Well that was a waste!

[SunshineJ]

I'm so annoyed. My son's school had a big carnival/Winterfest event last night. All parents who have their own craft type business were invited to buy table space for $10 and set up their stuff to sell. DH and I both thought this was a great opportunity to get the word out about my bath salts and soaps line. There were a few hundred people at the event, so we should have done pretty well. I manned the table while DH took the kids around to the carnival at the school. There were a total of 5 people with craft booths. Even though there was plenty of room in the cafeteria for us, they had us all set up on the 2nd floor. EVERYTHING was on the first floor, no one knew we were there! Seriously we had about 25 people walk up there and walk past us. That was it. There was 1 sign behind a door on the stairwell that said "Craft tables upstairs". So, when all was said and done, I sold $33 worth of things. Subtract out the $10 table fee and $200 I spent on supplies to make the stuff and I came out in the hole by around $167! So not only did I lose money when the opportunity was definitely there to make money, but if I'd known that's the way it was going to go I would have loved watching the kids play at the carnival! What a waste of a good Friday night. Sigh.

K.

[Billie]

((HUGS)) Sorry to hear it wasn't all you were expecting. You should talk to the event coordinators. I would imagine the table fee is used to benefit the school, so the more participation they have the better it will be for them. If there would have been good success with it this year, more than likely it would have grown by next year. But, if noone even knows the tables are there, it's not going to do them any good.

Will you be able to sell your products at a future craft event?

[woodchick]

Yeah. I would definitely give some feedback to the organizers.

Some things I was thinking of:
*Maybe the signs made people think that there were 'craft projects' at the craft tables upstairs...instead of crafts for sale?
*If you have other fairs or are on Etsy then the cost of supplies isn't a total loss, you can still make use of the products.

If they/you decided to do that sort of thing again, I'm sure they'd be happy with some ideas on how to make improvements! Sorry it wasn't what you hoped it would be!

[SunshineJ]

You're both right - these are things that I can certainly sell at other craft fairs in the area. It's just so very frustrating- I spent so much time on this one, and that time could've been spent doing things that would actually improve our bottom line right now (like listing the bins of outgrown kids clothes on ebay). There was a huge potential at this event to at least get my name out there, kwim? One lady had a small selection of jewelry and was doing manicures for little girls for $1 - really CUTE stuff like alternating colors with glitter, etc. She'd have had a line out the door all night if anyone had known and the kids would've loved it. As it is, I don't think anyone that was there is willing to go back again without a relocaton in writing. I don't have a problem with the $10 table fee, the PTA tends to use their funds for great things for the kids. It was just really discouraging. But on the bright side, I'm off to investigate local craft fares since I already have an inventory to sell!

K.