ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, January 19, 1997 TAG: 9701170027
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: CRAFTS
SOURCE: MEGAN SCHNABEL
Down in the coalfields, crafters are getting their due.
Craftspeople across Virginia have been complaining that the state doesn't do enough to help market their wares, but in far Southwest traditional Appalachian woodworkers and quilters are getting a boost.
The money used to start the Purely Appalachia Crafts Empowerment program didn't come from the state, to be sure. Grants from the Tennessee Valley Authority and the Forest Service bolstered their efforts.
But organizers hope PACE, under the auspices of the Coalfield Regional Tourism Development Authority and Dickenson County Cooperative Extension, could serve as a model for other regions - or even for the state as a whole.
Through PACE, the partnership buys merchandise wholesale, then resells it to visitor-center gift shops and other retailers. PACE-sponsored crafts already are being sold at locations including Natural Tunnel State Park and the Barter Theatre in Abingdon.
The program is, on a much smaller scale, similar to what West Virginia is doing. There, the state buys crafts wholesale from their makers, then sells them at its $16 million, 59,000-square-foot Tamarack center near Beckley.
"We're like a little shelf in Tamarack," said Sheila Kuczko, who was hired last spring as crafts marketing specialist.
Many of the PACE crafters have full-time jobs, and see their woodworking or quilting as a hobby. But some have been laid off from the coal industry, and their hobbies have become livelihoods.
"We've got our fingers crossed that we can really help these people out," Kuczko said.
Additionally, the group has expanded its annual crafts marketing directory, said Phyllis Deel, a Dickenson County extension agent. The pamphlet this year will include the names and addresses of individual crafters and retail shops, plus a calendar of events and a fold-out map of the seven-county coalfields area. The publication should be available early next month.
Perhaps, said Kevin Riddle of Eagle Rock, the coalfields project will catch the eye of state tourism officials.
Riddle, who makes slat-back chairs, was featured last May in a Roanoke Times story about crafters' concerns. Since then, he has continued his crusade to earn state recognition for artisans like him. He continues to worry that tourists will spend all their money in North Carolina, West Virginia and Kentucky, all of which have aggressive marketing programs for their multimillion-dollar craft industries.
Virginia, on the other hand, doesn't publish a comprehensive guide to its crafters or market local crafts through visitors centers on a statewide basis.
Seeking help for local craftspeople - who don't, by and large, have much marketing or retailing experience - Riddle has written letters to state tourism officials and has talked to several on the phone. The responses he's received - when he's heard back at all - have been lukewarm, he said.
But Martha Steger, spokeswoman for the Virginia Tourism Corp., said her office would be happy to help the state's crafters, as long as they're willing to help themselves. Plenty of people come to her office with grand ideas on spending the state's money, but few, she said, seem prepared to foot part of the bill themselves.
All of Virginia's publications are cooperative productions, she said, with the participating groups - such as associations of golf courses or ski resorts - providing at least partial funding or advertising for the brochure. A recently published outdoor guide was completely advertiser supported, as is the Virginia is for Lovers brochure.
Groups also can apply for grants of up to $8,000 from the tourism office, she said.
But crafters first should approach their local tourism offices to see whether regional marketing could be an answer, she said. "This is something that has to grow from the grass roots up," she said.
Steger's office is preparing to conduct a 12-month survey of visitors to Virginia, which will include two questions about art and crafts. One will ask visitors whether they shopped for arts and crafts on their most recent visit; the other will ask whether they attended arts and crafts festivals.
Additionally, the state-funded Virginia Commission for the Arts is preparing to publish an updated guide to crafts retailers around the state. It should be ready by March, said Executive Director Peggy Baggett. The brochures will be distributed through state visitors centers and by the retailers.
Riddle, who sells his $175 chairs through a hand-printed catalog and word-of-mouth advertising, said publicity for retailers and craft shows is a start, but it will leave out all those crafters who don't have access to either.
What the state needs, he maintains, is a unified effort to market crafts by guiding visitors directly to crafters, or by selling crafts through visitors centers. So he continues to make noise. And he's noticed what might be some cracks in the wall. Recently he talked to a free-lance writer from Norfolk who was writing a story about crafts for the Virginia is for Lovers promotional booklet.
"Somebody there ... has decided that they need to write a little more about crafts," he said.
Riddle himself is getting ready to do some more writing. With the help of other crafters, he plans to launch a letter-writing campaign to members of the board of the Virginia Tourism Corp. The crafters aren't going to ask for anything specific, he said. All they want right now is for tourism officials to take a look at what other states are doing.
"I'm still beating at it, is all I can say," Riddle said.
A copy of retail craft guide published by the Virginia Commission for the Arts will be posted on the commission's Web site, at
http://www.artswire.org/~vacomm
Look for the posting in March.
For a copy of the coalfields craft guide, write Phyllis Deel, Dickenson County Cooperative Extension, P.O. Box 1160, Clintwood, Va. 24228. If you're a retailer and would like to sell Appalachian crafts, call Sheila Kuczko at (540) 762-3946.
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