So my 2011 show season just came to a close. I'll be posting a festival re-cap in the next few days but while it's still fresh in my mind I wanted to go over the comparative costs of flying to art festivals vs driving to them. I'm writing this as I fly back home in the relative comfort of coach seating on a US Airways jet.
My good friend and fellow artist Lee Waterous of Head'n Home Hats has badgered me for years to include flying to and from art fairs as a way to reduce costs and travel time spent on the road. The reduced time I understood but how could this form of travel actually save me money? Lee's set up, unlike mine, compacts nicely into airline friendly cases which he air freights to the closest airport near the show he will be doing. He gets off the plane, rents a uHaul type truck right there at the airport, drives to where the freight terminal is located and loads up. Simple. Oh yeah, hats don't weigh much.
I on there other hand, I travel with a 500 lbs. Trimeline STEEL framed canopy, a dozen ProPanels, 3 large print bins, 2 folding tables a directors chair, a knock down ProPanel desk misc. support material and all of this is before I load one piece of my art. Even though I do rather well sales wise at most shows, this additional frieght bill would eat too much into my profits to make it work.
That's why I didn't even consider it until fate had my schedule packed so tight I bit the bullet and tried it out just in order to be able to make it from Santa Cruz, CA. back home to Sandpoint, ID and then to Las Cruces, NM all in one week. The drive by itself couldn't even happen let alone breaking down one show and setting up at the other 2000 miles away.
Here is what I did and why I'm a newly converted "flying traveling artist" and you should be too.
The deal breaker for me traveling this way was always how to ship my heavy, bulky display setup. What I found out was that I could become a "hybrid" flying artist. What do I mean by that? Well, on that particular trip I just talked about I needed to drive my 2010 Ford extended van down to the first leg of this show trip which was in Half Moon Bay, CA. I did that show as well as another one in northern California the next weekend and instead of diving the 1100 miles back home to "re-load" my art and then head out to New Mexico, I left my van at my brothers house in Santa Cruz, flew back home, printed and framed the art I would needed in New Mexico, UPSed this art back to California, flew back there the following week to pick up my van and the art I shipped and then drove to Las Cruces.
How did this cost compare? The round trip air fair (which was high because I booked late) ran $275.00. The UPS bill to get the art back to Cali was just under a hundred bucks. Because my son drove me to San Jose International airport I didn't need to cab it which saved about $50.00. So my grand total to this round tripper including freight was $375.00.
If I was to have driven this same trip I would have put 2200 miles on my rig just to get me back to where I left from in Cali and at 15 miles to the gallon and with gas costing over $4.00 (at least in California anyway) I would have spent over $550.00 in gas plus 4 nights in cheap hotels, $200.00 so my net savings was $370.00 plus (and here's the bigge) 4 freaking less days driving on the road. Lest we not forget things like van maintenance etc too.
With the success I had on this trip, I managed to recreate my savings both time and money on 3 other round trips this year.
Another tip Lee gave me was to book "Park n Fly hotels close to my departing airport for my trips back home. Why? Because even though these run twice the rate I usually pay in places like Motel 6 and Super 8's, these Park n Flys allow you to leave your rig in their parking lot for free while you fly home. Plus, they offer free shuttle service to and from the airport. One of my trips back in November I was going to stay at a Motel 6 in Phoenix, then park at the long term lot at Sky Harbor which would have cost me close to $200.00 for the room and parking. By paying $95.00 at the Best Western in Tempe, not only did I save half the money I would have spent but stayed in a way nicer room with door to door shuttle service. Sweet!
Because my season has come to and end and my last show for the year was in Tempe, AZ I decided to rent a secure storage space with closed circuit cameras and coded entry gates close to the show at a local uHaul center for $55.00 a month. This facility is next door to the Best Western I mentioned so I was able to use their shuttle van to get to the airport for my flight home. This is where my van will live until I fly back down to pick it up prior to my first show of the 2012 season which will be in Fountain Hills, AZ next February.
If I am able to take advantage on say half of the shows I do in 2012 by being a "hybrid flying artist" not only will I save money but I'll be keeping my butt out of the drivers seat a lot and that's a very good thing.
Comments
I have had similar wins with flying. I booked a show outside of Philadelphia and I am an artist from Los Angeles. I was terrified at the the thought of shipping my display to and from as I know that would have cost a bundle. I looked into renting props from a party supply place that was near the show and, lo and behold!, I came up with an extremely interesting, unique and beautiful display, and it was there, all assembled when I arrived from the airport (saved me hours of work); AND, I walked away from it all when the show was over (even more fun!). I had only to ship 5 boxes of my props and jewelry and whatnot to make this all work. I used points for my airline tickets, and saved about $1000 on shipping costs (that is, if I had used conventional freight lines) as my display is oversized and that just kills you. My total rental costs were about $260 and my UPS bill was about the same for my boxes. It makes a lot of "cents" to really think the logistics through before you just hop in the van again.
Timely article. I've been debating whether it would make sense to leave my van up north this summer and fly back home to Florida in between shows. Not sure yet, but this article certainly tells me that it will be worth it to crunch the numbers and take a hard look.
Dennis is spot on with the flying. Mackie and I have done it a number of times over the years especially when diesel fuel was over five bucks a gallon. It was an easy $700 bill round trip from the northwest to California and back, and the round trip plane ticket is usually around $150-175 when booking early!
Thanks Dennis. We'd already been talking about storing the Travel Trailer in Northern CA for 2 weeks if we get accepted into Issaquah Salmon Days, that would be our only show up here between mid-September and November with plans to do several shows in Northern CA. We were already thinking how much quicker and cheaper the trip back up I-5 would be without a trailer in tow. Now I'm just trying to figure out if there's a way to leave the truck there too but realizing that might not work, we have a second tent and spare weights, but not sure we have enough tables, displays, etc. for a whole second set up unless we can borrow from our friends for that one weekend, something we need to consider. Plus we would have 2 airline tickets and an extra fee to fly our cat home with us. However, definitely worth doing a little number crunching on.
Dennis, great info there for people to consider. Sometimes the way that may seem extravagant at the outset turns out better in the long run.
Hey dennis - welcome to AFI - nice to see another Pacific NW artist here!! Interesting info on the driving vs flying for shows, we've always said if all we needed were our product, that would be easy but the tent, weights, displays, glass cases etc. we've always assumed flying wasn't a good option.
We're working on our 2012 schedule right now, trying to group shows together as much as possible. We have one trip planned with a dead weekend in the middle of 5 shows and were trying to decide what to do. I think I need to go crunch the numbers and see if it would be cheaper to store the Truck / Travel trailer and fly home for 12 days. That might even mean we get our lawn mowed during that month at least once!!
Thanks for giving me yet something else to think about, calcuate, etc.!!