Everyone is making what I make!?

 Have you ever booked in to a show where you are selling your beautiful beaded jewelry that you spent all winter painstakingly crafting; only to find that there are 10 others with almost exactly the SAME beaded jewelry? I think we all have. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but it is also darn annoying when it is your arts that are being imitated!

Metaline Falls, WA Centennial Festival © 2011 Susan Patch

It does not matter what your art or craft is, if someone is not doing it now they will be in short order. When I first started doing handcrafted soaps it was unheard of. It was 1984. I learned how from an old Readers Digest book called "Back to Basics" first printed in 1981. It had everything I needed to learn to make handcrafted soaps the old fashioned way. I still have that book. There was no such thing as "melt and pour" or kits or online (OK, granted: "online" was not even part of the language yet!) sellers of stock lines you could slap your own label on and sell as your own product. When I made soap and sold it at craft fairs it was soap that I had rendered beef suet I bought from the butcher at the D&A Shoprite in Wasilla, Alaska, and woodash I saved from our woodstove to make. Closest thing to a 'kit' was when I used commercial lye - Red Devil in a can which you cannot even find anymore, Red Devil changed their mix to keep meth labs from using it! I made my molds from wood scraps and old cookie trays. I could not have bought a kit if I wanted to!

My soaps were unique, sought after and sold very well. I stopped making soap when they became the mainstream phenomenon they are now. I no longer had a unique and sought after product. When I see those insipid "melt and pour" kits in the crafts store I just smile and walk on by. Call me a snob but that is not real soap making.

I now specialize in fiber arts. Felting, weaving, knitting, silk painting, fabric arts. I studied fiber arts for two years at a University and apprenticed for another four years with a master fiber artist in Eastern Washington. It is an art form and it takes practice and skill to be good at it. I am still working on being good at it. But I see the kits for needle felting and silk painting creeping up on me just like the soap kits did,  making it oh so easy to do this, too. Suddenly anyone with a JoAnn's discount coupon can pick up a pre-felted blank and be a fiber artist. I do not begrudge anyone learning a new craft. I teach my craft to others. But I do get irritable when I end up next to them at every fair. I do get irritable when my goods that are painstakingly crafted get passed over to buy the goods that came already 90% done in a kit.

So what can you do to insure that you are not one of twenty crafters all selling virtually the same things at the same show? To be honest; not much. There are a few options that will improve your odds and your potential for sales.

Be The Very Best You Can Be:

 Sounds dumb, huh? Of course you are trying to be the best artist you can be! But are you being the very best salesman you can? Are you being the very best art fair participant you can? It is up to you to work hard on making your booth or displays as attractive as possible not only to your customers, but also to the show promoter. They want a nice attractive show. You want sales. Work on that display, improving it constantly. Keep your area clean. Stash the packing materials under a table. Toss the half a pizza. Be a professional. Do you spend a lot of time sitting in a chair talking on your cell with your SO, kids, BFF or anyone else? Hang up and pay attention to your customers, they probably will not interrupt you to pay for that $100.00 doodad - they will go buy something else. They will probably never come back. Same goes for the laptop, book or radio. Tune out of the distractions and tune in to your customers. Do not, however, get so tuned in that you keep them standing there, eyes glazing over while their pal looks pointedly at their watch while you babble on and on about whatever. Chat briefly and sincerely and know when to end it. Be a professional.

Do only well-juried shows:

 A juried show is one where the artisan submits examples of their work in the form of photographs (used to be slides, but now it's usually a digital portfolio) to the show committee and a panel of jurists examine the work and choose the best examples of each category for inclusion in the show. This system has a lot of advantages for the artist. It insures that you will be, if not the only felted hat seller; at least you will be one of a select few with similar items. Rarely will a competent promoter allow two identical items into a show unless it is a huge show.

 Jurying also instills confidence in the buying public. They will look forward to going to such a show because the ads have touted it as an exclusive, high quality selection of wares that are pre-screened for quality and variety. People value their time and will be more likely to go to a show they perceive as being worth that time.

Do only shows that limit categories:

 No artist wants to set up at a show that has 30 potters. Especially not if they are also a potter! With too many similar styles of craft, the buyers get too involved in comparison shopping, going from booth to booth trying to decide which bowl they love the best and end up getting confused and frustrated. Ever stood in a video store trying to pick a movie? Way too much variety is overwhelming! More often than not this ends with the customer eventually just giving up and buying nothing. Having a limited selection of very high quality goods from which to choose simplifies the buying decision and makes that purchase much more likely.

Stick to Arts Fairs:

 This means that if you want to sell your arts you must sell it at art fairs. The broad category shows are death on sales. These are the shows that let in anyone who has a product to sell. I have said it before but it bears repeating: If there are vendors selling goods they bought at wholesale, or selling Avon, Mary Kay or Tupperware (or any of the "Home Party" goods) then it is NOT an Arts Fair. It is a flea market and you will rarely see a serious buyer wandering around looking to invest in a one of a kind antler carving or unique piece of handwork. Leave the flea market scene to the re-sellers. You are an artist.

 These tactics are all proven ways to increase your sales potential. Keep in mind that you also must be prepared to cry "Foul!" if a show producer fails to live up to their end of the deal. If you book into a show that is promoted as juried, with no buy/sell goods allowed and then you set up only to find yourself next to a guy with silk shirts from India - go find the promoter and say something! Always make certain you have a contract and bring that contract with you the day of the show. The terms in that contract are binding not just on you, but also on the producers. It is their job to tell Mr. Silk Shirts to pack it up.

 If the producers do not live up to their end of the deal then you are completely justified in packing up and leaving or asking for a portion of your fees back. They misrepresented their show to all of the artists and that costs each artist money. Money that most artists do not have to waste. Stick to your end of that contract and hold your show producers to their end of it as well.

Good luck and Happy Selling!

Targeting your market

 Figuring out who your target market is will be one of the most important steps in your initial planning. This target market encompasses two groups - the vendors and the buyers.

Visitors peruse works of art amid the sights and sounds of the Las Vegas Arts District,
which lies along the Las Vegas Strip. Public domain. Las Vegas City Files Courtesy ByWays.org

 For your research to pay off you must first decide what sort of show you intend to produce. Lets try an example: You want to produce an upscale juried arts and crafts fair.

 Your target vendor segment is hand-crafted items and artworks of a fairly high quality produced by experienced craftspeople. You will be very selective about who you accept and will limit your categories so as to not have a glut of any type of goods.

 Your target buying segment is the reasonably affluent customer who appreciates quality, is looking for unique handcrafted items and has money to spend.

 A suitable venue for this market could be either an outdoor or indoor space, but it needs to be a nice space. A community center or well kept city park would work well. A large bare parking lot would not be a good choice. Atmosphere is everything. Make it a pleasant experience for all.

You can expand on the theme by targeting the Indie market. These artisans are on the cutting edge, producing fun, funky, usually recycled or "green" works and have an avid following especially in urban areas. They tend to charge a bit more for their work and they expect to pay a bit for good space at a well run show.College towns are excellent venues for this and if you can work with the student arts group and score space in the commons area - BINGO!

Another segment not to be ignored is the Primitive and Country crowd. While not as red hot as a few years ago they are still wildly popular with a dedicated following. This sort of show works well in almost any setting, but suburban markets are still pretty into this style.

In between these two styles is a whole world of variations. From the cutesy to the bizarre, from yard art made from recycled cars to hand thrown pottery one of the greatest things about a crafts fair is the magnificent diversity of artforms people come up with.

 One thing that should absolutely be avoided at all costs is having an "Arts Fair" or a "Crafters Fair" and then accepting any sort of buy/sell vendors. These include Avon, Mary Kay, Cookie Lee, Tupperware, et al. It also includes those who buy "handcrafts" from foreign countries and re-sell them as their own. Jury your shows and weed these all out. If you miss one and they show up, or have lied about their wares - remove them immediately with no refunds. Put it in the contract and enforce it. Allowing them is tantamount to lying - to your customers, your artisans and yourself. It is not a crafts fair nor an arts fair if the goods being sold are not made by the artisans selling them.

Selecting just the right mix for your intended market can be a daunting challenge, but it certainly is a beautiful lesson in the lush landscape of human creativity.

What makes a great show?

So what constitutes a great show? What makes one more memorable than another?

 Public domain photo (www.byways.org)

From the buying public's point of view maybe it is a lovely setting. Not many things are more pleasant than spending a warm summers day strolling along lines of clean, orderly and attractive booths, seeing beautiful items well displayed and chatting with friendly artisans who are selling their own wares. Not being jostled and pushed in a crush of people in too narrow aisles. Perhaps grabbing a bite to eat from the inviting, clean and well run food vendors, sitting down at a clean picnic table to enjoy your meal. No trash, no dust blowing up, plenty of shady places to sit on the green grass and rest a bit while enjoying the entertainment and clean, convenient restrooms - maybe they are only blue plastic portables, but at least they are clean. When it is time to leave you do not have too far to walk because the parking is nearby and getting out onto the highway is easy thanks to the courteous lot attendants who show you the way to the alternate exit.

Who wouldn't enjoy a day like that?

Did you notice how many times the word "clean" appeared in that narrative? It is amazing to me how many show producers fail that simple test. A trashy atmosphere casts an aura of seediness over even the best run show. Keep it clean. Hire high school kids to clean.

Now obviously that is a best case scenario. If anyone knows how to achieve that every time I would love to talk with them! The reality is somewhere nearer the middle simply because you cannot control everything it takes to create that ambiance - like the weather, for instance. Our idyllic scene will come off quite differently in a pouring rain or sudden windstorm. So we control what we can. Like the clean, for instance, no excuse for letting that one slip past you.

Everything mentioned above works for the vendors enjoyment, too. But they also appreciate having a full day before opening to set up (especially true at outdoor shows) and just love it that the space they contracted is exactly as promised.   They enjoy the time each morning to set up, to enjoy the coffee and donuts at the vendor hospitality tent and get ready for a great day of selling, trusting in the fact that the producer doesn't let the public in early.

Since many of them are working solo they genuinely are grateful that the producer was thoughtful enough to send around attendants who can spell them for lunch and potty breaks, or offer to get change or bring a bottle of water. When the last day comes they wait until closing to start tearing down as the contract says, and appreciate that the show ended well enough before dark to allow them to tear down in daylight. The squad of  polite, strong young helpers who offer to help load boxes, guide backing trailers and drop unwieldy tents is a nice touch, too.

Who wouldn't enjoy a day like that?