We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Dale Baldwin. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Dale below.

Hi Dale, thanks for joining us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

Baldwin’s Dream creates and sells hand-made craft items to the public. We believe in the quality of our products and guarantee the reliability and durability of our craft items. We also sell some products from a few vendors like Diamond Dotz, a creator of good quality diamond art kits and the Bower Studio who produces gift cards embedded with seeds that grow wild flowers or herbs.
We feel that our customers come first beyond all else and try to make everyone feel welcome and at ease in our shop.

Dale, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Baldwin’s Dream produces many hand-crafted products like the wood and metal pens produced by Dale Baldwin. Among the product line are theme pens like dragon and phoenix pens for the adventuresome spirit, cat and dog pens for pet lovers, faith-love-hope pens and “footprints in the sand” pens for the religious soul and first responder pens supporting the fire fighters and police. Pictured here are pens supporting the armed forces members serving our country in the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. These are bolt action bullet pens depicting the military branch emblem superimposed over the American Flag. The pens are made from products purchased from a supplier of quality metal pen kits and acrylic pen blanks, turned on the lathe by Dale and then assembled.
Baldwin’s Dream also produces hand-made pocket/book pillows, crocheted items, cat nip mice, sewn items and other gifts. We also feature hand painted artwork from a local artist who specializes in painted vinyl records, framed paintings and other decorated items.

Can you share one of your favorite marketing or sales stories?

In the case of our Diamond Dotz product line we encourge our customers who have never tried building a Diamond Dotz picture to start small with one of our inexpensive starter kits. We would prefer to see them succeed with something that doesn’t cost a lot of money before buying a larger kit and failing on that effort. We have had several people come in and tell us that they tried Diamond Dotz previously and got discouraged and never finished the kit.
It does no good to sell something to a customer that may be beyond their abilities.
It is best for them to start small and succeed rather than go for a big sale and lose them as a future return customer.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

We started out trying to sell at craft shows but onw of our primary products, pocket pillows, require a lot of space to display. This makes setting up at a craft show more expensive and time consuming requiring additional space and cost. We then moved to an open market in a building renting booth spaces adequate to display our product. That market began to struggle after the Covid pandemic and we were forced to move.
We tried a space in what we were told was an upcoming location. Unfortunately, the management company who was rebuilding the market there was unable to meet their promises. they were trying to change the mode of the market from flea market vendors to higher-end product vendors but the clientele there expected low prices and haggling for a better price.
Finally, we found a shop space here in downtown Sykesville and the rewards and benefits seem to have fully met our needs.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.facebook.com/BaldwinsDream
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/baldwins_dream/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BaldwinsDream

Image Credits
Images privided by Dale Baldwin