We just finished another first time show sort of. I have done Las Olas Part 1 and part 2 but never the part 3 in October. I had heard the Las Olas in October was not as strong as the ones in January and March but this was our best Las Olas to date. True the crowds are not as big but there are still a ton of people who attend the show, (see pic above taken around noon on Saturday) and most of them live in the area verses tourists and for our work we sell best to non-tourists. It can be expensive to stay in that area in the winter but in October you can find inexpensive lodging options. We rented a wonderful large Airbnb with an outdoor area about 100ft from the show for $75 a night. The best part of the October show, the booth spots are not as tight as they are in the January and March Las Olas. We had a ton of room and were even able to show work on both corners of our booth and we were not a corner booth spot. So, if you haven’t already figured it out I really liked this show. The only negative was the weather. It was hot and humid but the show is in southern Florida, it can be hot and humid any time of the year.
A quick recap of the logistics in case you aren’t familiar with the layout. I won’t go into a ton of detail since I have written this up multiple time in the past, you can search for more info easily. Booths are set up on the street of Las Olas, a shopping and dining area. The booths are back to back but there is a median with plants and bushes behind the booths. You can drop off your work on Saturday morning as early as 3:30 am but cannot start setting up your booth on the street until after 5:30 am. At 5;30 am all vehicles have to be off the street. If you show up after 5:30 am you will need to dolly. This year’s set up was very calm and easy. For break down you tear down with everything on the sidewalk. The show closes at 5pm and they open up the streets about 6pm for artists to drive in. Here is something I love about a Howard Alan show and wish more shows would do. If you have a trailer you will have to wait a little longer to come in to your spot at breakdown. We always have a double booth and no trailer so our vehicle can fit into our booth spot once the booth is broken down so we don’t block traffic at load out. When a trailer gets in and doesn’t have anywhere else to go except to block the road it can get ugly. Howard Alan holds off trailers from coming in until there is room for them. It was maybe 30 minutes more they had to wait and load out was a breeze. My only disappointment was that we were too busy to spend an extra night to enjoy the area because this area of South Florida and Fort Lauderdale is wonderful. Hopefully next year.
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