Well, the Bayou City Art Fair is now over and it is my time to do my best at writing a review. This is not about the controversy discussed in other forums because that has been overdone and is past news. This is about the time from load in to load out and all that I experienced during the time in between.
Carol and I arrived Wednesday afternoon and had a scheduled load in time at 10am Thursday morning. This gave us time to get to Houston and go to the artist check in on Wednesday ...better than trying to deal with the traffic to check in early Thursday prior to load in.
Thursday morning we arrived at the park and drove right in and unloaded the van with no problem. Hardly anyone there at that time. The weather forecasts were predicting rain and thunderstorms but they never happened while we were in the park.
After setting up we had lunch, went to a movie, went to a shopping mall and then had a late dinner before relaxicating back at the apartment. The weather on TV kept predicting more rain and thunderstorms for Friday but fortunately they never happened. It was overcast and chilly most of Friday morning up until around 1 or 2 pm and the crowds were extremely sparse. It was the slowest Friday I can remember.
This did give me a chance to walk around the park and visit with some artist friends and check out the additional tents along the back loop. I am not aware of how many artists signed up at the last minute to take advantage of the reject specials...but there was a lot of room available. I did see quite a few empty spaces...I don't know if they were supposed to be tents there of just open space. It seemed like there were more rented tents than last time....you know the tents with the big pointed tops, scalloped overhangs and the big jugs used for weights that no artist is likely to carry along with them.
Most people I talked with said their sales were nonexistent or weak on Friday.
Fortunately for us a good customer from 2 years ago came by..he said he came there just to see us... and made a nice purchase...I also received a commission from a new customer that said he had seen my work on the TV station that morning...I didn't even know it was on TV...but thank you TV station...! So Friday made our day even though it was a very empty park.
Saturday's crowds were much better and the weather was beautiful all day long. I don't have any idea how sales were for others because I rarely left my tent during the day except to go to the portapisser. I did see a few people carrying flat packages wrapped up, so obviously some paintings/photography were selling. People were also walking by carrying the Birdhouses on a copper pole...so I believe the birdhouse guy did just fine.
Sunday was also a beautiful weather day and the crowds were out and steady. Many people said this was the first weekend in a while that the weather was so nice...and they were definitely out to walk in the park, if nothing else. If I could pay the bills with compliments I could retire.
We made some nice sales but the last time we did the show two years ago we had even better sales. As with any show some are better than others financially. We didn't make a bundle but we didn't do bad after expenses. I stopped by one of the local hardwood lumber yards Monday morning before heading back to Prairieville and recycled some of the money I made
I sure hope everyone else had good sales and experiences..
The volunteer staff was always walking around and there was no shortage of water, sodas or snacks. One judge came by our tent Friday morning for a minute. I am not sure if there were other judges...couldn't tell ya. I am not sure who won the awards or when it was announced.
Load out was much easier than I expected. We originally planned to pack up everything and then go have a relaxed dinner prior to coming back around 10pm to load up the van. After all was packed up I noticed it was not a traffic jam, so I got my van and easily drove right up to where my booth was and loaded her up with still enough daylight to see . We were outa there by 7:45...
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