Selling at festivals without booth

I was wondering if any of you do this- just make a few things and walk around and sell without a permit. I know lots of people do this, and i was going to in a couple weeks at Come Together, but I was thinking I would hate to steal business from others, yet at the same time, it's a good way to get a start. I'm debating, but I'm not sure.

 

Hello.

My personal opinion is that it sucks when people who don't pay to vend at shows sell to the people there by walking through the parking lots or through the grounds. I think it takes away from the people who make a living doing this and actually pay the fees.

 

Why don't you see if you can go halves with a friend on a booth or see who is selling and sell your stuff consignment through their booth?

 

how much are the booth fees?

 

boths can be hell expensive at festivals, depending on how big they are, and what the profit intend of the company is. smaller festivals usually have smaller fees, festivals that are from certain groups of people or non-profit organisations usually have smaller fees then companies that are just in there for the money.


Depending on how much you are selling, it's probably no problem. IF you are just selling lets say 7 bracelets, noone is going to say anything. If it is far more, and you're actually made a profit from it, then it's a different story.


There used to be a festival here in germany, where the organizers said it's ok to sell a lil home made stuff, as long as it's only on the camping ground, and as long as it's serously only a little stuff.

So there were often people sitting on blankets and selling some necklaces. old records, ganja (hahahaha) and facepainting people...

 

some festivals have walking vender passes, you only have to pay a fraction of booth cost and you can walk around and sell...................... maybe they do, i wold email em or call or something and find out!

 

Well, apparantly it's around $1000 for a booth, so that's totally out of the question since my reason for wanting to walk around selling maybe a few skirts and necklaces is because i can barely afford to cover the cost of my weekend. I'm going with a friend who's walked around at this festival selling wrap around pants, and he's even done tons of trades with other venders there. He said no one really has a problem with it, but I kind of agree with one of the above posters....If i was a vendor selling my patchy stuff at a fest, i would be kind of pissed if someone was making serious profit without paying the fees.

 

More fests used to have blanket or walking vendor fees that were alot more reasonable and affordable to those that are getting started or just don't have enough merch for a regular booth. Too many have stopped this practice tho, complaints from vendors (because then you can have too many ppl vending the same kind of product and nobody makes shit) and/or the persuit of the almighty buck.

 

Also think about if someone else is vending the SAME THING.
Glo toys might seem small, but if a vendor is counting on their after dark glo toy sales to cover the booth space, it would just be wrong to take that away as a renegade vendor.
If you were WAY out in the parking/camping maybe.
Inside the show? No way.

 

Exactly! But I wish more would still do more reasonable blanket/walking vendor passes. That way they still have control over how much of what is there but gives people a chance to vend that can't otherwise, like me.

 

Well at beautiful days they had a fly pitching markett. £20 for the whole weekend. But she saw i only had like 10 necklaces and let me do it for just the day for free. In the end i went up to one of the stall holders (who i aguely know from another festival i did have a stall at) and she offered to put up a display of them, i managed to sell one. and i sold another necklace, a pair of barefoot sandels and a encaustic art picture just to people who were there who i got chatting to.

Try just asking politely one of the venders. Im sure if its not taing away from their own stock they wont mind.

 

20 Pounds seems a reasonable price for blanket vendors. But unfortunately they barely have those :-(

 

In our situtation we use our camper van as our booth at festivals... we used to set up in the parking lot or near the campground sites. We've always done good business with people coming and going and didn't take away from other businesses. We sell pretty unique stuff so its not like we stole anyone elses thunder. I wish they would bring back the blanket/lawn fees cause theres just no way a starving mama, her babies and hippie man could afford $500-$1000 dollar fees. If we had a good turnaround, then it would be worth it.

I guess I really didnt answer your question tho, lucy!!!

 

Sell whatever the hell you want wherever the hell you want, everyone needs at least a little money.

 

I'm a Festival organizer ( http://wef.ucdavis.edu/ ).
Our event is 3 days, free admission, 25,000 attendance.
4 entertainment stages, 4 education venues.
157 crafts booths, 20 food booths, aprox. 30 "service" booths (massage, henna, etc.), aprox. 150 education booths.

The 2005 fee for a crafts booth was $350. When you include the application fee, the booth fee, insurance, etc. a craft vendor is out of pocket maybe $500. Our show is juried. We jury no only on quality and price, but also on the ecological footprint of each vendor.

As I said, there is no admission charge for the public. We do not get any money from the University. (We do get free use of the Quad, thank you Regents.) The entire show is paid for by booth fees and a couple of benefit concerts.

I gave you a thumbnail of the Festival, to give you an idea of where I am coming from when I mention:

1) Even if you sell in the parking lot, the dollar that is spent at your van is a dollar that is not avaliable to the approved vendors. Crafts crashers are competing with the approved vendors.

2) Do your materials and processes meet the ecological standards that the other vendors must?

3) There are 157 approved vendors. There were more applications than that. Someone had to be #158 and was not accepted. Why should you sell at the Festival, when #158 didn't?

4) We chose 157 because that gives our event the right balance between commercialism, education and fun. Why are you screwing with the ambience of our event?

5) The bands (like Utah Phillips & Clan Dyken) that people watch, the speakers (like Julia Butterfly Hill & Ram Das) that people listen to, the fliers that publicised the Festival, the food for the volunteers who sort the trash (less than 450 lb. (3.5%) to the landfill, the rest is composted or recycled), the fee we pay to the DC for washing the dishes (food vendors cannot use disposables); all these expences are paid for by the booth fees.

WHAT ARE YOU CONTRIBUTING?

 

EXACTLY!

This is why I am bothered by people who sell without paying the fees.

 

I agree with that too. At least your fees are in the reasonable range. Too many of my friends and aquaintances vend for a living and I know what you mean about ppl taking and giving nothing. Many of them are trying to hawk the same things that others are vending and had to pay to be there
Whenever I've had a few items I've always worked something out with one for them to have my decoupage jars on their table since that is all I do. They always liked having them because they are such a conversation starter and its not like anything anybody has out there.
What I think would be a good idea to defray the costs of the small vendors is to do a small co-op, pool together your resources and small amounts of merch for one decent booth. I'm sure you could find a couple few ppl in your area to do that with.

 

alright, no one needed to get their panties in a bunch over this. I'm brand new to this entire scene, i have no clue, that's why i'm asking.

 

set up a kissing booth! that'll rake in the mula

 

I'm sorry, we thought you wanted opinions and reasoning.
And you could pik any answer to be what you want to do, anyway.


If a show isn't juried, I stand by the not during shows, not in the main fest area.
I vended at HIgh Sierra a few times in a co-op booth (not the county artist co-op, just a buncha freaks with some goods that's where the glo toys analogy arose)
and I have been in juried day longs that I wonder what criteria the jury had aside from a good check.
Did parking lots for a while too, but "personal showings" work best.
But you HAVE to do something that is really unique: not just a nother patchy/hemp and bead or whatever.