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| | | Author: | WildBricks  | | Posted: | Aug 26, 2022 14:54 | | Subject: | Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 141 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| Hi gang,
I have a bit of a conundrum. I agreed to be the sponsor for my local LUG at a
holiday festival at the end of November. Per my initial conversation I was thinking
I would get a small booth out of it. Turns out it is 20ft x 30ft space. And
I'll BE THE ONLY VENDOR THERE. It's a week-long event that is expecting
10,000 people, mostly families. This is an amazing opportunity and I want to
hit it out of the ball park, so to speak, but have no idea how to calculate how
much inventory I'm going to need.
Any words of wisdom from the collective would be a HUGE help.
Ginny
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| | | | | Author: | SylvainLS | | Posted: | Aug 26, 2022 14:58 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 38 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| In Help, WildBricks writes:
| | Hi gang,
I have a bit of a conundrum. I agreed to be the sponsor for my local LUG at a
holiday festival at the end of November. Per my initial conversation I was thinking
I would get a small booth out of it. Turns out it is 20ft x 30ft space. And
I'll BE THE ONLY VENDOR THERE. It's a week-long event that is expecting
10,000 people, mostly families. This is an amazing opportunity and I want to
hit it out of the ball park, so to speak, but have no idea how to calculate how
much inventory I'm going to need.
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Everything you have and then some 
| | Any words of wisdom from the collective would be a HUGE help.
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Oops, ‘wisdom’…
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| | | | | Author: | bahpstore | | Posted: | Aug 26, 2022 15:59 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 46 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| In Help, WildBricks writes:
| | Hi gang,
I have a bit of a conundrum. I agreed to be the sponsor for my local LUG at a
holiday festival at the end of November. Per my initial conversation I was thinking
I would get a small booth out of it. Turns out it is 20ft x 30ft space. And
I'll BE THE ONLY VENDOR THERE. It's a week-long event that is expecting
10,000 people, mostly families. This is an amazing opportunity and I want to
hit it out of the ball park, so to speak, but have no idea how to calculate how
much inventory I'm going to need.
Any words of wisdom from the collective would be a HUGE help.
Ginny
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Invite someone to share the space with you? I know eclipsegrafx do lots of shows,
maybe send him a message?
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| | | | | Author: | Adjour | | Posted: | Aug 26, 2022 16:21 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 52 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| In Help, WildBricks writes:
| | Hi gang,
I have a bit of a conundrum. I agreed to be the sponsor for my local LUG at a
holiday festival at the end of November. Per my initial conversation I was thinking
I would get a small booth out of it. Turns out it is 20ft x 30ft space. And
I'll BE THE ONLY VENDOR THERE. It's a week-long event that is expecting
10,000 people, mostly families. This is an amazing opportunity and I want to
hit it out of the ball park, so to speak, but have no idea how to calculate how
much inventory I'm going to need.
Any words of wisdom from the collective would be a HUGE help.
Ginny
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I haven't done LEGO but I've been a vendor at alot of reptile shows so
this may or may not be helpful
Bring help. There were times I couldn't take money fast enough and people
walked away
People steal, see the above "bring help"
You need the ability to take credit cards
bring snacks, you may not get breaks, also redbull
your help should be the opposite gender and or a different age demographic, this
sounds stupid but customers are not always comfortable with certain ages and
genders.
You may loose your voice. Chew gum or bring drinks but be aware you may have
few opportunities to use the bathroom
Some venues have bright lights that may give you a headache, bring tylenol
Kids will be very grabby, which I'm sure you've already thought about
and again, people steal. Alot. Watch everyone.
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| | | | | | | Author: | Shiny_Stuff | | Posted: | Aug 26, 2022 18:46 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 40 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| In Help, Adjour writes:
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and again, people steal. Alot. Watch everyone.
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Along the lines of Stealing:
Since the available space is large 20 x 30 feet, you should have the option to
arrange your tables to have most of your merchandise BEHIND YOU. Set up your
space like a corral so that people have to enter at one point and exit thru you.
Have no small, stealable merchandise on the front tables.
Many years ago when I did brick conventions, I used to set up my booth as a corral
and me and my helpers blocked everyone leaving the booth to collect the money.
In fact, I even collected money for OTHER VENDORS who had stealable stuff on
their front tables. I ended up having to keep a notepad so I could write down
the money I collected from other vendors. One vendor was extremely surprised
when I presented him with almost $200 that I had collected -- he had all
his merchandise on the tables in front of him and it walked away.
I stopped doing brick conventions when they started putting in place rules that
prevented table placement as a corral, requiring all tables to be fronted the
same. Screw that -- I am not gonna let expensive Lego walk out the door.
Two other tips not yet mentioned:
1. Have all of your merchandise clearly priced before the event. It may take
you a couple of weeks to get ready -- but having to price stuff when you
get there ain't gonna work. Single closed zip bags are far better than loose
stuff in bins, because if a customer hands you 10 things they got from 10 differently
priced bins, you won't have the time to calculate what the total should be.
So buy some cases of 1,000 count zip bags of various sizes and put prices on
every one of them.
2. Simplify your set-up for the event to be as quick as possible. Have everything
in bins or tubs or boxes that you can just open up and be ready to sell.
I made the horrible mistake at one event to have everything hung on peg hooks.
Well, it can take hours to set up the hooks and get all the merchandise on them
-- as I found out. I never did get all of my merchandise put out because
of that mistake. If I ever do it again, I will buy the type of peg hooks that
are secured in place during transport so I can transport entire display racks
fully loaded and go from vehicle to ready-to-sell in minutes.
Good Luck, Have Fun, Sell Lots of Lego and Make Lots of Money.
____
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| | | | | Author: | 1001bricks | | Posted: | Aug 26, 2022 19:01 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 35 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| In Help, WildBricks writes:
| | Hi gang,
I have a bit of a conundrum. I agreed to be the sponsor for my local LUG at a
holiday festival at the end of November. Per my initial conversation I was thinking
I would get a small booth out of it. Turns out it is 20ft x 30ft space. And
I'll BE THE ONLY VENDOR THERE. It's a week-long event that is expecting
10,000 people, mostly families.
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I'm not sure why you ask.
Bring everything you can.
You'll regret to have brought too much.
But you'll regret even more if you didn't brought enough!
On the other hand, if you're there for a week, you can start and progressively
adjust?
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| | | | | Author: | Xsixxi | | Posted: | Aug 27, 2022 07:58 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 32 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| We always pack the van as full as possible, depending on the prices, sets sell
least, minifigs most, and lots of stuff gets stolen, especially the loose stuff
on the table, so make sure you are not alone!!
Have fun
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| | | | | Author: | popsicle | | Posted: | Aug 27, 2022 11:11 | | Subject: | (Cancelled) | | Viewed: | 52 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| | (Cancelled) |
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| | | | | Author: | BricksOfFaith | | Posted: | Aug 27, 2022 12:46 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 25 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| This thread has been one that I’ve been following as I’m in the same situation.
I’m trying to sort out what stock to bring and what not to bring to a huge convention
here where I live. I’m debating if I should sell my flego sets along with my
lego sets (marked as such of course) and just trying to figure out the best possible
way to go about this. I have so many collectibles that I also want to bring to
my vendor booth. I’m glad that she asked so I didn’t have to! I can just sit
bac k and read the answers lol
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| | | | | | | Author: | Nubs_Select | | Posted: | Aug 27, 2022 12:57 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 21 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| | If your going to a LEGO convention I wouldn’t bring any fake lego |
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| | | | | | | | | Author: | BricksOfFaith | | Posted: | Aug 27, 2022 13:02 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 22 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| In Help, Nubs_Select writes:
| | If your going to a LEGO convention I wouldn’t bring any fake lego
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It’s not. It’s a comic convention (basically)
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| | | | | Author: | yorbrick | | Posted: | Aug 27, 2022 12:52 | | Subject: | Re: Need advice from experienced festival vendors | | Viewed: | 21 times | | Topic: | Help | |
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| As well as expensive sets, get loads of cheap minifig parts and do a BAM. Decent
markup, and the odd bits getting stolen is not a big deal. Plus everyone attending
can afford it and pester power means parents might buy some for the kids instead
of nothing.
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