A Fall Festival

Hi everyone!

Last night we had fun attending and selling at the 3rd Friday event in Wyandotte! It was a special Fall Festival night!

There was a chili cook-off and many tents had their chili for sale or, like us, for sampling.

Food and drinks were available.

Of course, lots of fun vendors showed up for the party!

A Haunted old store was there for those who dared!

“That 80’s Band’ rocked the night with lots of awesome music and dancing.

It was another fun and successful night. We had a great time and enjoyed talking with all the folks who came out to have fun and support the Wyandotte businesses!

We want to thank the Wyandotte Business Association for hosting this wonderful night!

Michigan State Fair

Hi everyone!

Wow, it has been a crazy busy past week for us! On very short notice we decided to be part of the Michigan State Fair this past weekend. This was the first time they invited vendors from the Farmer Markets to participate. So, we raced like crazy to gear up for the event!

We introduced a couple of new products just for this weekend. We hope to continue to carry them to some regular farmer’s markets as well.

We had our latest product, Sun Dried Tomato & Basil Spread available in both dry packet form and ready to eat containers.

We finally got our Finishing salt to where we like it. This will probably be a regular item of ours. People have asked for it and we now have it available.

We enjoyed the Michigan State Fair and had a successful 4 days! Now we are wiped out and need a  little down time!

Redford IART Festival

Hi everyone!

Last weekend we were part of a 3 day weekend festival. We had our DTL Herb booth set up and we were also selling Kettle Corn both outside and in the Marquee. It was a very busy weekend for us.

I thought I would share a few pictures of some of the things that were going on around us.

Some of the vendors inside the Marquee. This is where the Farmer’s Market is held each Sunday so, a lot of the farmer market vendors joined in on the fun for the weekend.

They had a line up of entertainment inside the Marquee as well. There was music, dancing, magic, fencing, karate, painting and a lot more.

Lots of activities were planned both inside and out.

Lots of outside vendors.

Fun activities for the kids.

Outside entertainment all weekend long.

There was even a bra auction! Say what? People decorated bras and they went up on a silent auction. Ours is the top center picture (a pink bra with an herb planter inside it). All the proceeds went to benefit the Redford Parks and Art Conservancy and Gilda's Club.

It was one long hot busy weekend but, it was also a lot of fun!

Indoor Gardening Expo

Hi everyone!

A couple of weeks ago Troy and I along with a couple of friends went to the “Maximum Yield” Indoor Garden Expo. We were invited to attend the Industry day (the first day of the expo for businesses in the field).

The first two hours were seminars and presentations from various professionals in the gardening world. They offered coffee and refreshments and there was a lot of Q & A. They talked about how to build your business and the pitfalls to avoid.

The place was cram packed full of garden related vendors. All the latest and greatest products were being represented.

For a small business like ours (and our friends) this is a huge event for us. All the different vendors offer all kinds of free items to try.

Troy and I had commitments later in the day so, we were only there for about 3 hours while the vendors booths were open. We probably only got to about 1/3 of the vendors before we had to leave.

The above picture is all the products we were given. Rough estimate, there is about $1,000 – 1,500 worth of gardening products. Like I said, we didn’t even get to half of the vendors. Our friends, well let’s just say they have at least triple what you see above!

This gives us the opportunity to try different products that normally we wouldn’t or couldn’t (due to cost). Since we grow completely naturally, we had to go through all of our loot and carefully pull out any products that weren’t 100% natural. Those will get donated or shared with friends/family.

We get asked a lot about what we use on our herbs and how we grow them. This gives us a chance to try some of the products without committing to a company. If we like them, we will recommend them.

We met some wonderful company representatives at the expo. A lot of them were impressed and happy to see how we are growing our herbs (being Urban Farmers) and the fact that we do a lot of community service. We have already had several companies send us boxes of products for free to help us out in our community projects.

Since the herbs that we grow at home are strictly for our testing and experiments, we have already begun to test out some of these products. I am excited to see the different results.

The second day of the expo was open to the public. Our friends went back that day (with other friends) and the vendors were still handing out lots of free gardening goodies. So, check out your local Expo centers and think about attending some of the shows that interest you!

Also being posted at The Thrifty Groove

Rosemary Easter Trees

Hi!

We have a show this weekend and have some 2 year old rosemary plants ready to be sold. I just wanted to Easter them up a bit.

Glued some foil wrapped chocolate bunnies to floral picks.

Grab a few other little things.



Just some fun Easter Rosemary plants.
We are at the:

Spring Spree in Allen Park, MI

Friday (Today) and Saturday.

Friday from 2 to 7:00 and Saturday 10 to 5.

Christmas Craft Show While at the Cabin

Hi friends!

I love living in a small town. I grew up and have lived my entire life in a small community. Although my hometown is small, it takes less than a half hour to get to either Detroit or Toledo. So, there is plenty of city life all around us.

At the cabin, first it takes almost a half an hour just to get “into town”. And the town itself is a very small town. And up north, the towns are at least 25-30 miles away from each other. So, when you have an event in town, the entire town shows up for it. Not to mention the so called neighboring towns make a day of it and head over.

Oh how we love these kinds of shows! You basically have a captive audience. We quite literally are “the only show in town”. This Christmas craft show is the last event that will happen here until Spring. So, everyone wants to check it out and spend their day shopping. And the folks that have driven 30+ miles to attend have money ready to spend. They want to do their Christmas shopping. And because of this, you have a lot of crafters/vendors there. The high school was packed with fun and different things throughout all the halls and gym.

Generally it is very rare for us to have any type of similar product competition. DTL Herbs is quite unique. Occasionally we will see a vendor selling spices. We don’t sell spices, we sell herbs. Big difference. People don’t realize that. We spend a lot of our time at shows educating people about herbs. And once in awhile we will see vendors selling dip mixes or dry rubs similar to ours. The big factor with them is they are generally vendors of the products. This means that there is a large company that makes these items and then you sell them for the company. Kind of like selling Avon or Tupperware.

Our company is not a big company. It is just us. We go from the soil to the table. We plant our herbs, we grow our herbs, we harvest our herbs, we dry our herbs and we create our end product. All of our recipes have been created by us and tested, what sometimes feels like a million times until they are just right in our opinion. We know exactly what goes into our growing herbs and our end product. We use no chemicals and we don’t use any artificial additives. Okay, that was just a small lie. LOL I have added food coloring to my sugars to make them pink, green or yellow. But, that is the only thing that has anything unnatural added to it. And it really stressed us out about doing the food colorings in the sugars. We test marketed it several times to see if people would be okay with it. Our customers are very loyal to us and believe in our company and products so, they give us their honest opinion. We love that!

That’s what it looks like sitting behind the table as a vendor. LOL Okay, back to the show.

Here is where you can find us this coming week….

Thursday 12/6 Redford Olde Fashioned Holiday http://www.redfordtwp.com/docs/2012/homepage/2012OldefashionHolidays8.5x11colorposter.jpg

Friday Dec 7, 1:00 pm,  Troy will be giving a fun presentation class on Holiday gifts with herbs, http://www.macombcountymi.gov/msuextension/documents/Fallherbregistration.pdf

Saturday Dec 8 River of Living Waters Ministries Annual Holiday Craft Show, 9:00-4:00 http://events.detroitnews.com/taylor_mi/events/show/295721825-annual-winter-holiday-craft-show

We don’t have a show scheduled for Sunday so, if any of you know of a local one, please let us know about it.

 

New Products ~ Limited

Hi everyone!

We have a few new products available for sale in our upcoming shows. These new items are in very limited quantities.

Pints of New Pickled treats!

Dill Giardiniera

Fiesta Medley

Dilly Beans

All 3 of these are labeled “Don’t Open Until Christmas” because that is when they will be at their Maximum Yummy Best!

 

1/2 Pint of Fiesta Medley

Look at how gorgeous these peppers are! I can’t wait to get into these!

We will be at the Lincoln Park, MI outdoor market Sunday November 11/18. Hope to see you there!

We are so Proud of Her!

Hi everyone!

What good is having a blog if you can’t brag a little …right? Well, I’m doing just that today!

Our little princess (she will be 5 in a couple of months…can you believe that!) spent every Tuesday last summer at the Farmer’s Market in Brownstown MI. Right next to our booth was the Brownstown Animal shelter folks. They would set up a tent, bring some animals and inform folks about the shelter. Well of course, this was the princess’s favorite vendor at the market! She spent a lot of time getting to know the people that work at the shelter, some of the animal control officers and some critters.

Now that we are doing craft shows, the princess always wants to make her own product to sell. In a couple for weeks she will be selling “Reindeer Food”. She knows that this products is her “Christmas Shopping Money”. She did it last year. A manager from one of the shows she did has already called and asked if SHE will be back this year to sell her reindeer food! She was so proud to be able to buy all “her people” Christmas gifts with money she earned. You can read the post I did about this last year HERE.

She loves animals. It doesn’t matter what kind, she loves them all. She decided to make a cat toy and give 50% of her profits to the Brownstown animal shelter. She wants to make sure the animals have enough food to keep them healthy throughout the winter (her concern).

So, she worked hard and made “Catnip Puffs”,

She took $1.00 from her “spending purse” (the money she earned helping at the Farmer’s Markets) and went to the dollar store and bought a bag of pompoms. We had dried catnip and gave her the plastic bags. She put together the bags by herself. We created labels for her and she finished packaging them herself as well.

She took them to the craft show this past weekend and set them out.

She even tried to sell Santa some!

Apparently Santa didn’t have cats. LOL But, she did inform him that she will be making some food for his reindeer very soon!

Teaching her about giving back has been a very important thing for us. For her, it is only natural because it is the way she has been taught from the get go of her life. To know that her heart is generous and giving is so amazingly special and beautiful.

I cannot even begin to tell you how much we love and respect this little girl! We are just so proud of her!

She sold 75% of her product this day! You go Sweetheart!!

Tonight we will be at the Orchard Clubhouse in Carleton, MI

It will be a fun craft show from 5:00 – 9:00 pm.

New Product ~ Packaged Teas

Hi everyone!

Wow, we have been busy lately. You can tell by the lack of post here at DTL Herbs!

I am thrilled to finally announce that we have packaged our herb infused tea and they are now available for purchase so you can take them home and enjoy them! We had so many requests this past summer after introducing the iced teas for this to be packaged for home use.

We are offering two sizes. The above is a picture of the the “Brew an entire pot of hot tea or a pitcher of iced tea” size. The flavors are all the ones we introduced this summer: Peppermint, Spearmint and Lemon Verbena.

And in the same flavors as above, we now have packaged individual tea bags for a single serving.

I hope you stop by and give them a try!

I am working on putting together a schedule of the different events that we will be at throughout the winter months. So check back so and see where we are!

Today (Nov 4) we are at Airport High School for a large craft show (Carleton, MI)

Where We Will Be this Weekend!

Hi everyone!

We are looking forward to this weekend because we will be part of the I Art Festival in Redford, MI! It is going to be a beautiful day and the event looks like it is going to be so much fun!

Besides selling our regular awesome DTL products, we will have more Lemon Verbena Infused Iced Tea and Fudgy Peppermint Brownies. And for the first time, we are also going to be offering a second Infused Iced Tea….Spearmint!

This is the first time for Spearmint Infused Fresh Brewed Iced Tea.

I hope all you locals will stop by and visit us!

We will be there Saturday 11-??

Sunday 10-5

Everyone have a great weekend!