Sunday, April 26, 2009

Luna? Not So Much.

Ominously, the first craft fair of the season was quite...eh.

Mind you, all the stuff was there. Quilts:
Pinback buttons: Gift Tags: And some new stuff that I've been making with these terrific upholstery remnants that I scored a few weeks ago:
There was even my own personal troll-girl who crouched under the table and played with stuff for five hours:

Customers, though? Not so much. And customers wishing to purchase things? Um, there were even fewer of those, at least for me--the hallway where we set up is kind of narrow, so vendors could have been making a killing just three tables down and I wouldn't have known. There wasn't so much being killed right near me.

The experience was educational, however. All of my sales were very small--I didn't sell any item that cost over $5--so that tells me that I'll likely need to bone up on a LOT of really small items for my craft fairs this summer. Of course, it's actually harder to make a good profit if you're selling really small items, because you obviously have to sell 60 $1 buttons to make the same amount of money as you can from one $60 T-shirt quilt, but whatever a girl's gotta do, I guess.

People seemed to like the belly dancers. Perhaps I could belly dance just inside my booth? Draw in the customers? Earn some extra singles?

7 comments:

Anna said...

My sales yesterday were at an all-time low, and I heard similar reports from three other vendors. Let's hope things are on an upswing this summer!

julie said...

I wonder if you saw any pattern to what people did purchase? People only bought my least expensive items, but my table display is also crap, and yours looks much nicer.

I'm also trying to remember if Luna was on a Sunday last year. My thought is that it wasn't--it was on a Saturday but in March?--and perhaps Sunday is just really NOT a good day to hold a craft fair?

cake said...

had i known you were belly dancing in your booth, i would have been there!
oh, wait...
i am sorry to have missed it. i had been looking forward to the plant exchange all month...
i did see your matt, and syd there, they even made it into a few photos of mine. and, i noticed that syd chose one of my sweet pepper plants to put in her bucket!
did you find a surprise husk cherry on your door step???

Anna said...

My sales were just weird and random. I sold more 8x10 prints than usual, but FAR fewer cards. Bizarre. And I sold zero necklaces, which has never happened.

You're right, it was on a Saturday last year, earlier in the season. I just assumed they had a good reason for having it on Sunday, but I think that it throws people off. I also hear someone say that they didn't realize there were indoor vendors until they overheard someone mention it, so...

The meeting last night was helpful, and I'm hoping for a better day for all of us at FotA.

Lisa said...

Bummer on your sales! Maybe belly dancing will bring the peeps to the both to buy? You are hilarious!

julie said...

I KNEW that was you, cake!!! It's AWESOME! Don't be mad when I accidentally kill it though, okay?

I asked Matt if he saw you there and he said definitely not. He is so oblivious. I was sad because I wanted a ton of daylilies (do they really call them "ditch lilies" around here? I guess they are so ubiquitous), but there weren't any? If I have to buy some from the greenhouse I know the neighbors will make fun of me.

cake said...

well, when matt and syd showed up, i was sitting in the shade across the street. i thought of going up to say hi, then got a little shy...or lazy?

i'll see if we have any extra lilies in our yard.

your neighbors won't make fun of you, and i won't be mad if the husk cherry doesn't make it.