the bouncey zone

In case you hadn’t noticed, bounceyzone has a new look!

Actually, it’s much more involved than that. Over the past month I’ve been moving all of my web sites. First, unclecharliessoap.com went to Weebly as an experiment in free web service. Then I deleted several web apps that were unnecessary.

The rest moved to a hosting company that costs half as much as the previous provider. The old company can expect a cancel-my-account notice in the morning. Just in time, too, because the service period expires at the end of this month.

I’d like to merge my various photo and video galleries eventually. (See side bar for links.) They might end up going to something like Flickr or YouTube, so someone else can have the headache of maintaining them. Notice how I’ve done test posts using both of those services.

Or maybe not. There are some advantages to retaining control. For now I’m just happy to have them on the new server with the photos and their descriptions all still the same. That’s the hard part about merging different galleries: Keeping the titles and descriptions intact. I’ll figure it out.

Other news since the previous post: We went to the circus for Scott’s fifth birthday. Sold soap and scarves at Norman’s Medieval Fair and at Wiesenfeuer Baronial. Also caught up with some business bookkeeping and filed our income taxes. Somehow I managed this without teaching the boys to cuss – though they did hear a few things that would have made Samuel Adams smile.

Conestoga 14 was this weekend. Beltane Games is next weekend. An exciting 10th anniversary vacation in Hawaii is next month.

Busy times. Now you’re more or less up to date. Hope you like the new look!

I’ve been working on my company’s main web site today. I was getting annoyed with complicated, bloated, unmaintainable content management systems. Most simpler ready-made systems, such as blog kits, seem to be geared towards something other than what I actually need — a relatively static web site that tells the world about my company.

So I wrote it myself from scratch in PHP, CSS, and HTML. My programming tools were a web browser and a plain text editor. The new system is simple and lightweight, using no database and no image files. (Though it should be fairly straightforward to add those if needed.) Adding a new page is a matter of copying one file and adding a link in another file.

Half of the actual content hasn’t been written yet. But have a look anyway and let me know what you think: [hyperadaptive link]

Norman’s Medieval Fair starts Friday March 30 (tomorrow) and runs through Sunday April 1. Park at Lloyd Noble and follow the crowds north. Look for Uncle Charlie’s Soap Company on the southwest side of the park.

This has been a big event for us every year. As usual, we have several guests coming in from out of state. One of them is Scott’s new cousin! One month old and already traveling… Scott went to his first med fair when he was a week old.

I just hope the rain lets up long enough to go out and set up the tent.

Tomorrow we fly to Kentucky for Christmas!

The craft shows went better than I expected. Not enough profit to live on, but still a profit anyway. Okay, with one of the shows we learned the hard way never to do a craft show in Norman on game day… But otherwise it all went well. Next step is to take pictures of products and finish the online ordering system. We’ve been too busy lately.

I’m thinking about offering Google Checkout as a payment option. We already have a PayPal account, but it’s in our main (software sales) trade name, which doesn’t quite fit the Uncle Charlie’s image. PayPal really doesn’t like to see multiple accounts with exactly the same bank info, and I haven’t found any practical way to add a second trade name. Their sales tax handling isn’t anywhere close to reality either. PayPal is better for selling pure downloads, which are exempt from sales tax in Oklahoma. It’s also okay for interstate sales. Most of our sales are in-state though.

We also have an account with ProPay for credit card processing, which is fine for in-person sales using the knuckle buster and cell phone. (Oddly enough, nobody has paid us with plastic yet! Maybe we should post a small Visa/MC sign.) But using ProPay for online sales requires transmitting and handling raw credit card numbers. The security precautions are somewhat difficult to do correctly.

Google Checkout would handle the credit cards for us without having to worry so much about strict security rules. I also like how they allow uploading tables of sales tax rates based on zip codes. It’s possible to submit sales tax as a line on the order too. Using their system requires another Zen Cart module, which Google seems to have been working on themselves.

More later… Time to finish my Christmas shopping.

It’s a busy time around here! Too busy to mention a few great local restaurants. Too busy to finally get around to posting my travel notes from the California trip. Too busy, even, to tell why I really like Oklahoma’s technology and procedures for voting in elections.

Yup, it’s time for holiday craft shows!

Since Halloween we’ve been making more soap. This stuff takes at least 3 weeks, preferably a month, to age enough for sale. We’ve also been signing up for craft fairs. That’s harder than it sounds; most of them fill their booth spaces months in advance. Well now we know.

I’ve also been trying to get an online shopping system set up. Most of the customer interest so far seems to focus on our smaller bars. People buy several at a time. I figure these soaps are going to be dispersed as gifts, because they’re cute and they don’t cost much. Eventually some of the gift recipients will actually read the tag and see our URL. I want a professional catalog to be waiting for them.

Look at our progress so far: [shop.unclecharliessoap.com]

No products listed yet, but the basic system is working. The sales tax lookup module, which solves a problem that delayed the store for months, is in the final testing and debugging stages. I had to write that part myself with a little help from an existing Zen Cart module. (If you really want to know, the existing module looked up tax rates by zip code from a very small hard-coded list. I adapted it to look in a database table and make more intelligent choices based on zip code, zip+4, city, and state.) Anyway, this module and the catalog as a whole have been good for technical practice.

Dana has been learning how to take pictures of products. She has more patience with that sort of thing than I do.

Last Saturday was our first real craft fair. In the past we’ve only set up shop at medieval reenacting events, except for one time when we ran a booth among normal people on the 4th of July. This time it was a serious organized shopping environment. Most of the shoppers had money, even the kids.

A quick check of the parking lot revealed a surprising number of Cadillacs and Lincolns mingled with the usual assortment of Fords. I’m not saying they were rich. I’m just saying that some of the potential customers liked to pay a bit more for good quality.

The event went well. They cleaned out most of our small bars before noon. Some of them showed interest in our foaming pumps and laundry powder. Now if we can just get them to buy more of our full size bath bars too…

Another craft fair is on the 18th and 19th. Over the next few days we have to do ending inventory from the last event, make another batch of soap, restock the trays, and do pre-show inventory again. Look for us if you happen to be at the 12th Avenue Recreation Center in Norman this weekend.