I recently agreed to do an event having been told it was to raise money for a school. The lady complimented me on my stall and told me that other than one other trader selling beads for jewellery making, mine would be the only jewellery & scarf stall. I was happy to hear this because I knew the venue would be small and footfall not likely to be huge.
So after a full day at market, I packed up and loaded my van (which takes a couple of hours), went and had a hot chocolate and a break for an hour then drove 5 miles on top of the 40 minutes it took me to get to market that morning to the event down dark, unfamiliar lanes.
Once there, I unpacked my boxes once again and created the best display I could in the space given. After a while another lady arrived next to me and started to unpack her...jewellery and scarves! As it happened she turned out be lovely and we passed a pleasant enough evening sharing our experiences of trading but the whole point of us being there, to do business, make some money for our efforts, got lost.
There would have been no point in asking to move, I had already spent over an hour setting up, and the venue wasn't big enough to make any difference. The lady next to me also happened to sell handbags (very nice ones too) but when she looked up, another lady selling handbags was setting up opposite!
A friend of mine who sells beautiful chocolates and sweets had a stall in the next room and told me she had also been told she would be the only seller of this kind at this event. Another trader lied to, I wonder how many were.
Now it doesn't feel quite right to ask for pitch money back when the event is for fund raising for a delightful little school and it would even seem meaner to have demanded back the raffle prize. So on the day, we all ended up over a barrel so to speak.
The organiser proudly informed me they'd had around 70 people through the door. Hardly enough to go round really and certainly not enough to validate my efforts (or those of my friend who had worked at her shop all day) at a 15 hour day. I finally arrived home at 10.30pm.
The lady selling scarves and jewellery next to me told me about an event she had attended at the Forum where the organiser had merely placed a small box advertisement in the EDP to promote it. Of course it ended up very poorly attended.
So please organisers, don't lie to traders to get them to an event, be honest! Make sure traders have enough space to do a proper display, and I can't emphasise this enough PROMOTE YOUR EVENT FOR MONTHS IN ADVANCE!!!
Even with a small budget there is so much you can do, Facebook and Twitter are free, get posters created (easy enough on a computer) and put them everywhere you can think of, talk to local radio and get mentioned, ask traders to give out leaflets and promote via their social networking, put up road signs. Be inventive, you'll raise much more money that way! Otherwise, you won't have so many traders at your event next time, I for one don't repeat disasters!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
I have experienced the same thing quite a lot over the past year and it seems to be getting worse not better. Many people are seeing that it is a good way to make money for the charity in question, but not considering that the trader's DO need to make a living. Advertising is key to any event and organisers should not just assume that traders have the energy or backing to support poorly managed events. I know its bad cop, but I would demand a refund. After all you were there as a result of being told that your stall was the only jewellry stall! Bet there were a few cupcake stalls!!
Couldn't agree more, there's nothing worse than seeing your hard work go to waste. I attended a market recently to see 6 (yes six) cake stalls. Each one must have sold one or two at most. And with a pitch fee of £10, plus again a raffle prize, they'd made a huge loss, plus having to bake goods especially for the even that would then have to go waste.
All because the organiser was poorly prepared, and possibly a bit greedy.
Needless to say, next market = no cake stalls.
It's such a shame and I hear the same complaints over and over again. At large events I don't have a problem with other similar stalls but is impossible at small ones.
It does seem that some people have no perception of how hard traders work, people are so shocked when I tell them it takes 3-4 hours to set up stall.
If I have a bad day at market, I don't like it but I can understand that's the way business goes (though markets aren't well promoted either.)
In truth some events are doomed to fail anyhow because of various factors on the day but lack of promotion and poor planning is inexcusable!
It must be said that such fairs were so rare some 3 or 4 years ago. Nowadays, not a week goes by to see that there is yet another good charity to benefit from the profits of a pamper evening, craft fair or similar.
From my experience, it is best to have a few of them rather than many - in this case there are not much competition somewhere else and, of course, attendance to the venue will be much higher.
If truth be told, I got tired of doing fairs and found that it is best to stay away for a while. I do not do so many fairs nowadays and when I do, I try to check how many are happening on the same day...
The organiser in question should have put her (his) shame hat on and say "OK, I have done wrong and here is your money back".
Hopefully your post will circulate on the internet and make other people aware.
Thanks for sharing!
Post a Comment