Colorful new vendors join Saturday Market rainbow.

Byline: Retail Notebook by The Register-Guard

SATURDAY SHUFFLE: The Saturday Market may be an institution in downtown Eugene each weekend, but things do change.

From year to year, even week to week, new vendors join the colorful mix of artisans, clothes makers and farmers who sell their goods at the park blocks.

This year, about 30 new vendors are approved to sell handcrafted items at the market, which began its 33rd year last Saturday. Other vendors are accepted during the market's annual eight-month run. There always seems to be room for newcomers because many vendors don't show up every weekend.

In fact, market organizers don't know how many vendors will set up their stands until Saturday morning, promotions manager Kim Still said. Typically, about 250 vendors ply their wares.

"It's very fluid," she said.

Here are a few of the new vendors: Leslie Hubbard of Veneta, who makes herbal bath and beauty products; Kierstin Oliver of Eugene, who creates functional and decorative ceramics for home and garden; Tiki Harris of Springfield, who makes a polished and decorated wand from the mineral selenite called Wands of Light; Kenneth Cater, a Marcola jeweler, who specializes in silver; Jordan Grover of Eugene, who makes corduroy patchwork clothes; Alix Mosieur, a Vida artist, who puts pen and ink drawings on gourds and wood.

Besides meeting the market's standards for handcrafted items, a vendor must pay a $30 annual membership fee, $10 rent per appearance and 10 percent of their sales. Small booth vendors pay the membership fee, $5 rent per event and 10 percent of sales.

BUDDIES SELLING BUDS: Friends Doneta Skovbo and Gail Williams have entered what could be a risky phase in their relationship: they've become business partners.

The women on Monday plan to open a seasonal garden outlet in Eugene called Petal Pushers, offering bedding plants, vegetable starts, pots, baskets, potting soil and other garden items. Their business is on West 11th Avenue, across the street from Obie Media's corporate headquarters.

Don't look for an upscale atmosphere.

The showroom is a 30-foot-by-60-foot area on a gravel parking lot enclosed by a chain link fence and covered with a plastic roof. Skovbo (pronounced Sko-bo), who worked at a River Road nursery for a couple of years, and Williams, a part-time bookkeeper, decided it would be fun to open a business together.

"It would be a good way to meet people and maybe make a little bit of money," Skovbo said.

The partners invested about $10,000. Their respective husbands helped with construction.

In spite of the potential pitfalls, Williams said she doesn't worry about mixing business with friendship. "It's like a marriage," she said. "You can't go into a marriage thinking you'll get a divorce. You have to think that it will work."

By business reporter Ed Russo. To include items, call 338-2359, or e-mail [e-mail].