As promised, here are some pictures of my booth and a bit of a report on how Saturday went! First, we left around lunch time on Friday, which was a good thing--although the drive should have been no more than 90 minutes, the awful weather + Friday traffic (in which rush hour apparently starts at noon!) meant it was over 2 hours. That got us there right on time for the beginning of set-up--in fact, we were the second people to check in!
We were disappointed to learn that the dollies that had been promised for unloading did not exist (the email said there would only be a few, but since we were so early we figured we were safe--no, it turns out a few = zero). Luckily we had packaged most things in to relatively easy to carry loads, and yarn & fiber are not very dense. But even with an elevator, it was a lot of trips to and from the car before we got everything out:
I was a bit upset when I arrived, because the booth space was slightly smaller than what I was promised (by maybe about a foot in each direction). I think this is due to the unusual space that we were using--essentially, a very wide hallway, in which we had to avoid blocking doorways, etc. There probably wasn't much the organizers could have done about it, and maybe they didn't know in advance--but hopefully in the future they'll make it clear that booth sizes are approximate and depend on the location.
I didn't have a tremendous amount of merchandise (it seemed like a lot to me, of course, but not compared to some of the large yarn shops that were there!), so in the end the extra space didn't make a big difference. We were pretty well organized, but had made one last minute change in how we wanted to display things that slowed us down (I had to cut plastic ties off one of the fixtures so we could re-arrange it, and I only had regular scissors which made it a VERY slow task!). Even with that, and the very slow process of hauling everything up by hand, in a little over three hours we had this:
I love my new gridwall with the hooks--in fact, I plan to buy a few more hooks next week (there is a new supplier in Kitchener, but he doesn't have the hooks in white, so I have to get them in London!):
This is the cube structure which was so time consuming to set up (because of a change of plans):
We realized a few minutes into the show that it wasn't attracting enough attention, so we turned it an an angle to catch a few more eyes and suddenly it was mobbed! (Unfortunately, we were so busy at that point that we didn't get to take any more pictures, so you can't see it on the angle.)
On the table we put display items, baskets of handspun and naturally dyed yarns, and bins containing kits:
I will definitely be doing more types of kits in the future (both spinning samples and project kits like the mittens). A lot of shoppers were much more likely to buy if there was a pattern that they knew they could make with their yarn, so it's time to put on the design hat and see what I can come up with. I'm thinking a few new scarf patterns for fall will make the booth an even bigger hit at the Knitter's Fair!
Which reminds me...I need to get my forms in for that, and start planning my orders with my suppliers. While I was looking forward to some recovery time this week, the show went so well that I now have a lot of new work to do! I think I will soon be filling some wholesale orders for yarn shops that are now interested in carrying my goods, and the Etsy shop needs to be restocked. And since I'm almost out of undyed yarn here, I need to restock on that! Also, I need to add new yarns to the website, among other updates. No rest for the weary, but since it means success I guess I'll take it. :-)
It was nice to meet many of you at the Frolic, and a huge thanks to the knitters of the Uptown Knit Mob for test knitting several yarns and giving me samples to put out. I know your work sold several skeins and kits for me!
We were disappointed to learn that the dollies that had been promised for unloading did not exist (the email said there would only be a few, but since we were so early we figured we were safe--no, it turns out a few = zero). Luckily we had packaged most things in to relatively easy to carry loads, and yarn & fiber are not very dense. But even with an elevator, it was a lot of trips to and from the car before we got everything out:
I was a bit upset when I arrived, because the booth space was slightly smaller than what I was promised (by maybe about a foot in each direction). I think this is due to the unusual space that we were using--essentially, a very wide hallway, in which we had to avoid blocking doorways, etc. There probably wasn't much the organizers could have done about it, and maybe they didn't know in advance--but hopefully in the future they'll make it clear that booth sizes are approximate and depend on the location.
I didn't have a tremendous amount of merchandise (it seemed like a lot to me, of course, but not compared to some of the large yarn shops that were there!), so in the end the extra space didn't make a big difference. We were pretty well organized, but had made one last minute change in how we wanted to display things that slowed us down (I had to cut plastic ties off one of the fixtures so we could re-arrange it, and I only had regular scissors which made it a VERY slow task!). Even with that, and the very slow process of hauling everything up by hand, in a little over three hours we had this:
I love my new gridwall with the hooks--in fact, I plan to buy a few more hooks next week (there is a new supplier in Kitchener, but he doesn't have the hooks in white, so I have to get them in London!):
This is the cube structure which was so time consuming to set up (because of a change of plans):
We realized a few minutes into the show that it wasn't attracting enough attention, so we turned it an an angle to catch a few more eyes and suddenly it was mobbed! (Unfortunately, we were so busy at that point that we didn't get to take any more pictures, so you can't see it on the angle.)
On the table we put display items, baskets of handspun and naturally dyed yarns, and bins containing kits:
I will definitely be doing more types of kits in the future (both spinning samples and project kits like the mittens). A lot of shoppers were much more likely to buy if there was a pattern that they knew they could make with their yarn, so it's time to put on the design hat and see what I can come up with. I'm thinking a few new scarf patterns for fall will make the booth an even bigger hit at the Knitter's Fair!
Which reminds me...I need to get my forms in for that, and start planning my orders with my suppliers. While I was looking forward to some recovery time this week, the show went so well that I now have a lot of new work to do! I think I will soon be filling some wholesale orders for yarn shops that are now interested in carrying my goods, and the Etsy shop needs to be restocked. And since I'm almost out of undyed yarn here, I need to restock on that! Also, I need to add new yarns to the website, among other updates. No rest for the weary, but since it means success I guess I'll take it. :-)
It was nice to meet many of you at the Frolic, and a huge thanks to the knitters of the Uptown Knit Mob for test knitting several yarns and giving me samples to put out. I know your work sold several skeins and kits for me!
Comments
BTW, I totally forgot about that shawlette you had - that would be a great pattern to offer!