Does anyone else sell at craft fairs?

[carrotsandcelery]

If you do or have in the past, what can you tell me about your experiences?

Did you enjoy it?

Did you sell much through them?

How did you display your crafts?

What advice would you give?

I have been given the opportunity to share (take a corner of) a table at local craft fairs and need to know as much as I can before I go if I go.

I've done 2 craft fairs and can't say I would rush to do more.

I have my own website and sell through Etsy, Folksy and WowThankYou.

First of all you need PL insurance (I paid £78 for 12 months), you need this anyway if you sell hand made goods.

You need to get there early to set your stall up and some fairs ask you not to pack up and leave before a certain time, so its a long day.

Is it inside or outside? You need to be prepared for the weather if its outside.

I used a white sheet to cover the stall,
put home made bunting across the front,
printed some A5 'flyers' with my website details,
bought some small brown paper carriers bags off ebay.
Displayed in wicker baskets and perspex dishes I have collected over the years.

It is a good way to meet and network with other makers/sellers and a lot of people like these events and you can tell straight away who the seasoned stall holders are.

I know we should all support craft fairs and local shops and I love nothing more than going to a summer show, craft fair or farmers market but standing there for hours on end isn't for me and you have to be prepared for comments such as 'I could make that myself cheaper'.

I did one at the beginning of last December, I left the house at 8.30am, got back at 5pm, the journey was 10 miles each way and the stall fee was £8. I took £38, so, minus the petrol and the stall fee didn't make much for a full days work. The weather was atrocious and this put people off from attending. All my remaining stock I put on ebay at fixed prices and sold it all the following week for approx £150.

Having read all this back, I'm sorry if I'm coming across as negative.

You should do it for the experience, you might enjoy it and want to do more, in which case you can start booking up for the months ahead, or, you might think, 'no, its not for me'.

teanosugar thanks for your reply and your honesty.

As a further question, what do you make/sell and how did you attract attention to it on the websites?

How do you get yourself noticed on etsy and folksy? There seems to be so much out there.

I have three sides to my business,
one is making and selling personalised cushions and other keepsake gifts and one is selling craft tools and accessories.

I have noticed, and this is pointed out on the Etsy forums, that the more items you have in your shop the further up the searches you go.

I find Etsy easier than Folksy and have had way more sales on there, although there has been an increase in Folksy sales in the last few months.

I would say that all my Folksy sales have been to the UK, all my website sales have been to the UK but my Etsy sales have been all over the world ( a lot to USA, Germany, Spain, Australia, Argentina, France, Hungary).

My website has the slowest of the three to take off as you have to get it found on the search engines, work on your meta tags, get links, submit to directories.

You have to network online, ie, join teams on etsy, twitter, FB, pinterest, blogs, forums etc.

You have to make sure your photographs are 'bright' and uncluttered ( I cant tell you have many times I have retaken photos and edited them).

Join UKhandmade and/or Creative Connections to get help and advice, they are both free and you get a page to customise for yourself and upload your photos and websites.

Sign up to Vistaprint and wait until they send you emails with free offers, you can get flyers, banners, labels, business cards etc and only pay minimum postage.

I got friendly with the people in the post office and the local craft shop, wool shop and fabric shop and they put a flyer up for me and a small stack of my business cards on the side.

Every time I send an order out I include a business card which has details of all my websites.

Look at sites like WowThankYou, where you have to apply to sell with them and send pics of your items before they accept you, I paid £35 joining fee and they take 10% commission on every sale, but they advertise on the web and in major magazines.

My third stream of income which will take the most work at first but will then be a passive form of income is adwords based on my websites.

So, hope fully, if you've managed to read to the end of this without getting bored I've given you some useful tips.

Good Luck! (I don't mind if you've got other questions)

Wow! teanosugar you certainly have a business plan!

Thank you for all the info. I have read it through but I suspect I will have to go back and absorb it step by step.

From what you have said it sounds like Etsy is the best place to start and that I will do better on Etsy if I can list lots of items.

I had better get going and build up a stock then!