BedandBreakfast.com Innkeeper News Vendor Spotlight: Deneen Pottery April 2008

Looking for a way to remind guests about their stay with you?
Hoping to increase revenue without adding on another bedroom?
Want your breakfast mugs and gift shop items to be as carefully created as your inn itself?
Ready for the greatest handmade coffee mug that is made in USA?

Then you are ready to look at Deneen Pottery.

Since 1972, Deneen Pottery has been producing custom handmade logo stoneware. Each mug is hand-thrown on a potter’s wheel by a master potter. Emblems take on a 3D appearance with our Glazed-Engraved™ process. All items are lead free, rich in color, beautiful in form, safe for the microwave, dishwasher, and oven.

"A beautifully hand-crafted Deneen Pottery mug featuring your inn’s name and logo holds far more than coffee or tea. Guests will buy them as a remembrance of their stay; every time they use them, the wonderful memories of their stay at your inn will fill each mug and enrich every sip.” – Niles Deneen

Hand-crafted pottery is ideal for B&Bs: Unlike chain motels and hotels, there are no “cookie-cutter” B&Bs. Each property is distinct and special, from the architecture and furnishings to the table settings and bathroom amenities. Similarly, setting your table with beautiful, customized, handmade mugs reminds your guests how much you care about quality and comfort. They can enjoy a mug that looks and feels great, while keeping their coffee or tea nice and hot. Guests appreciate that you’re spoiling them with the highest quality in traditional stoneware. Meanwhile, you’ll be able to enjoy the knowledge that they are remembering the name of your inn with every sip.

Let them buy these same mugs to take home, and they can reflect on the trip to your property on a daily basis. Unlike a postcard or brochure – quickly filed and forgotten – Deneen Pottery / Cloth & Clay stoneware will be used by your guests for years to come. While each one is different, the distinctive look of our mugs encourages guests to assemble a collection from their favorite inns.

"Every Inn should have these mugs! They are a great marketing tool, our guests love them, they are built to last (and by hand at that!), and most importantly, they sell very well!" -- Nathan Allan, Swantown Inn, Olympia, WA

"I have never broken or even chipped a single mug from Deneen Pottery. My mom, who can be my toughest critic, loves my B&B's mugs and drinks her tea from one every morning. Not often does she tell me that I am doing things right - but my Deneen Pottery mugs are one of those things." -- Gail Wichers
A Wicher Garden B&B, Auburn, NY

“I put off the order for two years, thinking that nobody would buy these mugs… so far every guest has bought one! I am so amazed!!! I wish that I had brought the mugs in sooner. The design is just so perfect.” -- Terry Buts, Whispering Waters B&B, Wisconsin Dells, WI

“I’ve sat at dozens of B&B breakfast tables, listening to the guests talk about their favorite inns. When I ask for the names of those B&Bs, folks rarely remember them. If each guest had brought home a special mug, they would know and recommend those properties!” – Sandy Soule, BedandBreakfast.com

Mug Collectors Club: Ask any innkeeper about Mug Collectors, and at least a quarter of them will have a story about folks who have stayed at their inn simply because Deneen Pottery mugs are used and sold. We have a special page on our website showing a map of the United States. Click any state, and you will see a hyperlinked list of inns that have Deneen Pottery mugs. We offer a free link to every customer; it lets collectors know that you have mugs for sale.

"We love our Deneen Pottery mugs! Every time I order, I chose a new color for our mug inventory, and our repeat guests will always buy the new color for their collection!" – Cheri Rojek, Heartstone Inn, Eureka Springs, AR

More than mugs: A variety of high-quality accent items will help you brand the high-quality experience of a stay at your inn and puts your name in your guests’ hands.

About Deneen Pottery
At Deneen Pottery/Cloth & Clay in St. Paul, Minnesota, making stoneware mugs has been a family tradition since 1971. For the past 17 years we have specialized in making coffee mugs and other stoneware pieces for bed and breakfasts.

“I started making pottery at Luther College under Dean Schwarz who was a student of Marguerite Wildenhain (1896-1985),” explains Peter Deneen. “I learned about the Bauhaus School founded by Walter Gropius in Germany, after World War I. The main thrust of the Bauhaus movement was to create an environment that would nurture the bond between art and industry. Marguerite studied at the Bauhaus with the master potter Max Krehan and the artist Gerhard Marcks from 1919 to 1926, where she became a master potter."

After being introduced to Marguerite at a college workshop, Peter and Mary applied and were accepted to her summer pottery school in northern California. “My wife and I spent six summers at Marguerite’s school. It was from Marguerite and her Bauhaus training that I learned to see how form follows function, and how design and beauty can become one,” he explained.

An accomplished master potter, Peter has surrounded himself with talented potters. With complete control of all phases of creation and production, Peter has developed a line of pottery in the academic and professional spirit of the master/apprentice tradition. Deneen Pottery mugs are hand-thrown one by one, in a time-consuming and labor-intensive process. Twenty-four pairs of hands will work on each piece during production until it is ready for shipping.

Glaze-Engrave™ is Deneen’s signature process, developed by Peter, and now under the careful eye of his son Owen Deneen. Original studio art is cut directly into the clay and filled with glaze, achieving a distinctive and detailed image. Creations include mugs, dinnerware, serving pieces, signs, magnets, ornaments, coasters and bud vases. These items are available in a virtual rainbow of colors, matching every decor. Customers can even choose a marble glaze, giving each piece two tones. Marble glaze colors are achieved by dipping each piece of pottery three times in various glazes. The variation occurs from the thickness of the glaze that goes on each piece and the temperature of the firing in the kiln. Stoneware is fired to 2,100 degrees, unlike earthenware, which is fired to 1,600 degrees and is not nearly as durable.

Niles, Peter and Mary’s eldest son, is in charge of sales and marketing, but he says that since it’s a family business each person pitches in to do whatever necessary. He believes the values of Deneen Pottery are the values of most B&Bs.

“Our stoneware is synonymous with the B&B experience—high in quality, unique in style, and distinctive in appearance—to leave a lasting impression,” he said. “Innkeepers truly appreciate our pottery,” Niles explained. “They reorder because the pottery is both attractive and functional, but also because it reminds guests of a wonderful overnight experience. When guests buy a piece of our pottery to take home with them from a B&B they enjoyed, it helps them remember their stay,” Niles said. “It’s something they can use again and again because our pieces will not fade or lose color - no matter how many times they are run through a dishwasher.”

Deneen Pottery
www.DeneenPottery.com
888-646-0238

Vendor Spotlight: Deneen Pottery

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