Boy, oh, boy, this was one dud of a show! Other vendors say they've never seen it so slow. Part of it seems to be location. I was in the furthest building from the entrance. It's a nice building, but people seem to be "spent" by the time they reach us. I've visited the other buildings and see far more engaged customers there. Live and learn, eh?
The time I didn't spend with customers was still put to use, though. I planned out the next set of booth enhancements. One of them is free, and the other will be cheap.
Here's the problem I'm trying to solve: people can't see my scarves. The way they're displayed, the edge is pointing toward customers.
My quick and dirty solution was to hang some on the wall so people can get a feel for what the rack contains. A better solution would be some sort of rack that lies closer to the wall and has lots of room to display scarves.
I thought Sunday might be slow so I brought a measuring tape to plan these enhancements. In this sketch you can see three tries to get a gridwall layout that works. The first one is too shallow and would fall over. The second one is too deep and would obscure the scarves. The third one is juuust right. It's narrower than the first one, but deeper to make it more stable. This solution won't cost anything because I already have the gridwall panels. It also makes packing easier because the gridwall stacks on the floor of the van. The rack that's there now always packs awkwardly.
The next enhancement will be cheap if I make it myself. I want a lintel that contains my business name. Looking at the booth from the aisle, there's nothing to keep the eye from traveling up to the truss work and lighting. The booth just doesn't look finished.
People tell me that they remember me as that guy who does the weaving. I also want them to remember that my work is related to my spiritual practice and that they can find me online by searching for "weaving monk". This lintel would give room for unobtrusive branding and help convey both of those messages.
There's no hurry for this enhancement so I'll just wait until cash flow is better before I start shopping for canvas and paint.
1 comment:
Signage is very important. At a large show, people will often look at everything then go back to purchase. If your booth isn't signed, it can be difficult to find again. I also hand out business cards with my booth location for be-backs to come back more easily. :)
cheers,
Laura
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