Archive for February, 2010

25 Years as a Woman-Owned Small Business!

Saturday, February 13th, 2010

Early Catalog Cover for Womanswork

This year marks Womanswork’s 25th year in business. We thought, what better time than now to say thanks to our garden glove fans with a little give away contest? 

The Womanswork Story.

But first some background on us. Womanswork was started in Maine in 1985 because there were no good work gloves designed to fit women’s hands. A little black and white (and sepia) catalog was sent to a growing list of women who needed a good work and garden glove. The logo “Strong Women Building A Gentle World” was written and became the rallying cry stamped on the back of each pair of gloves. 

What’s different about Womanswork gloves is that they are all designed by women, so the fit, the features (such as machine washability), and the designs and colors are all geared to what women like.

Dorian Winslow, Womanswork owner

High-Performance-Garden-Glove

I’m the owner of Womanswork and I like to stay in touch with our customers through email, phone calls, face-to-face at trade shows, and now Facebook and this blog. The feedback we get helps us make our garden gloves and other products better all the time.  

Thanks for 25 Years!

Thank you gift--Chocolate hearts

The other day we were putting together little packages of gourmet chocolate hearts in a Womanswork mug and sending them to a handful of our favorite wholesale clients, mostly garden center owners and managers. It occurred to us that, while we can’t possibly say “thanks” to all of our customers in this way, maybe we could say ‘thank you for 25 years’ to our wider audience of fans in a different way.  So that’s what we’ll do. Stay tuned for garden glove contest details.

Our production line of thank you gifts

Womanswork at The New York International Gift Fair

Sunday, February 7th, 2010

We spent the last 6 days in New York at the Jacob Javits Center, along with thousands of other people (perhaps tens of thousands). We stayed at the W Hotel on Lexington Ave and 50th Street. How appropriate.

"W" is for W Hotel and for Womanswork

Eve was with me as we met with owners and representatives of retail stores across the country. They were all looking for new items and many of them seemed pleased to see us there with our colorful, well made garden gloves, sun hats and Garden Wheels. We also saw some media people including editors from Better Homes & Gardens magazine and our friend Madaline Sparks from Real Simple.

Dorian and Eve at the New York Gift Fair

Down the row from our booth was a fun collection of indoor/ outdoor containers and baskets. I purchased some of them at the end of the show, which I will use for planting bulbs next winter. One of the fringe benefits of these shows is you get to pick up items from other exhibitors who are happy to sell their samples. We sold a lot of our own gloves to other exhibitors in this way.

Pots being sold at another booth