More doll boxes! And yet more boxes...

When I shop for the store at Toy Fair, I really TRY to space out delivery of my purchases. Evidently, I don't succeed very well. Today, again, I'm drowning in boxes! At least they are boxes full of wonderful things. One of my favorite items we received today is the new American Girl Mystery books, which are chapter books featuring the American Girls in mysteries. They are for an older group of girls, age 9 and up, than the other books in the series. We also got some miniature American Girl dolls which are adorable!

Then, there are the latest Ashton Drake RealTouch™ babies--they are so life-like; everyone who comes in the store wants to hold one. But..the boxes. The boxes are HUGE, and I can't understand why--the dolls are no bigger than the Lee Middleton dolls, yet these boxes are as bulky as can be. I don't know where I'm going to put them!

Besides my exercise from unboxing and moving the entire store room around today, it was also just a fun day to be in my shop--sold lots of easter bunnies and other basket items, a Tyler Wentworth Sydney, a Tyler trunk, three porcelain dolls, Italian Charms, baby items. People always ask me, why does Katherine's Cottage carry so many other things if you're mainly a doll shop? Well...it certainly helps in a smaller town to diversify, but also its my sneaky way of getting people into the store who otherwise wouldn't ever be exposed to beautiful dolls!

The boxes of dolls are piling up!!

Our doll shop is lovely and charming--Dutch door, right by a fountain, nice wall moldings, cozy corners and nooks. So, I don't regret picking this location for the doll shop for one moment. However, I DO seriously regret how small our back room is. The problem with selling dolls for a living is that you have to keep all the empty boxes in the back room for the dolls out on the floor (plus the dolls, obviously, still in box waiting to be sold on the Internet or in shop).

Which means that a large back room would be ideal. We don't have that! So, this time of year, when the doll orders from Toy Fair are streaming in, we end up with big boxes of dolls in the back of the selling floor that need to be unloaded immediately, priced, displayed, and then for the extra stock and boxes, stored in a much-too small room! Arrggh. We know we have to move to a store with a larger back room--the question is only when and where.

As to what we are unboxing--we've already received many of the new Marie Osmond dolls, and huge crates of Madame Alexander dolls are on the way! We've also gotten a few Robert Tonner dolls, including the lovely Lady Kitty and some darling Tiny Kitty dolls.

There are also new miniatures, new Ty (Beanie Baby) products, new Showstopper porcelain dolls, Charm! Its and so much more to display, price, unbox and store! Its a great exercise program! And, its a fun time of year, to see all the new products come into the store and our customers reactions to them. Well, I'd better run...the UPS man has just shown up with more boxes!!

Wow! We've finally gone official with the Doll Shop Blog!

Its so nice to be organized, and blogging in the Doll Shop Blog, the official blog about life running a doll shop (Katherine's Cottage) using my new Blogger software. This will make it much easier for me to update the Blog, and keep everyone current with all the fun! So, welcome, bookmark this page, and look for frequent updates and my musings on owning a Doll Shop right here!