I love feedback... :-)

Saturdays gift wrapping course had two ladies on it who had read about Wrap for You in the Women & Home Magazine.  One of these ladies travelled all the way from Johannesburg to attend the course and as she had been a Scrapbook teacher for a few years and had attended other Gift Wrapping courses, I was a little daunted in the beginning.  Whilst I was confident I would be able to teach her lots of new techniques, you can't help feeling a little breathless in the presence of an expert. So you can imagine how delighted I am to have received the following email from her:

My name is Debbie Mather and I've attended a great many "courses" over the years - I am an avid crafter and love to learn new things and combine them with things I already know.  I attended Ingrid's gift wrapping course expecting the usual boring routine and was pleasantly surprised to have thoroughly enjoyed myself and actually to have learnt new things!!  She is a brilliant teacher, patient and encouraging - explains and demonstrates extremely well.  Her passion for wrapping is very evident and totally infectious!! She makes you want to wrap everything in sight!!  Her presentation and preparation is professional, the materials provided are of good quality and her wrapping knowledge exceptional!

I encourage anybody out there interested in learning how to present a beautiful gift to attend one of her courses!! I can't wait to come back and learn some more!!

What wonderful feedback!  Thank you so much Debbie and it was a joy to have you attend the course.  I really appreciate that you made the effort to drive so far.

As from January 2013, Wrap for You will kick off the Advanced Gift Wrapping courses.  Please note that the Introductory Gift Wrapping course is a pre-requisite to the Advanced course which will cover some different wrapping techniques and different creative wrapping ideas.  In the Advanced course you will use a variety of materials and will cover: 

• a brief refresher course on some of the introductory techniques, 
• advanced gift wrap techniques i.e. diagonal method, diagonal Japanese Pleating, the sack method of wrapping, wrapping envelope style
• making gift bags, 
• making an envelope, 
• joining papers the professional way, 
• additional ribbon and bow techniques
• including making tissue paper flowers. 

Ideal if you wish to improve on the techniques you learnt in the introductory course!  This course will also last 4,5 hours and costs R450,00 per person.  All wrapping material is included in the course fee.  You only need to bring your scissors!

Creative wrapping ideas which are covered in the Advanced Gift Wrapping Course.

The Sack Method of Gift Wrapping which is covered in the Advanced Gift Wrapping Course.

Course dates will be posted soon.

Woman&Home Magazine

Wrap for You gets a mention in the latest, October 2012 issue of Woman&Home on page 191 in their Smart Guide ~ Find the Perfect Course for You!

In her Editorial, Frith Thomas says the following:

If you're feeling in need of a change or just want to tap into your creative side, check out our guide to the best courses out there.  It could be the start of a new chapter!

 How exciting for Wrap for You!  Wrap for You prides itself on providing gift wrap courses with a difference.  We cover 'out of the box' techniques which are just gorgeous and great fun!

I followed up with one of my course attendees from a few months back, Sandi, to find out whether she was making good use of her news skills and Sandi had the following to say:

I definately use your ideas from the course, especially the wine bottle, and I am sure there will be some round biscuit tins under the Christmas tree, which will be wrapped as you showed us!!!  I am a lot more happier to experiment, I think you gave me the confidence!!!
 

I just love to receive feedback like this! I'll be posting some more pics soon from the Introduction to Gift Wrapping course held on Saturday.  We had much laughter with a very creative bunch who weren't shy to incorporate their own unique flare into the techniques that they were learning ~ and that's exactly what it's about!

 

So happy gift wrapping until then!

 

 

 

 

Gift Wrap Service? Are your staff trained?

Wow! What an awesome day was Saturday!! The I Heart Market just seems to get more and more popular every month and I'm just loving the fact that I get to do a bit of everything on Market days.  I wrap gifts, sell ribbons, sell gift wrap, market courses and chat and meet all sorts of lovely new people!  When customers start saving up their gifts to bring to the market especially so you can wrap them up for them, it leaves a lovely warm fuzzy feeling inside.  Hell yeah!! Bring it on!! :-)

One such customer brought along her gift which she asked me to wrap for her friend.  I had some fun with this dotty gift wrap and decided to incorporate some Japanese pleating.  Japanese pleating is so impressive on it's own that you don't need much in the way of embellishments to finish off a gift. 

I spent the rest of the weekend planning Christmas gift packaging ideas for a retail customer with a number of stores across KZN and Gauteng.  Some words of wisdom to anyone considering offering a Gift Wrap Service in their shop:

1. Ensure your shop assistants don't have to think!  Plan all the combinations well in advance.
2. ENSURE PROPER AND SUFFICIENT TRAINING!!! (Sorry about the "Shouty" Capitals but this is so very important.)  Nothing worse than a badly wrapped gift with sticki tape all over it. Especially when you, the retailer, have just spent a fortune on branded gift wrap, stickers and ribbon!
3. One size NEVER fits all so encorporate different packaging mediums into your planning so that you have the right packaging for every shape that gets thrown at you.
4. Don't do a half job! If you're going to offer a gift wrap service, don't set limitations down for your shop assistants.  One size bow does not work for every size gift.  If you do sufficient training in advance, your shop assistants won't be wasting your packaging because they'll know exactly how to measure it correctly and what type of packaging is best for different shapes and sizes!

It is well known that a retailer who offers a gift wrap service with beautifully wrapped gifts, increases their foot traffic.  After all, who wouldn't want to give a gift that is creatively, beautifully, and neatly wrapped?

Training needs to start now.  Shop Assistants need time to practice and they need time to get over their nerves.  Last year, I walked into a well known and fairly large retail store who were offering a Christmas gift wrap service.  Two gentlemen requested two small awkward gifts to be wrapped.  Do you know that the shop assistants actually refused to wrap the gift?  There were at least 3 people behind the counter who all said flat out:  No! They don't know how to wrap gifts like that! 

The gentlemen were desperate and begged and pleaded as they didn't have time to stop and buy gift wrap as they were enroute to the airport.  I eventually gathered all the shop assistants around (I can be bossy like that you see... my mother is a school teacher so I learnt not to be shy! :-)  ) and whilst I wrapped the two gifts for the extremely grateful men, I taught those three shop assistants what to do the next time they received such a request.  What damage that does to your brand!  It can ruin the entire shopping experience by ending on a bad note.

So if you're a retailer, offering a gift wrap service, please be careful that you don't make the same mistake and start booking your Christmas Gift Wrap training now!

And before I forget, my next course dates are the following Saturdays: 18th August, 15th September and 20th October.  November and December dates are still to be finalised due to all the Markets around that time.  Oh, and I won't be at next months I Heart Market on the 1st September as I'm supporting my daughters school Fun Day!

So with all that information to ponder over, I'm going to leave you now and get back to planning the ultimate gift wrap service offering for my customer and hope that you have the most wonderful week!

 

Gift Wrap Courses in 2012

Welcome back everyone and may 2012 be an awesome year for gift wrapping!

We start off with the first I Heart Market on Saturday, 4th February at the Moses Mabhida Stadium, hope to see you there.  Then it's also time to kick-off with Gift Wrapping Courses.

Courses are scheduled for once a month on a Saturday, at my home in Durban North, and run for approximately 4 hours.  They cost R450,00 per person, including paper, ribbons and shapes to wrap.  Coffee/Tea and biscuits available to keep your sugar levels high so you remain energetic! :-) You just need to bring along some sharp scissors.

We'll cover the following topics:

1. Getting Organised.
2. Different kinds of paper and it's uses.
3. Tips and Tricks before getting started.
4. How to wrap a standard gift, a round gift, a bottle, an awkward gift, and more if we have time.
5. Wrapping techniques for that something 'extra special'!
6. All you need to know about ribbons and creating bows.
7. Where to hunt for supplies.

It's time for you to bring back the joy of opening a gorgeously wrapped gift to all your friends and family.  Gift wrapping is great fun and the more creative you get the better!

For more information, you can inbox me at info.wrapforyou@gmail.com or call me on 082-8014622.

So you don't have tons of ribbons?

If you don't have much space around the house to store tons and tons of ribbons, don't worry, there's a solution for every kind of gift wrap adventure.  I've had so much fun thinking 'out of the box' by incorporating pleating into my gift wrapping.  It creates that WOW factor and leaves people scratching their heads, wondering how on earth you did it!  It's really not that hard to do when you know how and as an alternative to ribbons, it can be just as effective.

Here's a pic you might have seen before and it demonstrates the Tuxedo Pleat:

The Tuxedo pleat involves a series of pleating on either side with a flat band in the centre.  You can do the pleating in a different colour paper and that will eliminate your need for ribbon!

The next picture is of a 3-Fold Pleat. I love the look of this pleat as it allows a little space on the side for a small gift tag or to attach just a little something special to the gift.  You unfortunately can't create this pleat in a different paper without a load of fussing and sticking and afterall, plain is often better.

Finally, a variation of the Tuxedo pleat and my favourite Gift Voucher solution.  Something so simple and yet so eye catching!

If you want to learn how to create these wonderful Gift Wrap pleats, I am offering one-on-one gift wrapping classes. R550,00 for 4 hours (including gift wrap and accessories) and this class includes how to wrap bottles, round tins, pleating, the Awkward Gift and standard wrapping tips and tricks.  Don't forget that it's Christmas around the corner, you can add some pizzazz to your personal or corporate gift wrapping this year.  Just inbox me with your request!

I won't be at the I Heart Market this month as it's my oldest daughters birthday, but I'll see you there in November at the Moses Mabhida Stadium.  Until then, happy wrapping!

 

Looking back...

So my very first I ♥  Market is now just a memory! And what a great one it is!  I had a ball chatting with so many interesting people and found it facinating watching how my concept was perceived.  Offering a Gift Wrap Service to the general public, outside of Christmas, is something most South Africans are not familiar with.  Sure, we know we can go to large retailers and some small little shops and we'll get a wrap, but, and that's a confident BUT, nowhere near as detailed and beautifully wrapped as you'll get from Wrap for You!

One lady commented: "oooooh, it's like the way they do it in Italy!".  ...I'd like to think I have my own unique look and feel but YES! It's about time we introduced some European flair into our gifting.

Whilst I had great fun wrapping and coming up with on-the-spot creativity...nothing like a bit of a challenge for yourself... I was amazed at how well my ribbons sold.  South Africa's ribbon selection is unfortunately, not very inspiring, so the shoppers went mad for some of the more detailed imported ribbons I am stocking. There are a few lessons learnt for me...how to roll up 5m of Gift Wrap. Not the easiest when you're measuring at the same time, and that I need some larger bags as I wasn't counting on selling 5m of ribbon at a time either.  But I am SO delighted that the feedback was so positive and for the next market on the 2nd July...yes! I'm going back! AND... I'll have a few new ribbons in stock to inspire you.

The request for Gift Wrap Courses was overwhelming so I have decided to buckle down and get my course notes 'wrapped up' as soon as I can so that I can get courses up and running.  Please email me at info.wrapforyou@gmail.com if you'd like to put your name down on a waiting list for courses and I'll keep you up-dated.  In all likelihood, I will offer a short 'Introduction to Gift Wrapping' for Book Clubs which will last around 2 hours, and then a half day course for more detailed wrapping.

To those of you who managed to pop around to the Market to say 'Hi' and buy a few ribbons, a very BIG Thank You to you. It really is appreciated and was so wonderful to see, and meet, you.

Until next time... :-)