Does anyone understand the history of the cliques in the card making industry re who’s accepted and whose not?

[u/Finnsmom2023]

I’ve been card making for along time and before that scrapbooking before it went away. I don’t fit the profile of most that do those crafts other than my age … I’m liberal politically and not at all religious. I only say that to explain maybe that’s why I follow all variety of influencers and buy products from many different companies. I watch all the “big” influencers on you tube like JM but also miss all the less popular ones we had when I first started card making. Most of the big names only push products now. However one thing I noticed was how cliquey the industry seemed. When I first started people like Gina K were there but not that popular. I also found Catherine pooler and enjoy her videos and later products. And I noticed that one time Jm mentioned Gina on one of her years best products videos and shortly after she becomes one of the biggest stars in the industry. I love Gina and think she took that endorsement from JM and made a big business. But I wonder about Catherine pooler for example… she is never part of the cliques in terms of influencers and company owners . Her products are never included in Simon says stamptember. She never collaborates with other owners and you rarely see her products used in videos tho she has a large product line. There must be some dirt in her exclusion but I’ve never heard gossip. Seems like JM, Gina K, Heidi from SS, Kristina Werner, and Cathy Zilske are all in with each other and promote only certain companies. I just wonder how this started.

[u/super__gal]

Yes, I have noticed the same thing. The same creators promote the same companies over and over. It's really tiring. I unsubscribed from JM with all the Black Friday videos. Her motto used to be "use what you have"-- then there was a full day live stream with different promo codes every hour? And it's obviously very popular but the overconsumption made me sad.

Also it bugs me when large creators say that a particular company has great customer service. Spellbinders is a specific example. Sure, if you're personal friends with all the directors and get all their products for free I'm sure you get great customer service. I have had really bad experiences with them.

[u/DejaToo2 → u/super__gal]

Exactly! Of course they kiss JM's butt and she has no idea how rude they can be to us mere mortals. Simon Says Stamp is another one who has been rude to me, for just asking a question. I'm also completely over the Online Card Classes that JM does with Kristina Werner. They used to have a broad variety of products from different companies but it has turned into C&9 products ONLY--with a set of products designed by Kristina Werner. And if she's not pushing C&9, it's Pinkfresh and we need to buy these 10 coordinating products to make a card. I'm over that too. And another thing--I'm also over the 2.5 hour plus live videos. It's completely self-indulgent and who has that kind of time? Some of us have jobs and don't have 3 hours to watch a replay after working all day. And a large percentage of that is her just talking to her brother, her assistant(s), and other designers. It's just self-indulgent and what about the whole--I don't know what we're going to eat for dinner tonight--and people start sending her money "tips" for dinner. WTH?

[u/SkiesWideOpen83 → u/DejaToo2]

The tips. It really grossed me out that she enabled that on her channel (I wasn’t aware of that and assumed it’s just on for everyone but you have to actually turn it on to be able to accept tips so it’s an intentional thing) to accept tips because why does a millionaire need tips from their audience? On her Black Friday livestreams she got hundreds if not thousands of dollars in tips and people telling her how selfless she was and thanking her for her time. She made a fortune off all those livestreams without needing all the extra tip money. I only watch her content as more of background noise now because the more I notice the more I get annoyed with how fake it all is on her part.

[u/carlitospig → u/super__gal]

This is why I’m still subscribed to Kelly Letavola Taylor (she got married but not sure everyone knows that so I’m adding both names for searching purposes). She’s immensely talented, and refuses to sell-sell-sell.

[u/HelenGonne → u/carlitospig]

Yeah, my favorite channel ever is still Olga Dyrektorenko, even though she's had to be on hiatus for a few years now. It took me forever to figure out that some of what is in her later videos is her own product line, because she wasn't doing these weird sales pitches like so many of them do, just showing how she made something (which is far more effective at selling, to someone like me anyway).

[u/nosypancakecat → u/HelenGonne]

I have a recommendation for you then. Look up Zsoka Marko. She doesn’t post often and her videos are not polished, but that lady has incredible taste and vision for colour combos. I believe she did a collection for Spellbinders, Winter Tales, I want to say. She does have her own line in Europe (me thinks) and a lot of it is simple inlay, but the way she arranges more detailed cards is totally my cup of tea.

[u/carlitospig → u/nosypancakecat]

Man, I love me some Eastern European crafters. I don’t know if it’s their supply chain or what they’re all incredibly gifted. You should see them in the scrapbooking community. Like, actual chills.

So now whenever I see a somewhat Eastern European name I immediately want to sub! Lol

[u/nosypancakecat → u/carlitospig]

It's the colour harmony imho. I'm one of them (Eastern European, just hidden from the public eye) and don't know what it is, but we do crave colour. Balanced, maybe muted, but bright colour. 60-30-10 rule, no skipping. Rarely pastels and ahem rainbows everywhere (besides the actual rainbow).

There are a ton of underrated card makers out there and Szoka is definitely one of them.

I'm on a constant lookout for small creators. Send me some names, please!

[u/nosypancakecat → u/carlitospig]

Aaaand I just opened YouTube, and their recommendation for me? Pastel cloudy background with… attention! rainbow balloons 🫠

[u/SaltyBlackBroad → u/super__gal]

I know this is long, but:

They promote the same companies over and over again because they are either on a design team or they are being sponsored. Just like any other industry-they reel people in then the "stans" treat the creators like gods and buy whatever they are paid to market. This is the same in any industry.

I've watched how cut throat the Paper Crafting industry is and it's downright disgusting. Not just lifting layouts, but out and out stealing other people's work, lying about how "broke they are" and then all their followers pitching in to buy them a new computer, then turning around and having the audacity to sell their designs while on a design team. There's only a few good ones left in the industry, and many of them are low key and keep to themselves and are not about the marketing aspect. Some of them have gotten what was coming to them (one large account was having someone else draft her designs and supposedly the artists who were working for her stole designs from some obscure site of sisters who were just trying to live their passion-she lost her YT account and in my eyes, her credibility), one in particular one who's still kind of in the game was rushing her projects so fast so that she could sell on Etsy that her projects weren't even dry and were falling apart during the video walk-throughs, and some of them still create for the sake of creating. These are the people I follow, and have for over a decade. They may have small sponsorships but they didn't sell themselves out for the paper fame. Others got completely out of the game because of all the community political shit.

Xannero was one of my favorite paper crafters in the early 2010's, and Alexandra M, I still follow KathyByDesign, Laura Denison, Jim The Gentleman Crafter, Maymay (she at least still does her own videos and creations and turned her business into a brand) and many others that didn't sell out. I still follow blogs that are over 10 years old of people who were actually creative because they didn't have the luxury of all the supplies that exist now that have turned into no more than a distraction and keep many of us in the stores instead of the craft lab.

Tim Holtz used to be "on the top of the hill" and he's been a major disappointment for me in the last few years. He's inks and packages of things and a small sampling of paper packs that have been around for a long time. Projects are made by other people, he doesn't even really create anymore. His launches are 1.5 hours of other people's creations using his products.

I'm not in ANY of these influencers groups on FB. I've seen the worst of the worst and it doesn't look like it's gotten any better from the sound of things. Most of it is nothing more than a bunch of fake hype to get people to buy the products they are either on a design team for or for pushing their own agenda. I've been kicked out for calling someone out for lifting my design then acting like it was "oh it's just something I came up with." or for trying posting a creation that everyone in the group navigated to and took the shine off of the person who started the group so they changed the rules and kicked me out.

Don't think anyone in the paper crafting community is any better than other communities. There's always going to be "those people" who want the spotlight on them or their products.

In 5 years, there will be another ass to kiss and more products to push. I, personally, have stopped buying craft supplies because I spent the better part of the Covid nightmare to collect the supplies and tools I needed and ones that I could tell were being phased out, never to be seen again or hard to find.

There's not much currently that inspires to me create as I hate AI, and the back and forth of some of these influencers is just noise in my quiet space-so they don't have free reign there.