Selling At Shows

Selling At Shows
Flea Markets and Home Shows,Fairs etc.

Selling at home shows, flea markets, roadsides, fairs, and mall kiosks, is a low cost way of starting a retail sales business. Visit any home show or market place for ideas of what products to offer for sale.

The information provided at the link below is a real offer from one of my companies (Glasgow Imports). See how to find merchandise below for other ways to locate goods. The same ideas will work for any item you choose to sell in a similar manner. This type of sales venue may be the way for you to start a retail sales business with low overhead, and low start up cost.

You will find two different price ranges of products being offered at shows, and markets. Low cost items, and high priced items. When selling low priced items, (under $50), the sales booth operator designs a sales pitch and product demonstration to attract crowds. They need lots of orders and the customer will want immediate delivery. A typical sales goal would be $2,000 to $4500 per day. With low price items, 100 plus individual sales will have to be made to reach the sales goal. Without the pitch and demo, the sales goals can not be reached.

With high priced items, ($100 up), the booth operator explains the features and benefits of the product to one person at a time. Both businesses have similar sales goals but the person selling the higher priced items will need fewer individual sales to reach a similar sales goal. Higher priced items are usually shipped to the customer.

Selling at shows is a good way to start a business with little overhead, or expand the sales of an existing business. I wish you the best of luck in your endeavors.

Where To Find Merchandise.

Several times a year the Sands Convention Center in Las Vegas hosts the ASD/AMD General Merchandise and Gift Show. Call 1-800-421-4511 for a list of show dates and locations. You might contact Summer Communications, (www.wholesalecentral.com), for a list of their publications. The list includes wholesale directories and trade shows directories. Also, you could buy an item at a show and get the address of the manufacture of the item.

The Internet is a good resource to locate wholesale vender and, if you can afford to import a container full of items from china or another overseas location, you will get lower cost, and more profits.

Booth Rental.

Show promoters rent booths based on a 10' x 10' area, or multiples thereof. For example a 10' x 10' booth might cost you $900 for the weekend. Expect extra charges for carpet and furniture rental. Corners locations may cost more. Always ask for a discount when taking more than one booth space. I always pay the least amount down that I can, and pay the balance 30 days before the show date.

Pricing.

Unless you are doing local shows, booth rent and travel expenses will be a large budget item. You will need a minimum mark-up on the items you are selling of double your cost. On small items, (items selling for $20 or less), you will need a mark-up of three to four times your cost. Visit shows and see what the other suppliers are charging. The more unique your item, and the fewer supliers offering it, the higher your prices can be.

What We Are Doing Now!

A new flea market opened up near our office. We rented a large booth, (15'x50'), at a cost of $900 per month. We are using it to get rid of customer returns and over stocks from our other businesses. We have the items from Glasgow imports and from our surplus web site in our booth. We are selling about $1,000 per week.

The best items at this time are our game tables and greenhouses. Other good sellers are miscellaneous items I buy at auction and sell cheap. It does not seem to matter what category the items fall into as long as it is a great bargain. For example, we have some optometrist eye glasses frames that you could buy off our surplus web site for $2, at the flea market we are getting $5. We had some ash trays that I picked up at auction for $0.15 each and we were selling for 3/$1. Some guy came in and bought all 40 dozen at 4/$1. (10-20-04)