The Renegade Experience
The Renegade Craft Fair in Brooklyn, New York
I have been doing craft shows for over two years, within a fifteen mile radius of my house. My experiences
within my safety zone are always great and my sales are usually pretty
good. Recently, my friend and neighbor, Ileana Rodriguez of
Indiaromeo, has been teaching me how to expand my business and
encouraged me to apply for shows that I never would have entered
before. Last month, Ileana had reserved a booth at The Renegade Craft Fair
in Brooklyn, New York and asked me if I would like to share the
booth with her. I decided to take a step outside of my safety zone and
give it a try.
There was a lot to consider while I was packing for this 500 mile
journey. I couldn’t just run home when I realized that I had
forgotten something important. I also needed to take the weather into
account since I couldn’t buy a whole new wardrobe if I brought winter
clothes instead of summer clothes (which I basically did by the way.) Here
are some important items to consider while you are packing for
“the big event” and some important things that I learned from this
show:
-Bring a white 10X10’ canopy tent. The organizers asked that we bring
one of these and it came in quite handy due to the fact that white
reflects heat and it was 93 degrees outside.
-Bring a changing area if you sell clothes. It is important to make
sure that you have a place set up where people can try things on.
Many of the vendors had shower tents set up behind their booths for
their customers. I do not recommend depending on bathrooms as a
changing area unless you are familiar with the location. The bathrooms
at the park were, well, in need of some work and the
stores around the park made you buy something if you wanted to use the
bathroom. For you jewelry designers out there, make sure that you
bring a mirror. People want to see how they look while wearing
your jewelry.
-Accept credit cards. This show was well advertised and still many of the
people in the park that day had no idea that this event was even going on.
More than half of our sales were impulse buys using a credit card. On the first day of the
show, almost all of my sales were credit card purchases.
We use Propay for our credit card service.
-Bring hundreds of business cards. The majority of people that came into
our booth took our business cards. Many people grabbed our cards so they
would remember to come back to our booth after they got a chance to check
out the other 150 vendors there. Other people took our cards so they could
shop on-line in their air conditioned homes and not have to walk around on
black asphalt in the middle of a heat wave.
-Dress for the weather. I cannot stress this enough, as this was my
biggest problem the first day of the show. I wore jeans, not realizing
exactly how hot the heat wave really was. We brought tons of bottled water
which kept us hydrated.
-Bring the “Magic Basket”. Our magic basket contained pens, extra
merchandise tags, a hole-puncher, clothes pins, Scotch tape, and packing
tape. We used every single one of these items multiple times. It got
pretty windy on the second day of the show so we used the packing tape to
keep our tablecloths from smacking our customers in the face. My earring
cards also started to blow right off of the T-bar they were displayed on;
I used the clothes pins to weigh them down. It wasn’t the most beautiful
display anymore but at least people could see my earrings.
-Know your product! I was asked a large number of questions at this show.
People wanted to know all about the stones that I worked with and if they
were allergic to the metals that I used in my jewelry. Luckily, I did know
what pieces contained nickel and was able to tell them more than they
really seemed to want to know about the stones in my jewelry.
All in all, this was a really great experience for me and a really smart
thing to do for my small business. I made a lot of contacts, gained a ton
of new customers, made some good money, and got to meet some sincerely
wonderful and talented artists.
Designer, Leeann Hynes, creates modern jewelry pieces with a vintage
flair. Her designs combine elegance and originality. You can visit
her website at www.stirstudios.com