Victoria Baths 3

Sunday saw me at the third bi-annual Victoria Baths Art and Craft Fair. I can't believe it's been a whole year since my first fair!

Unfortunately, I can't say that it was as successful as the first one - it wasn't through lack of people, just lack of buyers. (Although I would be tempted to see if the correlation is related to my brother manning my stall with me the first time, as none of them have been as successful . . .)

Despite the cold, I still had a good day, albeit long and tiring (although that was mainly due to still recovering from my Newcastle trip in the week).

One thing that I did begin to think about was when I was on my Hiking Club's table at the Freshers' Fair back in September (so long ago . . . .). As I had experience running a stall, I was more than happy to lead and I loved every second of it. I had lost my voice by the end of the first day and then again by the end of the second from shouting over the crowds and talking practically none stop for the two days. 

But how is it that I was able to talk for Britain and get people to come over to our table and essentially 'sell' the club to them but I can barely say hello to people when I'm behind my table at a fair?

Surely it should be the same? I mean, hiking and card making are both things that I am passionate about, running a table is about engaging with the people browsing and at the end of the day I am trying to sell them something. I guess this is something that I need to work on . . . .

I've also been scolded by my friends for selling my cards too cheap. But that's for another time . . . 

Victoria Baths II

Sunday was my second time at Victoria Baths for their craft fair. Based on last November's fair, I was hoping for a good day, although my previous fair failures made me a little nervous. Then there was also the fact that the Manchester Day Parade was happening that same day. It could have gone either way.

After having a couple of extremely late nights previous to the fair, a coffee was in order Sunday morning. The sun was shining, I guess the birds were singing but Oxford Road is a bit noisy, and I was super organised and had packed the night before to be ready for the morning. I grabbed my coffee from the Cafe Nero around the corner from me and headed off to the baths.

I was on my own at the table this time and after battling with my (freshly ironed!) table cloth, I was ready to get my cards up on display. I found some make-your-own-bunting in The Works when I was stocking up and decided to give it a go. I've always liked the look of bunting and even considered getting some made but when I found this, it seemed only right that
1) I should make it myself and
2) With me being in the paper craft industry, it should be made of paper
The difficulty was deciding what paper to use!

It amazed me that 6 months ago, I half a table to display my good and this time around, I managed to fill the entire table! I though I would have some space to spare so that I could work on some crafts but it was not to be. I remembered to bring my portfolio of cards with me as well this time and had my shiny new business cards on display (full colour ones this time!)

Mid day came and the doors opened. For a while it seemed quiet and it was quite slow and I managed to make my friend's birthday card and another paper pieced picture but things started to pick up later on in the day.

A couple of friends came to see the fair and I think I sold more to them than anyone else but a sale is a sale!

Overall, it was a really good day and although not as successful as my first fair, definitely better than the other since then. I also picked up exactly where I need to improve - each fair is a learning experience and I am looking forward to the next on to work on my social skills. Speaking of learning, it was really interesting to look back at my first fair and see how far I have come. From not having a clue and my brother doing most (all!) of the talking to standing on my own and doing it by myself (although I could really benefit from his charisma!) 

Then

Now

Happy Birthday to me, Happy birthday to me . . . .

Can't believe its been twelve whole months since I walked into my JCR and self consciously set up my cards at my first ever stall. I had no idea how to go about setting it all up but excitement took over and I spent the whole evening stood behind the little table getting a buzz every time someone bought a card.

I've gained so much experience over the last year though I've still got so much to learn about running a business. My first craft fair was in November at the Victoria Baths so it seems appropriate that I got an e-mail about the two fairs coming up this year! Really looking forward to them.

As what seems to be a birthday present, I have just got an extra big order from one of the girls in my halls. She is a massive Man Utd fan and has requested what seems to be nearly the whole team! Looking forward to working on this project and I will make sure to post all about it - even if it means loosing some readers. 

Also, to celebrate, head on over to my Facebook page where I'm having a give-away. All you have to do is like my page and leave a comment under the status. I will be picking a name at random at the end of the day and . . .well, I'll let you find out what you could win!

There's Good Days and Bad Days . . .

Reflecting on the last couple of weeks bought to mind this Kaiser Chiefs song. I have had not one but two craft fairs in the last fortnight and as you can probably guess, one good and one not so good.


 Victoria Baths was my first fair and it was amazing. No, more than amazing. Words cannot describe how  awesome it was. 
I arrived at about 10:45am which gave me more than enough time to set up and meant I didn't have to hang around longer than I needed to in the cold cold baths (6 feet of cold air underneath you + glass roof + old victorian building - heating = absolutely freezing my tights off!) The fair officially started at 12pm and it got busy very quickly. My parents came all the way from home to visit the fair and they had to queue to get in. At 12:30!!!!
They found me as I was making a sale and I never really stopped making sales. My brother, who had been on a Young Enterprise team at school helped me to re-arrange my stall and to help draw customers in. He seemed to be taking over a bit although he denied everything but it did help so much as I had never really done this kind of thing before.
So, Jamie's top tips for running a stall:
1. Scatter business cards on the table, not just in a box - people are more likely to pick them up.
2. (For card makers) Don't leave all your cards in the box, spread a few out on the table. Apparently boxes scare people!
3. (Again for card makers) Put you best designs at the front of the box - this draws people in if they see something they like and would encourage them to delve deeper.
4. ENGAGE!!!! Jamie couldn't stress this one enough and if I didn't get in there quick and say hello to everyone that came within 5 ft of my stall, he would! Not only was I instructed to greet everyone, when every someone looked at my card-lympics, either me or him explained the story behind them.
5. Don't display all your stock at once. I had a lot of repeats so they went back in my bag for the time being. This reduced the number of cards on my stall and made it a bit less daunting to those having a browse.

Baring all these things in mind - and repeating myself quite a lot - I had a very successful day. I even sold a couple of my paper pieced pictures - Iron Man went to one of my fellow stall holders and Alice and the Cheshire Cat was sold so quickly! A man just came up and asked how much it was and bought it just like that. Then he bought half a dozen cards as well! Probably my best customer of the day.

So that was the good, and here is the bad.

If you have been on my Facebook page recently, you may have seen that I have been supporting a project called Tube Cubed. This is my university project at the moment and it's a pavilion that we are building for Dunham Massey's winter garden. We have been working on this for the last couple of weeks (hence why I haven't had much time to post). I offered my services as a card maker to try and raise some funds. This leads us onto my next craft fair. I was told about it on Monday and was umming and ahhing over it until it was suggested that we could sell the off-cuts if we sanded them down to a good finish and decorated them with sketches, illustrations and, courtesy of one of our group members, names written in Chinese. After a very stressful week of cutting, sanding and varnishing tubes (Check out our blog if you want to find out more) it was nice to sit down and doodle. 
It was an early start on Saturday to get the the fair in Prestwich but we managed it in plenty of time and got our stall set up. I would share the photos but for some reason, my laptop isn't reading my card at the moment so they may have to wait. 
It was looking good apart from our part of the table being a little bit in the corner. And then it opened.

And nothing happened.

Nobody came.

Well that's not strictly true but there weren't very many people there at all. We sold a few cards and a few more wooden decorations. It was a bit of a flop of a day really. Later, we found out that the conservative club up the road was holding their Christmas fair that day, which probably explains the poor turn out. It was worth a try though, better luck next time I guess.

I already have my next craft fair lined up. It's in Chorlton on 1st December. So watch this space!