octoberfest Dayton, Ohio

I did it last year, and I don't recommend it. It's a zoo.

It's a three day show that runs until 11:00 at night. You're inside large tents that leak if it rains. You have no room behind you, unless you count about a foot or so to be enough. They supply electricity, and you'll need it because it is dark inside the tents. The winds come fairly strong through the smaller tent we were in. Load in and out is problematic if someone takes too long and parks their van inside the tent. If that happens, you're SOL, and you have to dolly out to the parking lot.

The crowds are there to drink. I saw T-shirts being worn by many that said, "I'm not here to think, I'm here to drink". It's not an art buying crowd despite being sponsored by a museum. The word I heard from a few artists around me was that the show has been devolving into a drunken bacchanalia over the last several years and most won't return. There were over 50% newbies at the show, or at least in my tent. My tent could have been the rookie league as far as I know, but for the booth fee they charge, I'm not giving it at a second chance.

The crowds tend to be young twenty-somethings who are there to party. I sold one $80 piece of an urban landscape, and the rest (11 pieces) were some humor pieces with GI Joe and Barbie that were $20 each. That didn't even come close to making booth fee. There were at least 8 other artists around me who didn't make booth fee. There was some buy/sell there also. The emphasis is on music and drinking which doesn't bode well for selling art. I saw many, many times people wandering about carrying several steins of beer in their hands, plastic steins that looked like small pitchers, and I talked with a more than a few patrons who were a sheet or two into the wind. One memorable hat an older guy was wearing sums it up: it was a cloth replica of a beer mug with a large foam head. I quipped that he had a good head on his head, and he laughed uproariously. He didn't buy anything either.

If you do the show, take inexpensive items that are good impulse sellers. Better yet, find another show that isn't dedicated to Bacchus. One lasting vision of that show is the long row of Porta-pots between the tents, at least 40, and having to wait for a long time in line to get in. As someone told me years ago; you don't buy beer, you rent it. Those porta-johns were the customer service centers.

Maybe someone else had a better experience than I did, but at tear down there were many, many artists in my tent complaining bitterly about the experience.

Replies

Robert Wallis February 21, 2013 at 10:00am

I did it last year, and I don't recommend it. It's a zoo.

It's a three day show that runs until 11:00 at night. You're inside large tents that leak if it rains. You have no room behind you, unless you count about a foot or so to be enough. They supply electricity, and you'll need it because it is dark inside the tents. The winds come fairly strong through the smaller tent we were in. Load in and out is problematic if someone takes too long and parks their van inside the tent. If that happens, you're SOL, and you have to dolly out to the parking lot.

The crowds are there to drink. I saw T-shirts being worn by many that said, "I'm not here to think, I'm here to drink". It's not an art buying crowd despite being sponsored by a museum. The word I heard from a few artists around me was that the show has been devolving into a drunken bacchanalia over the last several years and most won't return. There were over 50% newbies at the show, or at least in my tent. My tent could have been the rookie league as far as I know, but for the booth fee they charge, I'm not giving it at a second chance.

The crowds tend to be young twenty-somethings who are there to party. I sold one $80 piece of an urban landscape, and the rest (11 pieces) were some humor pieces with GI Joe and Barbie that were $20 each. That didn't even come close to making booth fee. There were at least 8 other artists around me who didn't make booth fee. There was some buy/sell there also. The emphasis is on music and drinking which doesn't bode well for selling art. I saw many, many times people wandering about carrying several steins of beer in their hands, plastic steins that looked like small pitchers, and I talked with a more than a few patrons who were a sheet or two into the wind. One memorable hat an older guy was wearing sums it up: it was a cloth replica of a beer mug with a large foam head. I quipped that he had a good head on his head, and he laughed uproariously. He didn't buy anything either.

If you do the show, take inexpensive items that are good impulse sellers. Better yet, find another show that isn't dedicated to Bacchus. One lasting vision of that show is the long row of Porta-pots between the tents, at least 40, and having to wait for a long time in line to get in. As someone told me years ago; you don't buy beer, you rent it. Those porta-johns were the customer service centers.

Maybe someone else had a better experience than I did, but at tear down there were many, many artists in my tent complaining bitterly about the experience.
- lisa barnum > Robert Wallis February 22, 2013 at 6:13am
  
  Oh wow ! I really appreciate the advice. My first reaction to the name Octoberfest, I thought of people just drinking so I guess I was right. Thanks I will stay away!

This reply was deleted.