The Other Show in Des Moines, Iowa.
I apply to show before but I needed to cancel due a death in the family and my divorce. The show is very organize and seems to run extremely well. Another artist told me to give a try and I apply and got accepted. Main reason to do show instead of the downtown: Hours are normal, indoor, no worries about your tent, people park in fair ground and the take the bus to the downtown show. These weekend and rain very hard in the area and flood warnings. Sunday it was under Tornado Warning.
This was the third show of the month and needed the show to be good. I meet Nels at Virginia Beach I told him I was doing this show and his respond was that show produce more losers than winners. Munks told me that people in Iowa do not support art buss as well as you hope. I could misunderstood the comments but that what I got from what I understood. Still I was willing to give a try because I could be a winner.
To get from Chicago to Des Moines it take 5 hours. The set up is Friday at 4pm sharp. You have 4 hours for setting up and 3 hours before the show start Saturday morning. The hotels in the area was full due to the Rodeo so I took a hotel for Friday night near to 80 (bad idea) and Econo Lodge across the Fair Ground for Saturday and Sunday night (very good choice). Since is a short trip I took off Friday morning got to my hotel by noon. Check in and head to Fair Grounds. I ate lunch and just wait until 4pm. The only part that is hard about the set up is dolly in and no AC.
Saturday and Sunday you can see a good amount of people walking but very few sales in my end of the show. There was and Artist that paint his cooper with a flame and he did very well Saturday. At the End of Saturday I decide to head back home Sunday night and give my hotel fee to another artist instead. Sunday it was very slow sales wise for everybody. I did my expenses on Saturday and have a normal day on Sunday but it was a very difficult crowd, polite but difficult.
This a show that even if I would made 10,000 I will have a hard time doing again but I made still give it one more try.
Why, in general people do not want expend money in art or paid for what I consider a fair price. It was dishearten to see at least five artist next to me no make enough to cover expenses (painter, drawing, jewelers) I saw things that look like buy and sale but that was my concern. PRICE POINTS WAY BELOW THE NORMAL. I think what I got was this year people walking the show was looking for bargain and is the second year in row that the newspaper are telling buyers to get things below 200 or less because people complain of things that they can not afford or do things that had nothing to do with art. When I see things like this makes me wonder.
So one more time Munks was correct.
Like or not it could be a down year but something is wrong.
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Comments
I think the AC was off for load-in and load out. We heard it shut off a few minutes before closing time. I suppose it's because the have the overhead doors open and don't want to cool the outside. Normally, it would probably be fine, but it was so humid outside that it probably was worse than normal.
Other than my sales, I liked the show. I don't really have any other complaints about it. If the crowds were down because of the weather, that could be what the problem was. But when my last show in an area of about 40,000 people has almost three times the sales I have in Des Moines, I need to figure out what the problem is.
Kay Foley, I really do not understand where you got the impression that I did not have a good show. The show, like any other show have people that do very well and do really bad. The artist around me that had done the show since it started told me that attendance was way down.
What this show did for me is appreciated what One of A Kind Show and Sale Chicago does. They need help with the layout and marking the aisle and booth numbering. Putting the number of the booth in artists cards does not do it. As a visitor you do not have any point of reference or sense where you are. It will help if they put Aisle - booth space. What this show did for me is considering adding note cards and middle point. The should be extremely good but you need volume and need to understand is not for high end work. If you high end you better off doing the downtown show.
If the AC was on is what not in the East Side of the building since everybody was complaining how hot was in my area. Saturday The AC did cool our area until 2pm. If you walk to food area you feel the AC working just fine.
The point of the review is to inform people what to expect but the main reason I will give another try if I get in again is: The weather was so bad that I was surprise that people still show up. I was expecting the show to be really bad because of the weather not the promoter or people in town.
Also, Kay I do not know your work but your work should be higher price point than my work. Photography should be the lowest price point in 2D art.
And Roxanne! Sorry!!
And I should have said, Oscar, I'm sorry you didn't have a good show. I know very well how disappointing that is.
That's good to know. Maybe I should give it another try.
I really feel like I need to add my comments because I have done this show at least 6 times and I love it! My sales are consistently good, unlike at other shows, and I am in the same price point as you, Oscar, with 2D mixed media and greeting cards. I know many other artists who are happy with the show and do it every year, as well. I feel like Iowans really support the arts (or at least my art). I have return customers every year, as well as lots of new ones. And most of them go to both shows, many commenting that they like this one better because they can afford things here.
I am a woman doing shows by myself, 62 years old, and I find the load-in and load-out very easy. The AC is on in the building during set-up and teardown--but the huge doors are open to allow dollies and carts in and out, plus the loading dock doors are open for big trucks with large items, so it gets hot. But the AC is on.
The show is big, for sure. Booth numbers were printed on booth signs.
I love this show. I will do it every year, if I can.
Oscar, I was there too, and my sales were horrible. I haven't added it up yet, but I'll be lucky if I made my booth fee (and I think I paid less because I was on the wait list.) My neighbors sales were horrible also, except for one guy who had like indoor/outdoor yard sculptures that were like poles with rocks on them. He did great.
When we arrived, several people said this was their 8th/etc. year doing it and that it was a really good show. I had high hopes. When Saturday was slow, someone told me they did better on Sunday last year. I thought maybe they were downtown Saturday and would come see us on Sunday. I was wrong.
There are a few things that may have caused it, and I'm not sure which were the big factors:
The traffic seemed kind of sporadic (except for Saturday morning). I had lots of people tell me how beautiful my pieces were, etc, but that they had just arrived and were going to walk the show and may be back. (One came back.) I just wonder if the show is so huge that by the time they walk through all those booths they are too tired of walking to come back and find my booth. Also, I don't remember if our signs had booth numbers on them. If not, maybe the booths were too hard to find? I had a friend come to see me, and she couldn't find me even though she knew my booth number. At the end of the show she texted me. By that time I was in the middle of tearing down and she had already purchased some jewelry from someone else. Mine was already put away at that point.
I am really torn between giving this show another chance or deciding that it's just too big for me. I don't make enough money to do another show like that.
Thanks for your review, Oscar...I always enjoy hearing from you and your interesting point of view. Good for you that you're willing to give it another go, I admire your positivity.
The AC was not on during set up and break down. The price point that I sold was 35. I was surprise that people complain about the price of a 8X12 frame piece for 95. I usually sale 3 per day of this item. I only sold 2 small frame pieces for 95 and one large piece for 500. The rest was loose prints at 35 per piece. To do good you need a lot buyers. I still may give another chance because the weather was so bad I can not blame people for not coming.
Hey Oscar, the building didn't have any air conditioning? Was that just during load in or the whole weekend?
I like your attitude. You gave the show a try.
What was the average price piece that you sold?