My Craft Show Experience
VIDEO:
I did a craft show recently at a local brewery, and I wanted to share just how it went for me. Watch the video and follow along with what my experience was below:
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BACKGROUND:
A little background for this craft show that I did. A friend approached me saying that they were going to do this craft show at a local brewery and wondered if I would like to go in with them for a double booth. I said, “Let’s do it,” and then started making stuff in the background for about a month.
Here is my experience with it and some of the things I would do again and would not do again.
MINDSET:
There is always this weird balance of having enough stuff to sell at your show and making too many things. Then, you end up with stuff leftover that you have to try to sell elsewhere, which is what happened to me. I think that is actually the better position to be in, rather than having too little stuff to sell. I just made way, way too much.
Ahead of time, you need to determine how you will take payments. There are quite a few options out there such as Venmo, PayPal, Square, Stripe and I’m sure others I don’t even know about. Most of those have code generators that will generate a QR code with your info embedded in it. That way, the customer can just scan the code and they’re ready to pay. That’s quite easy. You may want to have some of those QR codes printed out around your booth so it is easy for your customers to pay you. The easier you can make a sale, the more likely it’ll happen. Although I found it a less likely payment option, you need to prepare for cash payments. You’ll need some small bills to be able to make change for people.
To guide what types of products I would make, I wanted to focus on things I could make relatively quickly or automate. Also, I wanted to have as little money in the material as possible. This would allow me to sell things at a lower price point (hopefully selling more this way) and still being profitable.
One final thought was I wanted items in many different price ranges. You know that more people will gravitate toward the lower priced items, but you still need to have items at a range of prices, because you never know when someone will just see something they must have.
HOW TO PRICE YOUR ITEMS:
Even with inflation and shifting prices, I feel like people are pretty comfortable spending $20 or under at craft shows or events. And if you can keep items under $10, and they even remotely like something, they’re pretty likely to pick them up. That’s my philosophy anyway.
I don’t know what you charge for your labor, but it would do you well if you sell things you make to come up with a day rate or hourly rate for your labor. Your time is not free, and your pricing needs to reflect that. That being said, we also live in reality and the market will bear what it will bear. There are some things you just cannot make your ideal margin on, and maybe if you’re not happy with that on a particular item, you just don’t make and sell that item. I have had many products over the years that have sold a little, and some people comment about things I’ve made saying, “Oh, you should sell those.” I made a conscious decision not to make and sell them any longer, because the market will not bear the price it would take for me to be happy making them. Hopefully, that makes sense. For instance, years ago, I made these double decker salt cellars. They were beautiful, but they took so long to make. I would have to sell each one for probably over $150 to make it worth my time with how much labor I had in them. There’s no way these would sell for that, therefore, I don’t make and sell them any longer. They’re just not a viable product for me.
Another method for pricing your work is the cost of materials times 3 plus about 30% for overhead (blades, electricity, etc). That can get you really close to a good margin on many things.
SETTING UP FOR THE SHOW:
I was way behind getting setup for this show. Luckily, I was sharing a double booth with some friends, so they were already there. That was just poor management on my part for trying to get too many things done in too little time. Get there early and setup.
If you’re doing an outside craft show, it might be a good idea to have a canopy. If you’re not sure if you’ll do a bunch of these and you don’t have a canopy, I would not spend the money on one. You might not even make that money back.
It’s always good to have some water on hand and camp chairs or stools so that you can rest. Some of these shows go on for hours and it can be really draining. Obviously, you need tables and stuff on which to display your items. Some craft shows will have stuff there for you to use like tables and displays, but many I’ve seen, you have to bring your own.
If you have some really small items like the bottle openers that I made, it’s a good idea to have some bowls or baskets to house them. I had some of these really cool, old porcelain bowls handed down from my grandparents, so I think they added a nice element to the look of the booth.
ITEMS I MADE:
What sort of items did I make for the craft show? As I mentioned earlier…too many. I made all the things. Ha
I made a giant bowl full of bottle openers. These are cool little items that I sold at a pretty cheap price point, $6 or 2 for $10, and they were almost entirely made from scraps that I couldn’t do much of anything else with. So, my material cost was just about nothing on those. I just had a bit of labor in them, and by batching out different actions with them, I was able to spread that labor pretty far.
I made a different variation of the Clean/Dirty dishwasher signs that you might have seen. My buddy, Drew from Fisher’s Shop, made a video about one years ago, and I always thought that would be a cool product to sell if I could make the numbers work. By the way, if you don’t know, I have a podcast with Drew and my other friend, Mark from Gunflintdesigns, called We Built A Thing. It’s in it’s 4th year and it’s a ton of fun. It’s a casual conversation about all the things we’re making and working on. I’d love it if you would check it out the next time you’re looking for a podcast. The dishwasher signs were pretty fancy being made from spalted white oak and then I put some thin leather on the back so they wouldn’t scratch the dishwasher.
I made some charcuterie recipe boards. Two different charcuterie styles of serving boards with 7 different recipes and different species of wood. The back side was left blank so it could be used to put out a nice charcuterie spread for entertaining, and then the recipe could be displayed when not in use.
I also had some smaller cutting boards that I laser engraved a kitchen measurement cheat sheet onto one side. You know, how many cups are in this…how many teaspoons are in this. That kind of thing.
I made some oil and bread boards. These were cutting boards, but a bit longer than some of the others. I carved a recess in them in one corner so these cool geometric ramekins would fit down in there. They were made to serve some fresh bread and oil to dip the bread in.
I made these really large, live-edge serving boards out of some highly figured cherry. I published a video recently about making those, so be sure to check it out. I’ll have a link in the description to that video. On that note, I wanted to say a huge thank you to all of those who commented on that video. I’m doing this craft show video because of the overwhelming feedback in the comment section of that video. I asked if I should tell about my craft show experience, and you said yes, so here I am.
I turned some farmhouse candlesticks on the lathe that then got painted and distressed a bit. Those turned out pretty good, being just made from a few 2x4’s. They didn’t sell really well at this particular show, but I thought they looked nice. I’ll have a video out in the near future about making those. They’re dead simple and a pretty fun DIY decor thing…especially if you’re not trying to make a ton of them for a craft show. Ha ha
I had some Santa Boards…a large serving board with a graphic laser engraved in it for a cookie and milk to be placed on it on Christmas Eve for Santa, and even a spot for a carrot for Rudolph.
I had some carved farmhouse signs for the kitchen and bathroom. This was an attempt to use up some scraps of hardwood that really didn’t have another use. I just can’t seem to throw some things away. A couple of them were made from reclaimed barnwood and a couple of them were from scrap walnut. Yes, I painted walnut.
The live-edge serving boards were some of the items on the higher end. Also on that higher end were some large 12”x18” edge grain cutting boards and some large teardrop shaped cutting boards.
For some more small and inexpensive items, I had a few styles of ornaments to choose from with ribbons tied on them already. This show was late in October, so I figured people would already be out looking for some Christmas gifts. Not as much as I would have expected.
Finally, I had some kind of small, odd-sized cutting boards that I called “cocktail boards” for keeping on your bar and cutting garnishes and such.
You might be asking how I decided to make the items I did? Well, I tried to guess the audience of the craft show. It was being held at a local brewery, so I did think some of the things should be drink related. Thus, the bottle openers. (Even though this brewery only sells cans, I figured people would want the bottle openers for themselves or for gifts to others.) Also, I was thinking that those in attendance at a craft show at a local brewery might actually take pride in things made by someone there in their community. You know…small business and handmade and all that crap.
The reason I turned the candlesticks on the lathe and made the signs for kitchen, bathroom, dining room is just to have items in a different category other than the kitchen. Also, the ornaments strayed from the kitchen goods. Most of my items were very centered around the kitchen, but the few outliers gave people other options.
DESIGN:
For some of my items, I designed the files to actually make the thing or engrave them with graphics/sayings. For others, I just purchased designs. I’m not that great at digital design (I’m getting better all the time, but still find a lot of holes in my knowledge). If you’re feeling the same, don’t worry about it. Do the things you know how to do and look to outsource other stuff. Even though I know how to design some of the things that I laser engraved, it was just more efficient for me to source commercially available graphics to use and not spend my time doing that.
I had a conversation on Instagram recently with someone about craft shows. We were talking about items they should make for the one they’re doing coming up. They were mentioning something about wanting a laser engraver, but they didn’t have one yet and didn’t know if they would have one before the craft show. I told them to find someone to outsource the laser work to.
I’ve been making large cutting boards for Realtors for closing gifts for something like 7 years now, and for the first year and a half, while I waited on my first laser engraver to arrive, I found a local company that had a laser and negotiated a rate for them to do the engraving for me. I just outsourced it to them. Sure, it cost me more of my profit margin while doing that, but it got me the business. I could bring it in house at a later time and find those efficiencies, but don’t be afraid to seek out other businesses/makers in your area to help you make your product. They’ll probably jump at the chance to make some money for their small business, and it’ll help yours too.
SELLING STRATEGY:
This is going to sound simple, but when the crowd is starting to visit your booth and you’ve spent all of this time making things to sell, be ready to sell. You’ve got to work at it. You can’t just sit there and not talk to anyone. You could have the prettiest stuff, but people like to buy from people they like, so be likable. Speak to everyone who walks by. Just ask them how they’re doing. You’d be surprised how far that will go. When you see them looking for a price on something or looking at your price list, ask them if you could clarify anything for them. That conversation will likely turn into a sale.
I’ve worked a Comic Con with a friend selling things and at other craft shows I’ve done, it seems to work well to price things to move in multiples. $6 for one or two for $10. Give them a slight discount to purchase more product. We all see that with everything else we shop for…spend this amount and get free shipping. It works.
Toward the end of the show, wheel and deal. Make some deals and discount things more than you would at the beginning of the show so you don’t have as much to take home. For instance, I was selling some wooden jack-o-lanterns at this show and Halloween was about 8 days away. I knew my window for selling those was closing, so when someone was looking at them, I told her to make me an offer. She smiled, but didn’t offer anything. She didn’t want to offend me. I told her $35 for all of them and I’d walk them all to her car. The show was ending and I got rid of something that would have been unsellable in another week. Win win.
Pricing lists sitting around do help so people don’t have to ask about what something costs. Most people will just walk on rather than ask. That’s why I mentioned speaking up if you see someone looking at a pricing list and not saying anything.
MONEY:
I didn’t really know what to expect from this craft show, so I came prepared with some cash to make change for people. Decide how much you think you need to bring for this. I’ll tell more about it later, but I actually didn’t do that much in cash sales, even though I was prepared for it. Most of my sales were digital. I brought a few hundred dollars in 1’s, 5’s and 10’s, just to be sure.
How much money did I make?
$32 - in cash
$770.90 - Venmo
$852.90 - Total
BEST SELLING & WORST SELLING:
Which items sold best or worst for me, you ask? Well, I would say the Santa Boards sold the best. I brought 4 of those and sold 3.
Other good sellers were the bottle openers and the recipe boards.
Some of the worst sellers were the ornaments (maybe they weren’t in the Christmas spirit yet), the live edge serving boards and the teardrop boards. I did sell one of those teardrop boards, but I think I brought 9, so that’s not a great ratio.
CONCLUSION:
I think I might have made too many different items. You know how when you’re shopping for something, and there are just so many options that you kind of get paralysis looking at them all? I wonder if that was happening with my booth. There were just so many options that people were looking and looking and maybe just frozen in non-decision.
I wish I had made some stands to hold the cutting boards upright, making it easier for people to see what all I had. I had them sitting kind of vertically in some crates sory of like when you browse records, but I’m not sure that was the best way. You could probably have seen them better on some stands I’ve seen people make.
Don’t underestimate how long it will take to sand and finish your items. I had been making things kind of in the background and setting them aside until I could get to a later stage. The week of the craft show, it was hitting me just how much time I was going to have to spend in the final stages of all of the items. Just sanding alone took hours with the amount of stuff I had. I had to sand everything with 80 grit, then 120 and for the items that would see water contact like the serving boards, raise the grain with water and then do a final sanding at 220 grit. That was a ton of sanding!
I think I estimated that I worked about 90 hours the week of the craft show, just preparing all of the items. And I actually didn’t take everything I started…some coasters got left behind at the last minute.
Know how you’ll finish each item so you can know how high to sand them. For instance, the bottle openers and dishwasher signs were only sanded to 120 since I want spraying on a couple of coats of lacquer on them. That definitely saved a ton of time.
The reason I don’t do a lot of craft shows is that I don’t like a bunch of inventory hanging around that I have to try to sell. It takes up a lot of space and depending on how trendy the stuff is, you might hold onto it long enough that it won’t sell later. I wasn’t too worried about making too much stuff, because I have an Etsy shop where I sell stuff, as well as my website, and some local contacts that purchase gifts from me pretty regularly. Since the craft show, I have sold all 3 of the live edge serving boards, all the rest of the 120 ornaments, all of the bottle openers and a few other items. That’s a bonus! But if you don’t have those avenues open to you, maybe consider the quantity you make for your craft show and adjust accordingly.
