Has anyone been doing Craft Shows?

Good luck, Jill. Hope you do real well. Please keep us posted. carolbee

Thanks to both of you!

Your Easter table runner is so cute...I'd be willing to bet those will find a new home quickly! Very well done! I just received an email from a friend who did a show yesterday and she said the show was swamped for about 4 hours. It seemed everyone who vended there did good...so that's a good sign for upcoming shows! Best of luck to you next weekend and say goodbye to that table runner, someone will see it and say "I got to have that"! Thanks for your response!

I was wondering about doing shows right now myself. I think I'll do okay at my show next weekend because the fees are small. I'm already a member of the sea glass collector's site and love the info and stories that everyone shares... I sometimes spend hours reading the stories : ) Thanks for your response!

Ohh great I will be looking for you on the sea glass forum . Good luck at the craft show !!

I'll be adding a couple new piece of jewelry to my photos later today. An aqua/cornflower heart-shaped piece and a wire wrapped red sea glass necklace.

Our daughter is enjoying my crafts as well. I made her a set of 8 coasters, mug rugs, and they use them all the time. The fact they are also washable is a good selling point. And people do love handmade gifts and believe they would prefer to buy handmade items vs. store bought. For now, I will continue to make stock and see how it goes. Thanks.

I hope refunds and the stimulus helps to spark the economy somewhat. I've noticed quite a few people that have chosen to buy handmade items, say they trust handmade more than the items of big corporations and I don't blame them. The lack of quality control, costing people here their jobs when they sent the work overseas and the lack of quality control has left a bad taste in the mouths of many of their customers. We bought our youngest son some beautiful handmade cars and trains for the holidays and his birthday. They are just beautiful and he has taken very good care of them so far...maybe as he gets older he'll display them in his room...they are that nice! Sorry to hear your not doing shows this year, but as much of a compliment it is to sell a handmade item to someone, it's probably far more satisfying to watch your granddaughter enjoy them ! Thanks for participating and best wishes to you!

I really started off on Etsy with knitted items. I opened my shop in the month of August (almost 2 years ago) and quickly realized that I wasn't going to sell many scarves when it was 90+ degrees everyday. So I tried my hand at making jewelry and since I've been a sea glass collector for many, many years, I eventually incorporated my sea glass into jewelry creations. I started crafting when i was a child. My parents were quite suppotive of my artistic side and my first "real" job was at a boutique. I was encouraged to make tie-dye shirts for the summer crowds and also made some inexpensive jewelry. Eventually that job came to an end when I needed benefits for me and my first child and my crafting was limited to fun projects at home. A couple of years ago, I started knitting during my lunch hour at work. I was knitting scarves to give as holiday gifts and birthdays (by request from my sister and sister-in-laws) and everyone at work began knitting...lol. One of my supervisors, showed me an article about this site where people buy and sell handmade items. It turned out to be Etsy and well, the rest is history...as they say : )! Thanks for your response!

You sound so much like me... I don't have the confidence it takes. I make beaded jewelery and it's sooo much fun. I'm going to try a craft fair again this year - a local one at a church in our area. I tried last April too and was crushed when nothing sold but I didn't know enough to find out if there were many other people selling the same items (there were 15) but I know better now. I have a few pieces on Etsy, no nibbles yet - perhaps you should try too. The price to set up a store it is certainly easy enough to handle and it's fun too.

Thank you so much! I really wanted to keep it for myself, but I do have another piece that is similar (but not quite as perfect)that I plan on keeping for me. I'm not sure what to make of this show, but at $20 for the table fee, it can't be too bad and I know a few of the vendors, so it'll be fun to "hang" out with them. Thanks for your response!!

Good luck with your craft shows. You will have to fill us in on how it goes! I would think small priced items would sell best. Seems people want to buy but conservatively. THey might spend a little more if they have their taxes done and back but in the past when I sold crafts it seems slow until past tax time. I havent done any shows in awhile now. I just do some store consignment now.

I've heard quite a bit of mixed reviews from local crafters and the shows have really been hit or miss. It hasn't mattered if the weather was great or not so good, or a new show/long-time show...so it's been very hard to figure. Because of this, I'm not doing any spring shows (other than next weekend's show...which is run by a fellow crafter and has a tiny table fee) instead I'll wait until the summer shows and the summer crowds. I'd love to hear how the local show does...I wish we had a weekly show around here. Thanks for your response!

I know exactly what you mean. We've cut back and know so many people that have cut way back as they just try to keep their heads above water (so to speak) I do hope it gets easier for you and everyone else that is struggling in this economy. Because I was in the area (and there was no admission), I attended a couple shows recently, just to get out of the house and to try to feel out how/if people were spending. Talking to some of the vendors leads me to believe people are starting to begin spending. Unfortunately, I wasn't one of the people spending money that day. My show this coming weekend was a last minute addition to my craft show schedule. I canceled three shows that I normally do between Valentine's Day and Easter because of the economy. This economy has not only hurt the spending, but more people are selling items at craft shows...so the supply far outweighs the demand. Hopefully everyone can begin doing some of the fun things again.

I know what you mean! My J-0-B has kept me from spending a lot of time at my crafting table and myLot recently. I'm trying to force myself to visit here more often. After feeling a little burnt-out after the holiday shows, it feels good to spend some extended time at my crafting table. For me it's very therapeutic... and I'm so looking forward to taking a fine silver jewelry class next month. It's funny how a couple of rough months at the JOB, can remove that burnt-out feeling and make crafting something to look forward to again! Thanks for responding and welcome back!!

Oh wow, I was thinking about going to the show. I'm only about 45-60 minutes away from Philly! I'm glad that your friend did well, I've been told the show is quite competitive and I wanted to go and see how it is before considering for next year... (but I had a meeting with a place that wants me to display my sea glass jewelry in their gift shop...so I couldn't make it) I'm lucky because there aren't a lot of jewelry makers that specialize in sea glass jewelry in my area. Most of the time that I have found another seller, they tend to have a mixture of authentic sea glass and craft glass that they try to pass off as sea glass and when palced side by side it's easy to tell that one or the other isn't real. I've found that I'm probably one of the lowest priced shops on the internet when it comes to selling authentic sea glass jewelry and I often drop my prices a bit on many items for a craft show. Thanks for the good news about last weekend's show and thanks for responding!