Selling at Atlanta Festivals Tips

This is our first year doing craft shows, so we are still total newbies.  But I wanted to give a run down of what we've learned so far.  I've had a lot of Facebook friends ask for advice.  Just like other artists have told us, it's hard work and exhausting, but it's worth it.  So far, we've just stayed in the Atlanta area.  We plan on doing some traveling in 2014.  We'd love to do some shows in Asheville, Cincinnati, New Orleans or anywhere there's a high concentration of hipsters.  We love hipsters!

Our first show was Reynoldstown Wheelbarrow Festival in September.  We hit the ground running and signed up to do 5 shows and a few consignment shows, where we just had to drop our product off and didn't actually have to work the show.  (Those are nice :-)  We are learning new things at each show, making friends and getting good tips from fellow vendors.  

By show #3 we had bought an enclosed trailer and tons of clear, plastic storage containers.  We learned at Suwanee Day that if it rains, cardboard boxes aren't going to get the job done.  And we can't fit everything into an SUV or borrow Jack's truck for every show.

Reynoldstown Wheelbarrow Festival 2013

Our tent set up at Reynoldstown.  That rug would meet it's doom at Suwanee Day two weeks later.  

When I first saw the venue, I wasn't sure what to expect.  They told me to pick my own spot, and this being my first show, I had NO idea what a good spot looked like.  I just happened to pick the corner spot at the entrance and apparently that spot was golden.  It ended up being a REALLY good show.  So good that it was the straw that broke the camels back.  Jennifer put in her two weeks notice at The Ritz Carlton the following Monday.  As long as they'll have us back next year, we will definitely sell there again.

The onesie set up = branch from my back yard + some twine.  Bam!  Beautiful!

Mason Jar soap + lotion dispensers.

I wouldn't have survived this show without my helpers, Melissa and Rachel.  Jennifer was out of town and there was NO WAY I was going to do a show by myself.

Suwanee Day 2013

It didn't quit raining the entire day.  It started out as just a mist and then by 1pm or so it was a full on down pour.  

Our feet were soaked and so was my friggin' rug!! Dang it!  Note to self - bring rain boots to outdoor shows from now on.

Jennifer, ready to go home.

Amazingly, there were still some troopers who were out shopping.  So, the show wasn't a total bust.  We would have killed it if the weather had cooperated.  We'll try again next year.

Riverview Landing Fall Festival

Riverview Landing is a fairly new park in Mableton.  It's a stone's throw from Smyrna and right next to the Chattahoochee River.  It's a beautiful, rustic venue even though it's right next to Atlanta.  

We didn't do as well as we had hoped.  The turn out was okay, but there was a concert and other activities going on.  People weren't there to shop.  They were there to get their kids out of the house and enjoy a GORGEOUS Fall day.

Sweetwater Brewery was serving at the event, so we had a pretty good time.

KSU Owl-o-Ween

Our gypsy booth at KSU's Owl-o-Ween.  

This was the first year for the Owl-o-Ween festival and it was INSANE.  It was incredibly packed, too packed.  It was hard to make your way through the crowd.  We did OKAY.  I'm not sure if we'll do this show again next year.  If we had to choose between this show and a show that was in town, we'd choose the Atlanta show.  There was an entrance fee, which I think, kept people from spending as much as they would have without the door fee.  And people weren't there to shop.  They were there to drink, eat and take a hot air balloon ride.

Indie Craft Experience 2013

ICE was AWESOME!  It was a 2 day show and we sold out of stuff on day #1, had to go back to Jen's, make more and then we sold out again on day #2.

Jennifer setting up next to our new friend, Susan.  Her company, Knesting, sells IKEA slipcovers.  For anyone looking to jazz up your IKEA furniture, you should check out her site.  Much more selection than at IKEA!! (And much cuter!) 

We had a lady tell us that she had seen the Hangry towel on Pinterest, followed it back to our website, saw that we were going to be at ICE that weekend, so she came to see us.  She told me "You're the reason I'm here!"  HUGE compliment!

Another girl told me "Hey!  I saw you at West Elm!  Oh, and aren't you in Georgia Crafted this month?!"  Our first groupie who isn't one of our friends!  Awesome!  

So, that was our 2013 show experience.  We'll have to do a more organized, detailed tips for shows article once we've learned more.  But a quick list from what I've learned so far:

- It can't hurt to OVER prepare.  Don't think "ah, there's no way we'll sell __ of whatever"  Just bring as much as you can.  If it doesn't sell, oh well, sell it on Etsy or at another show.  You'll be more upset if you sell out of things and people keep coming up and asking "Hey, you don't have any more ___?"
- Give a discount for multiples.  If you can afford to come down on your price a little, I'd highly recommend offering discounts for multiples.  9 out of 10 times if we say "we give a discount for buying more than one" the person will start looking around for another towel to buy.

- Have a credit card back up plan.  There were so many people at KSU that the internet wasn't working on my phone.  We couldn't take credit cards.  Our solution was to get emails and then send PayPal invoices and we were letting people walk away with product without us actually having payment.  What SHOULD have we done?  Old school solution = carbon copy of their credit card.  We should have gotten their credit card #, the exp., the #s on the back and their zip code.  We could just manually enter their info once we got home and the internet was working.  Didn't think of this until after the fact.

- Be organized.  A lot of shows have people who help you unload.  There's a time crunch.  Put things into PLASTIC containers.  If it rains, cardboard boxes will melt.  And you don't want people to have to pull a million little tiny things out of your car.  This takes forever, things get broken, you have a hard time finding them when you are setting up because you don't know where everything is.

- Think about why people are there.  If it's a festival where there's a lot of other things going on - a concert, petting zoo, hot air balloons, etc.  People aren't there to shop.  They still might make an impulse buy or two, but try to pick festivals that are all about going there to shop.  Indie Craft Experience - people are there to shop.

- Make friends with your neighbors.  You are going to be there ALL day, or maybe ALL weekend.  It helps to get friendly with neighbors.  They might give you some great advice, or help you out when you need to run to the restroom, get some food, etc.  Also, it just helps to pass the time when things are slow.  And don't forget that you are there to network.  You never know how your business might grow from the connects you make at shows.

Finally - if you are looking for a good list of Atlanta festivals this website is really helpful:
Atlanta Spring Festivals

Thank you to all our groupies who come see us at shows, pin us on Pinterest and share our site with friends and family!!  We really appreciate all the support we've been getting.  There are French Silver tea towels hanging in kitchens in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, France, Brazil, the UK, Iceland, The Netherlands, Hong Kong, Germany... and probably every state in the US.