Building Your Brand.
Last weekend I had a table at the 2017 Libraricon in Fayetteville, NC. It was my second year selling there. Now, I had done the craft fair scene before a few times so having an Artist Alley booth wasnt a totally unfamiliar experience for me. But I will admit, I tend to play it rather conservatively. I picked the con because it was small and had the most reasonable table fee in the area. A good "jumping off" point. But it wasnt until this past year that I realized how much more successful I would be if I just.... DOVE in instead of dipping in a toe into the world of being an Artist Alley artist. I was very fortunate to have a table next to the NekoKitty Studio and I was able to pick the brains of two brilliant women who have poured a lot more dedication into their business than I have.
But regardless of my cautious snails pace towards progress I learned a lot this year and Id like to share some tips:
- Grid cubes and other displays to give your table depth are a VERY worthwhile investment. It looks so much more nice and professional than having everything laid out flat on the table and you can display SO much more that way.
-Original art prints honestly sell better than fan art prints. Because conventions always have strong themes and media tied to them fan art is an important eye catcher but I think in both years Ive done this Ive sold about 4x as many original pieces as I have fan art. (And thats really a wonderful feeling, you know? To have people want the original characters your own mind created.--- So dont be afraid to do your own thing. You dont HAVE to have cool but redundant art of Deadpool or Voltron in order to make sales and gain fans.)
-Mystery Grab Bags are the impulse shopper's kryptonite. I had some surplus of my smaller items while I was gathering up my inventory for the con and I thought Id just put together some Mystery Bags. Id seen those before at cons and I KNOW how my friends and I always agonize over impulsively purchasing those small mystery tsum tsum packages you find everywhere. Yeah, well. I sold two of my "Mystery dedfox Loot" within the first hour of the day and by the end I was putting together more while I was sitting there.
-Dont display large quantities of the same item. Its harder to keep track of that way and youre just ASKING for a not so nice, sticky fingered con attendee to swipe something. Ive lost about a handful of product that way in the last 2 years. Some of it is unavoidable. Little kids are notorious tiny kleptomaniacs. And items like my soaps are constantly being picked up and moved around because they smell good.
-Square Card Readers are super cheap and easy to use and if you want to have any sort of a business at all its a real solid investment. No one likes to carry cash anymore.
-Talk to your fellow Artist Alley people. Everyones had a different journey to get there to that same con as you and you never know what you could learn from them. And many of them revisit the same series of cons every year so its a good networking opportunity. This year I got a lot of good tips on what other conventions in the area my products would do well at. Thats research I had been really struggling to do on my own; knowing where else has an audience I can sell to.
-Bring a hypeman. If you dont have a hypeman... learn to BE a hypeman. My roommate is a real lifesaver for me. I have a lot of social anxiety and have been told several times that I tend to come off as "cold" from an outsiders perspective. Not your ideal sales person. My roommate on the other hand is very energetic and friendly and loves to talk. Shes a cosplayer too so that always attracts people over to us. My last piece of advice is something that I am still struggling with. Just find your niche and run with it. The most successful Artist Alley tables I see when I attend these events are strongly themed. One woman I saw sold nothing but elaborate and gorgeous miniature fandom top hats. Another was nothing but handmade felt dragons. I havent quite found my niche but Im getting there. My Legend of Zelda rupee soaps and my Pokemon Evolution Stone soaps are a big hit. My prints tend to heavily feature: Women, skulls, and mythical settings. Im obviously having some trouble bringing that all together to one cohesive theme. Maybe I need some skull or mermaid themed soaps.... hmmm.
