Spirit of Christmas 2015

We all know at JS that Christmas has approached once we attend the Spirit of Christmas show in Olympia, London. 

Whether you attend Spirit of Christmas for the food and wine, a social event, or to start the christmas shop, the week long fair has all of the above!

So Jane and John head off from our Somerset studio to hit the road, early should I say! It’s all go once we get to Olympia, vans pulling in from everywhere, boxes being unloaded, the odd fragile box you hear drop… We leave the stand looking like we aren’t going to be ready for the Monday and that the week is going to be an utter disaster.

Sunday is when I (Shannon) come along, I get the long straw for setting up! Pricing products and making the garland look ‘pretty’. The Sunday flies by as does everyday when we are exhibiting, but, ta dah the stand is complete, so the week commences!

On the Thursday it is late night shopping, the day still seems to fly by even when it closes at 8pm. This is the night I manage to escape from the stand and check out the show, need I say more when Lily, from Branche D’Olive and I end up sampling the upstairs which is of course, the alcohol…!

The whole show this year was a complete success, it was our second biggest year since we have been attending and that’s been quite a few years. It was such great fun, meeting repeat customers, new customers and also networking with other businesses, what more could we want. We have the lovely ‘Branche D’Olive’ opposite us, ‘Helen Moore’ to the right and ‘Carina Hildebrandt’ just around the corner, such a fun and festive atmosphere!

We hope you have a lovely Christmas from us all at Jonny’s Sister and hope to see you at next year’s Spirit of Christmas! 

-Shannon

Pet Christmas Sacks

Do you ever think that maybe pets get forgotten at Christmas? Well we say 'no more!'

This year we have introduced a new Christmas sack to our festive range; with the choice of a cat or a dog symbol, with a rudolph-esque nose sewn on, your pet is sure to feel just as included as you. Imagine your pets delight when they wake up on Christmas morning to find their very own personalised sack filled with fluffy, squeaky and edible treats!

Whether they're a Buster, Barney, Sissy or Sooty, your pet will love their own personalised Christmas sack. Just send us the names and the animals that you would like sacks for and we will do the rest. 

You can find them in the Christmas section of our site, here.

Happy New Year!

We can’t believe it’s that time again- we want to take a moment to say a great big happy new year to everybody and we hope that you all had a fabulous Christmas!

Here at JS we all love the festive season; full shelves, the constant hustle and bustle of people singing ‘jingle bells’ and the chocolates on the office table! Despite the feeling of relief when it’s all over, Christmas 2014 was a good one for everybody. This year we had the most temps to date, we feel like we packed hundreds of ‘BAKED BY KATE’ cake tins, and sold over 1500 Rudolf Christmas sacks- who knew there were that many lucky children in the world!?

To celebrate the success of 2014 we felt that nothing would do the trick better than nibbles and some champers. Here are some pictures to show what we got up to!

 

Although January always brings some relief from the Christmas mania, it is still sad to say goodbye to our Christmas elves and to tidy away the tinsel and baubles for another year. But forget the January blues as during 2015 you will be seeing lots of new and exciting things from Jonny’s Sister….so watch this space!

Spirit of Christmas 2014

Last week Jane and Shannon went up to London to be a part of the Spirit of Christmas Fair at Olympia... and gosh did they enjoy themselves! With Christmassy music playing, the hustle and bustle of those organised shoppers and with a secret stash of Celebrations behind the stand, they came back on Monday and brought the festive spirit with them!

For those of you who haven’t heard of Spirit of Christmas, it is a large fair made up of hundreds of small boutique retailers (such as ourselves) offering original gifts and quirky Christmas ideas to thousands of shoppers. Due to sheer size of Olympia, in our opinion you would need a couple of days to take everything in, but would definitely recommend a trip in 2015!

Like many previous years, this year did not disappoint and we did very well at Spirit; not only did we get a chance to meet other companies alike, but we got the opportunity to sell directly to customers which isn’t something we get to do very often! The weeks coming up to Spirit are always busy, making booklets, finalising new products, getting excited whilst freaking out, but we love it none the less. 

Bring on next year is all we can say!

A message from Jane: 

As always Spirit of Christmas is a great way to meet our customers and to get a feel for what products they like best. Each year we have some tickets to give away as prizes in a competition that we usually run mid October time. Make sure you keep checking your in box for details as it is a great show for visitors as well as exhibitors! 

Christmas: 83 days to go

83 days ‘til Christmas. Let the games begin! If we’ve learnt anything over the past 9 years, it’s that Christmas starts in October here at Jonny’s Sister. Although it comes at the same time each year and no matter how much we like to try and prepare ourselves, we’re never ready!

With 20 days and counting, we’re soon to be moving our studio to a new location (blog post on the way- keep your eyes peeled!). At Christmas we have our lovely little handmade gifts coming out of our ears and are sick of the sound of jingle bells by December 1^st. But this year we will be ready. Although October has only just begun we have already started preparing; finalising our exclusive Christmas range, mass producing gift cards and gathering the troops!

Here are a few shots from last year- look at poor old postie trying to squeeze those all prezzies in!