Craft Show Tips

A few weekends ago, we had a 2 day outdoor craft show.  This is only our second year for craft shows, but we have learned SO much in one year.  I was inspired to include some tips for outdoor craft shows from a fellow artisan over at Two Seaside Babes blog.  I'm going to keep my tips brief and base them off of the pictures I took, so if you want more details, let me know!

Keep yourself organized during the packing process before and after the show.  We used to not have lids to any totes and we'd just kind of throw stuff in totes at the end of the show.  This resulted in repacking everything before every show and never knowing where anything was, which was annoying and time consuming.  It is also a lot easier to stack things in the back of your truck/suv if EVERYTHING that fits is in a container with a lid.  Also, if you buy a bunch of totes after Christmas, you can get them pretty cheap!

Be weather ready if you're doing an outdoor show.  This includes having weatherproof WALLS on all 4 sides of your tent, and weights on every corner of your tent when you leave it overnight.  We usually stack our tables in the center of the tent, place totes in the middle of the table AND cover it with a tarp just in case.  It only takes one bad storm to blow away a lot of money and hard work.  You would also feel horrible if your tent blew into someone elses!

Pennants.  They make everything look better. Always. Also, make sure you use different heights to draw the eye to all of your gorgeous stuff.  We also put a large outdoor rug we found on clearance at Target in the middle of our booth.  It makes it look like a little shop and pulls the look together.

We have never used the same set-up twice.  We look at our space, traffic flow, location, etc. before we decide on a set-up.  At this show, we changed our set-up MID SHOW.  The vendor next to us left, so we changed our set-up to a corner booth, which ended up being a great decision.

This has nothing to do with the picture, BUT don't forget a calculator, ink pens, business cards, a receipt book, change, and if possible, take credit cards.  It's really easy- go to propay.com, sign up and you can either purchase an inexpensive microcard reader or a projack if you have a smartphone.

Make friends with other vendors and get to know them!  We have learned SO much from other vendors and you will find that you will run into the same vendors at various shows throughout the year.  At this show, the booth next to us was Caroline's Boutique, who made tutus and gorgeous hair accessories, including this headband that looks adorable on Harper!

Again, this is not everything, but just some tips if you are a newbie to the craft show world and need some help starting out.  Although craft shows can be exhausting, they can also be a lot of fun and very beneficial to your business!