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Ok, with all of the home and garden shows, craft fairs, etc, it would be nice if we put our heads together to figure out what sells... where... when and why.
I can tell you garden benches and chairs sell pretty good at a garden show. Jewelry boxes.... not so much.
Al has his tourist clocks and firedepartment stuff, what is your best seller and when? Lets help out the new guys and everyone else.
Wine Racks and Custom Signs....
The wine rack works as a CD and Book rack too, turn the rails upside down.
I got a lot of request for different width wine racks and made 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,..... bottle rails. Shrink wrap them with the wedges and all they need to do is pick out sides.
The wine rack pattern is in the pattern thread.
AL
Might kind of depend on what part of the country you are in. Just a guess on that. But I know I have not had much luck in the small town that we are in. But it is not a tourist type of town so there is not much traffic. And I think this economy has some areas hurting more then others.
I'm one of the new guys Terry mentioned, I'm very interested to see the responses here.
Oldjoe makes a good point about locations differing. But even a discussion about most popular price range would be helpful as well. A 50 dollar moose sign may not sell in a particular area, but a 50 dollar something else may.
As a side note: I really like the bear pattern I bought Terry!
Terry, I have a sign shop and I have never did well at Home and Garden shows. Even making the signs on the spot, then last year I tried a Christmas craft fair with wildlife type signs and that was a bust.Quote:
Originally Posted by TerryT
I do pretty good at county fairs, but remember I hand route my signs and use my CW and make the signs on the spot. But I have seen inside various sellers of woodworks.
One seller sold very cool wooden jets, WWII planes, trains etc. and must do well. Then I know of a seller who makes corian cutting boards just plain without and design. My Dad makes redwood wishing wells and planters, bridges, wheel barrels. He does better at co. fairs and ok at H & G shows.
I know to get the impulsive buyer it needs to be priced right and if it is a large item offer to hold the item until they are ready to leave. Plus offer to carry the item out to their vehicle.
Have you tried little signs with the cute sayings? I know my Mom buys them all the time. Another ideal I have a sign the shape of a bread/ cutting board with sayings carved into the board. I.E. Mom's Kitchen, what you see is what you get!
Anyway maybe a couple of those ideals may help?
Ike
Price is every thing, you need $5, items up to $125 items also.
The type of shows or festival matters. In Lousisana the festivals are divided into food and crafts. Some of the crafts shows states all items have to be hand made and they come inspect the items or they request pictures of the items and some approve them ahead of time. Food festivals tend to draw people to eat, dance and drink and don't do much looking at crafts.
The area matters too, some areas offer different type of people that attend the shows. The protected shows also have anywhere from 1000 to 4000 people on a weekend that are looking to buy special or seasonal item, Thanksgivings, Christmas, 4 th. of July or unique items.
My first craft show was all hand made items, 70 vendors, and no one had custom carved items such as I had. I passed out a lot of cards and got some business from those cards and sold a lot of items.
Location in the festival is important too. I happen to get an area that was off to the side and people could not just walk by my booth. They had to come to my booth in order to see what I had to offer. I had a large sign "Custom Carvings", that drew the crowd.
The uniqueness of my items and material that I used to create these items was a draw. When they found out I used Corian counter material, for my coasters and plaques, their instrest was raised. In my neck of the woods Cypress of any kind is a big draw also.
Sometimes it's the luck of the draw, in one show hardly anybody showd up and vendors were upset and wanted half their booth price returned.
I will keep trying until the end of the year and maybe try again next year.
just my input on the subject
Myshop1044
The first year I had my carver, I did a couple of simple 5.5" x 12" Cedar signs for our Camper -- nothing special just our family name in an oval plus a couple Pine trees.
A few folks stopped at our camp site and asked where we got the signs, I explained to them that I made them myself, and they asked how much I would charge to make signs for their campers, I told them $25.00 plus $8.00 for materials and mailing cost, I told them I would carve and send them out when I got Home.
I sold 8 that weekend to other campers plus 6 to the Camp Ground maneger with the name of the campGround on the them for the camp store.
It's been about the same each time we've gone camping for the last 3 years, even a few follow up orders from the camp managers.
last year I started carrying a photo album of signs with several styles and graphics with us when ever we went camping.
It often pays for our campsite and some of our camping supplies, --- Just in the right place at the right time I guess :wink: