Hello everybody,
this is my first review in this forum,please excuse all my typos,english is only my third language.
Last weekend (Labor Day) I did for the 10th consecutive year the 3 day show on the Santa Fe Plaza run by the Fiesta Council of Santa Fe,NM.
Set up is always the day before, so on Friday.
Every artist gets 15 Minutes to unload,very convinient close to the booth spot.
Also you can park after the show close to your spot to load again, just a little
waiting time until it was my turn.
This year a new managment took over just days before the show, but everybody was very nice and helpful, better than ever before.
I always have the same booth spot for years and know my neighbors well over the years and it's always nice meeting those 3 Texas couples every year again.
Unforunatly since 2008 year after year the show gets worse what sales is concerned.
When I startde doing the show in 2004 the booth fee was $300 or $350, not sure any more and I went home with 6k or so, so very, very good.
A good show for me is when the booth fee was 10% of my sales.
Well this year my sales were down to under 2k but the booth fee was up to $450.
So I consider this show not a good show anymore.
There are more and more buy-sell "artists" in the show who sell cheap neck-coolers etc.
and people spend their little money with them and not with us artists anymore.
I do abstract paintings in oils and acrylis, ORIGINALS ONLY ! and sold just one painting.
Thanks heaven I also do bead work (like a gazillion others too) and jewelry always sells, as you all know.
So I will hold off on this show even so I live in Santa Fe just 2 miles away from the Plaza,
until the economy gets better.
Thanks for reading my review,
greetings from Santa Fe to all of you and have a great remaining summer
Heike
Comments
Thanks did talk to a friend who sells painted clothing and she did very well but did not sign up for next year. I did show last year for the first time and found it to be mostly buy/sell. yes setup was easy but teardown was a joke. had to cart my work out. Then also saw some reps.with buy sell. Glad there was a review since i decided not to go back last year. i also went back with less than 2k stayed in a hotel which was not bad. This year in colorado, estes park which I did ok at but sun and monday in estes was a show of dogs and more dogs and no bags.
Hi Heike: I know a lot of artists had the same experience this year...too bad! Actually, last year's show wasn't too good for me either so I had already decided to skip this year. Of course, with my illness, there's no way I could have done this year's show anyhow.
Thank God you have your beautiful jewelry that people love and that helps you a lot with the shows. Lots of hugs to you, Heike!!
Hello Ruth,
well if you like to check out our area, think about the Denver area, I only hear good
stories about the greater Denver area,
greetings from Santa Fe
Thanks for the review, we've been looking at shows in the Southwest for the future, so thanks for the honest review.