Show is prodiced by Craft Producers the second weekend in October for three days with setup on Thursday. Held at Top Nothc field which is just a large field about two miles west of 'Stowe. Nasty weather Thursday with heavy rain with small hail off and on. Large indoor heated tent for approximately 100+ artists. Remainder outside. Weather was cold Friday and Saturday but nicer on Sunday. Heavy rain all night Friday just after show closed. Field dried out and mulch was put down in wet areas so all areas were acceptable. Sales reasonable on Friday. Saturday cars were lined up as far as you could see. People from all over the country there to see the colors which were fantastic. We had customers from Tennessee and Texas ans well as the whole New England area and beyond. They bought like no tomorrow on Saturday. Sunday slow to start but got busy early afternoon. Hours 10 to 5 each of three days. Show turned out to be our second best after Port Clinton. Did not have time to talk with many exhibitors but those that I did had really great sales also. We were outside near the entrance/exit so could judge approximate sales by people leaving with packages and there were many. Wide variety of quality of artists but as a whole reasonably good. Some questionable possible buy/sell but not many. Good mix of various media. Not overloaded on any category anthough a good number of good photographers. Have seen some of the artists from our Chicago shows.
One nice thing was portable trailer toilets. Heated and/or air conditioned depending on weather. Also running water and flush tiolets. Not bad. Ont tent with vendors selling Vermont products. Good variety of food vendors and reasonable priced. Even had a portable ATM machine on site.
Well worth the 900 mile drive do do the show. Local lodging in Stowe quite expensive. We chose to stay in Burlington and drive back and forth. Approximately 45 minutes each way. Worth he drive time. Great variety of restraunts in Stowe. Some quite expensive others reasonable. Great Mexican place with reasonable prices.
Show to move to a new location closer to town in two years. Will be a better layout and hopefull even etter crowds.
Comments
Has anyone done this show in the last couple of years? I was thinking of applying but it is fairly expensive! Thoughts, comments, helpful advice?
The craftproducer crew does a good job coping with the weather and the ground conditions. The auction for CERF on saturday night is always a great party for a great cause. I hadn't heard that the show was moving. It used to be closer to town in a better location but that field had terrible drainage issues. It's a great time of year to be in VT, especially when the weather is cooperative!