My Experience of a fair type thing
It was interesting and a learning curve. Interesting being an interesting word
It was billed as a Fayre in my local but it was more car booty than Fayre booty so people were looking for cheap bargains.
There was a lot ooohhs and aahs about my bags and loads of people stopped to look and admire then swiftly walked on by when I uttered the price.
One woman was quite miffed with me and said she could get 2 bags at a well known high street bargain shop( Hint: the one featured on Panorama recently) for the price I was selling.I was going to give her a lecture on sweat shops and child exploitation but decided otherwise. It was a lovely day and nothing was spoiling my groove
I had a few things for a tenner and under and they sold really well so I did recoup the price of the table and extra for my Saturday night out. Anything over a tenner got the oooh and ahh response.
These did well at £7.50 each
A few people asked me for my phone number and web address and two people gave me their contact details and would like me to contact them to arrange for custom made bags. All in all it was a bit of a mixed bag. (forgive the pun)
So what did I learn from this experience
- Prepare
- Do your research. Its a bit like location, location, location. Research, research, research
- Market accordingly: Don't market a Ferrari to someone who's looking for a Peugeot 205 (Nothing against Peugeot 205 but they are two different personalities)
- Identify and then focus your energy on your target market: Luckily I did make a lot of purses/pouches for a tenner and they were really quick to make. I did though spend enough energy making my exquisite bags and although people appreciated them they didn't have the budget for them
- Go prepared with your business card and preferably have a web site up and running: Enough people asked me if I had a web site and as I don't I was somewhat stumped so I gave e mail and phone number instead. People were not that keen to give their email address ( I suppose spamming is a real concern)
- Go with as much change as you can get your hands on:You can loose a sale just because you don't have change to hand. People will say things like don't worry I'll come back then they'll go down the road and spend the money with someone who does have change.
- Learn from your experience: Make notes of the plus and minus and tweak it for next time
- Last but not least I learnt that I have quality products. people generally appreciated what I was selling but just didn't have the budget for it. Back to square one research and market appropriately.
That's it for now folks. I am off to set up my web site. I've heard that etsy is a real great place to start or maybe I'll try DaWanda. decisions decisons.
