First Market 2022-23 Season

A couple of weeks ago, we had the first market of the season. We plan to do a few of them this year again, but we are thinking of changing some things this year… ( BIG THANK YOU to my wife for her continued support!)

There is always a lot more work prepping or the first one. There is tactical and season strategic things to think about and to-do, but the first thing is to figure out where the stuff from last year is. Over the past months, things got moved, and one has to figure our what you have first, so, tactically, and with the help of my wife – the organizing guru – discovery and inventory is first.

This will be my second year doing the markets using a tent and displaying my art. We learned a lot last year.

Last Season Observations and Learnings

I think it is good to reflect on what worked and did not work from last year….

Idea	Result
Audience Confirmation	This was a big one for me. We knew we wanted to start small and on very selected markets. We definitely had a lot of excellent positive feedback. People liked the art
Booth Setup	Tent, Banner sign in the back, 2 or 3 tables with black cloths worked out GREAT. The display grids worked well as well, but the hanging of them was a bit hard to do. Square POS using the phone was very easy and worked well to take on credit card transactions.
Art Will Sell	So thankful to confirm that people will buy the art!
Artist Story and Background	We were coming out of the COVID year, and many of us still nervous about crowd exposure. The artist story circled around two thing: art was a way to keep my mental health, the quantity of pieces, and the idea that this was the first time we were exposing the art to the world. People related very well to the storyline.
About the Products we offered	Notecards: Confirmed – lots of card packs sold! Aprons: Confirmed – Yes, a good number of them sold. Unframed Art Prints 8.5×11: Yes some, but people preferred framed items Framed Art Prints: Yes! Bookmarks: None – end up giving away a lot of them. Calendars: a couple out of 14 printed sold (this one surprised me)
Buyer Options.	This one is a good lesson learned. The more options on the table – the more difficult it is for buyers to decide. We had way to many options.

What’s the plan for this season?

First let me say that this is all subject to change, as we are still in learning mode.

Bottom line: Treat my pieces more art like

This means that we will have selected designs available sale (although we not always agree, the pieces will mostly curated by my wife) Less is more! Quality vs Quantity

For the markets we plan to attend: we plan to have notecard packs, framed pieces, selected unframed and aprons again. We changed the display to show many more selected framed pieces, both at the tables and on the wall grids.

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