by jewelryladi » Sun Nov 26, 2006 11:14 pm
You're right, the jewelry does sell itself. But the purpose of a party is not just to sell jewelry. It's to book, recruit and have FUN!
I do at least one game as an ice breaker. Some times more than one, like a family party where they just want to have fun.
A popular one is the "potato game." I have them "warm up their pens" by writing down everything they can think of to do with potatoes. The one who has the most on their list gets a nice gift bag, with lots of pretty paper coming out of the top. It's a sack of potatoes! (Then I hand her the "real" gift.)
Also (you'll like this one) at every party, to highlight the 2 and 1 plan, I tell people that if they say "Sarah!" every time I say "half price" then they get a ticket. Then i tell them that their most expensive item of the three they buy is always half price, and five women in unison say "Sarah!" Sometimes (like when they're changing catalogs and all the retired jewelry is half price) I don't want to be handing out tickets every 10 seconds, so I purposely say "50 percent off." (Others can use another phrase to describe whatever special they offer.)
At every party I also do the "ask me about my job" and hand out tickets to everybody who asks a question about my job. (The Sarah one, not the day job, or night job, as the case may be!) At the end, I draw tickets and give away the remaining door prizes.
I have a jewelry box full of retired jewelry (you can get them through the "collector packs" they sell as supplies.) I set it out at most of my parties and when people start asking about where it is in the catalog, I say, "Oh, these are available but they're not in the catalog, I'll tell you later." Then I have six envelopes. Three say, "Thank you for attending. Please feel free to take a piece of jewelry." The other three say, "Thank you for agreeing to host a Sarah Coventry party." Sometimes nobody takes a piece of jewelry, sometimes many people do. I got four bookings out of a party using this!