What a year! - a 2021 summary
Award
The start of 2021 began with Coronavirus (Covid-19) being the new headline and therefore they seemed to have overlooked the highlight of Barn Craft winning their first award! In the latter part of 2020 Barn Craft won the 2020/2021 'Natural Home Fragrance Products of the Year' at the CorporateLiveWire North England Prestige Awards. At great achievement and many thanks to whoever nominated us. It took us until April 2022 to attend the awards presentation at the Blackwell Grange Hotel in Darlington.
Volunteering
As the pandemic continued we decided to help the local community by signing up as a volunteer to help with the vaccination roll-out. This proved to be a full year commitment but it was fantastic to be in a position to help people through the vaccination process. All our volunteering took place at our local vaccination centre kindly hosted by Tennants Auctioneers in Leyburn, North Yorkshire.
Retailers
During the year we did gain just one new stockist at Burnby Hall Gardens in Pocklington, York thanks to their collaboration with one of our existing stockists, Just Makers in Ripley, North Yorkshire. Unfortunately we did have to lose a small number of retailers which will enable us to focus our time more effectively, especially in relation to family and friends.
Events
Due to Covid-19 numerous events were cancelled but we managed to attend both ‘Crafts in the Pen’ in Skipton and the Christmas Fair at Ripon Cathedral. In addition we have been involved in creating a new event in our village called 'Made in Bellerby' to allow local artisans to showcase their products to local residents. This enabled local residents could buy local without travelling out of their village. We do hope that 2022 will enable to attend more events in and around the area.
New developments
We've been working on our display setup for events and we now have oak display boards to showcase our range of candles and diffusers, together with our selection of accessories. In addition, work has continued in developing our products based upon customer feedback and in the coming year we'll be adding the following to our collection:
- Three wick candle
- Redesigned oak candle holder
- New tea light holders from Katie Bentley Ceramics
