Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Sparkle and Charm goes to the Craft Fair

The craft fair on Saturday was a success! It was not a great success for my friend who makes jewelry, and had a table across the room from me. But, people like the necklaces and earrings I make, and I sold as much as I could have expected to, and was very pleased. I had set my goal high for this one, and realized afterwards that I didn't even have enough inventry to meet that high goal. I sold at least 10 necklace and pairs of earrings, and people liked the beaded gold swirl ribbon bookmarks too. Some of my items I marked down at the end of the day, and that was fine too.

Craft fairs are not really all about the vendors. They are really all about getting the customers to come in a shop, but organizers don't know that yet. I think they put so much effort into the vendor side of things, that advertising gets second place and the crowds that we expected at this recent fair never materialized.

I have a lot of fun talking to everyone. Lots of people stop to stare at my necklaces, since they have never seen anything like them before. Then I tell them how they are made, and some people move on, and others love them too and want to buy one or two. I have even had some teenage girls buy them, which REALLY pleases me, since they are very sophisticated shoppers these days.

After the fair, George and I packed up the lamps, tables, cloths, inventory that was left, and baskets, and went home to a pizza and bedtime at 8:30 p.m. We were exhausted and happy. A good day.