]

Would you rather go beginning or middle of December in terms of your shop? My husband has vacation Dec 3-15 and I'm torn if I should go take a vacation right when his leave start, or closer to the 15th, if I should close the shop, or just put an announcement on each listing that orders won't go out until a certain date because I'm on vacation.

What's your advice?

[WilliamsGiftshop]

I think the period of Dec 3-15 is very important for Holiday sales (especially in the US, I'm in Europe), so you might miss out on a nice amount of sales if you close your shop during that period.
Not closing, but saying you won't ship untill it's too late for their orders to arrive before the Holidays will probably just have the same effect.
On the other hand: perhaps those sales are not that important to you and you rather spend that time vacationing with your husband!

[heartofautumn]

Depends on when your cutoff dates for holiday shipping are. My take would be to go more toward the middle of the month and get all your items out before then. The only risk with that would be you may lose out on last minute sales. Can you compare to last year's sales and timing? Or is this your first holiday season here?

[Former_Member]

Closer to the 15th

[SelkieCrochet]

can you take your 'shop' with you?

mine comes over to the UK with us on the ferry every Autumn for a couple of weeks - it might be longer this time as I think I'll be nursing my mother in law after an operation.

[heartsabustin]

Closer to the middle of the month, some of the insanity starts to die down. I'd say closer to then would be better.

[Former_Member]

Thanks for your input everyone. I looked at my sales from last year and I definitely had less orders at the beggining of the month. I'm thinking I will keep it open but change my avatar to "on vacation" and hopefully that will be super visible since I know a lot of people don't read the listings. My husband is a firefighter so his vacation is super strict; last year he missed out on a trip because even though he asked 4 months before hand he couldn't find anyone to switch his leave period (the one coming in December) with the dates we were traveling. Long story short, he had a ticket to go to Puerto Rico (where my family lives) and couldn't go, so I'm def. looking forward to spend a few days with him, even if I have to sacrifice a few sales :)

[Former_Member]

I know it wouldn't work for me. I made an announcement on Etsy & FB last year that I had an early cut off date and I still had 28 sales. Ya, I am planning for that this year and getting my personal holiday stuff don early.

[ElectronicGirl]

yaaaaa....as others have said..that is the money time in Dec.
for international sales..you should be about done by then.
but the US sales...man..your gonna miss a lot. :\
if you can do it closer to the 15th, that would be better. i think the 1st class shipping cut off date is normally around Dec 19th.

good luck.

[Former_Member]

I'm kinda wondering why I had more sales closer to the 15th... Maybe people were buying makeup for holiday parties, New Year's? I'm only going to be gone for about 4-5 days since I just started a new job and I'm not really going to have that much leave accrued.

[ElectronicGirl]

ya. maybe..or gifts for teenage girls..never know.

welp..maybe bring some products with, as suggested..and when you run out..ya run out. and i guess just put your shop on vacation for the rest of the time til you get back. ;)

have fun! are you going anywhere cool?

[Former_Member]

I'm def. not taking anything with me. Sales are so unpredictable. Out of 100 something items it could be anything. I haven't decide where we're going. My husband doesn't care where we go. I'm thinking Las Vegas, but we went there last year. I've never been to California, so I'm also thinking there. Suggestions welcome!

[Former_Member]

Come here to san diego..plenty to do ;)

[Former_Member]

Thanks Breanna, I'll look into it!

[ElectronicGirl]

oh man..there is so much out here to see too.

what are you guys into?
you can go skiing in the morning and lay on the beach in the afternoon. O.o

San Fran has awesome food! and the coolest chinatown i have ever seen..beats my beloved chi-town chinatown!

LA...well, it's LA. nuff said. hiking in the mountains, LA zoo, Santa Monica pier is about 45mins away on the 101. downtown LA... Huntington beach is a good one...Laguna beach is supposed to be gorgeous too. shopping at the Grove in Hollywood is really cool. you can go see the rich folks over in Beverly Hills...i don't think Fresh Prince lives there anymore. ;)

you can also do an interesting road trip from LA up the coast on route 1 to San Fran. It is a long a$$ drive with too many hairpin turns...but it is a seriously amazing landscape to see. I will never forget that trip..even with the white knuckles. (i was the driver)

also, don't forget the wine country. they have Amtrak train packages that go specifically to the wine vineyards. that i would have liked to do.

south...yep. San Diego..and TJ is just over the border..if you bring your passports.

thats about all the suggestions i can off. i haven't been to the extreme north of CA.

[ForgedMettleJewelry]

I wouldn't put your shop on vacation mode, it pretty much kills you views and you basically are starting from scratch when you open up again.

Your best bet is to just post in your shop announcement and your message to seller that you are away so items won't ship til whenever a date. I've done this a couple times in the past and have actually gotten a sale during that time with no problems...

[rainbowofcrazy]

Just to note, I went on vacation mode in the summer and views and sales shot back to normal practically right away; so vacation mode doesn't necessarily mean insta-death for a shop.

I'm having the same dilemma as well as I'll be away sometime in November/December. Won't be trying to sell/ship while I'm away and I don't think I'll be going on vacation mode either; so it'll just be notices in as many places as I can put them and emailing those that may end up buying while I'm gone. Sorry I can't really offer advice though but hope it works out for you!

[Former_Member]

Thanks Electronic Girl! That's a lot of info. Starting to sound much more interesting than Vegas for sure :)

I have put my shop on vacation twice, once for a really long time, and one for just a few days. When I closed it for 10 days I noticed a huge difference in views and I *felt* like it took a while to get back on, but the few days didn't make a difference to me (it was 2 days I believe). I still wouldn't close it in December though!