All the mistakes I've made!

[BitOfSugar]

My partner and I were looking back at pics from our first show in 2009 and had a good laugh about how much we didn't know about booth set up when we first started! Here's a list of just some of the many craft fair display mistakes I've made, and I hope that someone else can learn something or find value in them.

1. Put up a banner to cover/hide one side of a corner booth. Because my displays have a frontside and a backside, I put up a banner to cover the backside. But the banner made a barrier between my booth and one of the main walkways.

2. Not leaving a space for myself! For many, many shows I stood in the middle of the booth and rang people up where ever there was room to put my receipt book down. That plain sucked.

3. Putting a rack of phone charms at the end of the table. I thought the $5 tag would attract shoppers but it attracted thieves instead. Now I know to put either large or very secured items at the front.

4. Practicality trumps aesthetics. That's not to say that it has to be one or the other. For my first show, I only cared how things looked. I spent too much time taking down jewelry, showing it to the customer, putting it back on the display and not enough time greeting people, watching for shoplifters, and demonstrating my products.

5. Not enough merchandise! By the third day, I was nearly out of merchandise. The Sunday shoppers only got to see an unprofessional looking booth with scattered merchandise that no one else wanted to buy. Not the kind of first impression I was looking to make.

6. At our first outdoor show, we set up our table so that our shoppers were standing in the afternoon sun. Everything was nice and cool in the morning but a little after noon, it was just too hot to shop! We would have been better off with a reverse U. When you pick your booth space, think about which direction the sun, wind, rain, etc. will be coming from.

[Former_Member]

Thanks for sharing your mistakes. This is why some of us who've been around the show-block for years try to share.

We want new show peeps to succeed. It's tough enough to put yourself out there, to be public and to say "Hey, Look At Me please buy my work."

The discussion portion of the team page has every subject possible. We've covered it all, and many times twice.

Reading over your mistakes, you come a long way baby. Good thing you have it down now =0)

[Former_Member]

Thanks for the tips! I will be doing my first show in a few weeks and it's always nice to get ideas of what works and what doesn't.:)

[Former_Member]

Great advice! Thanks!

[ClaybyStacia]

Number 5 is a pretty snazzy problem, for your first show! Of course, it's best not to sell out, so you can still entice later shoppers, but for your first show, I'd say almost selling out sounds like a fun problem!

[PrairiePrimitives]

If you do find that your booth is looking a bit thinned out, whether it's after a day or two, or even the first hour or two, try to tighten it up. It might mean taking down a table or scootching the display forward a bit; maybe both! Just find some way to make your booth appear full, even if it's smaller than the space you're allowed.

There are shows where I start out with a booth that's only about 5 feet deep, if I don't have enough product to completely fill the 10x10 space. I've learned that one the hard way myself.

[heathercashart]

These were great tips!! I never even think about looking for shoplifters - and I have a lot of smaller items too. I'll have to keep that in mind!

[SomeKindOfPretty]

I didn't think about looking for shop lifters either until I was at one show with a lot of teenagers. I had a group of them come in my booth and a few seemed interested in my jewelry and started asking me questions. The other were talking among themselves and hovering over my stud earrings lying on the table, acting kind of suspicious. I acknowledged them and leaned towards them to ask if they needed anything. They just looked at each other and left. I noticed the earrings had been moved around, but I couldn't tell if they had taken any. The other girls stayed and bough something.

Normally I love having teens in my booth, since some of my jewelry can have a younger slant to it, but having that large group in there made me realize that I would have to keep a better eye on things and when my booth gets too crowded that I would have step out from behind the table and stand outside my booth.

[TigersandDragons]

Not all teens are thieves, but out of the 10 times that I've had items stolen (that I've known of, something like hairclips could of been taken and I wouldn't of noticed), 5 times it was definitely teens. Three times it was adults, and I have no idea who the thief was the other two times.

They will spend a long time looking to wait for the moment you stop paying attention to them. Or they will work in teams having one person ask questions and distract you, while another steals.

Items that are more expensive, or easier to steal (small), sit closer to me, are double pinned on displays, harder to reach. The "edges" or table ends tend to have the larger items, and things are are less expensive or harder to steal.

[ArtisticSparkle]

Wow, thanks so much for the advice! I'm doing a craft show this weekend & art show the following. I've done a few before, but will definitely follow all advice here.