Trip to the flea market

[thecfarm]

Raise it all you want. I will sit back and eat a burger,rare, Maybe a steak too. Rare too.  ;D

[WDH]

Slab kickers and grits bashers . 

[thecfarm]

I only bash grits as needed. I usually don't have to say the grit word. Seem like others are always trying to edge the grit word in and say how good grits are.  Kinda like ethanol gas. It's suppose to be good for ya and it's better.

[Don_Papenburg]

Them perdy ladies will help sell things .  We were selling sweetcorn hot outa the copper kettle at a show once . This young lady with short short shorts and a tight top bought an ear and while consuming it she was ecstatically exclaiming how good it was . and then guys were starting to gather , then they had to buy because  the perdy lady wanted another ear before her first one was consumed . Plus it is not polite to just stare ,If you buy some thing then you can stay and stare longer. and more guys showed up , more guys bought an ear of corn and one for their best girl . and the perdy lady bought another ear . and more guys showed up ,We were never so busy . then she wondered if she could buy a dozen to take home . Why yes , and the guys that wanted to observe also thought that would be a good idea.  We sold more corn in that half hour than most of the day. I told her to come back and the roasted ears would be free. My wife gave me the look.???

[WV Sawmiller]

   Well, I will re-open and add to an old thread. I do these trips a couple times a year. My two local GDs went with me today. Their mom's sister set up next to me so they were able to visit with their aunt, uncle and 1st Cousin. Having them handy was good so I could step away for a few minutes from time to time. Here is my set up:

Took about a dozen benches (Oak, Locust, Maple, Walnut, Cherry and ash), tomato stakes, crib blocks, walnut cookies, 2" lath/project strips, crates, raised planter and bluebird boxes. Also took a box of photos for my wife.


 Later I spread some of her pictures out to get more attention. I gave out business cards and talked to old and new friends.

    Slow sales. I had a prototype unfinished ash bench I had a blacksmith add a couple of wrought iron bands. It did not take off like I hoped but a lady saw it and fell in love with it but I let it go at fire sale prices (but still more than I had offered it last year). I sold a couple dozen tomato stakes and took an order to make a couple of short RO LE benches with Lichtenburg engraving. I was going to cut a 4' slab in half but I decided to take a blank slabs, cut to 24" lengths, then have them engraved. One little girl bought a couple of small animal photos and another lady set aside about $130 of larger ones, went to find her husband for the money and never came back. 

   My 12 y/o GD sold more stuff than me. : Started with 2 bear skulls, military stuff her dad left with her, a few toys, kitchen stuff, etc. She really likes to go to these things.

   Usually I pick up a mobile sawing job a month or so after such a trip so we will see what the future results turnout to be.   At least I got to spend some more quality time with the grandkids so it was already a good day.

   I did see one family come by with a cute old English Bulldog puppy and 3-4 months old. I asked the little girl walking him "Do you know why bulldogs have flat noses?" She said no so I told her "Its because they chase parked cars." Her dad thought it was funny anyway.

[farmfromkansas]

I never thought much about the pretty girl sales, but my daughter was homecoming queen at our school, and one time I needed a part for the old car she was driving, and she said "give me the paper" I had written down what the car needed, and she went into Auto Zone, and came out with the part for free.

[WV Sawmiller]

   They didn't offer to install it for her? Them Kansas boys could take lessons from some hillbillies I know.

   Flea market after effects continue. I built 2 LE benches 24" long and 20" tall for end tables and will take them back Sunday to the guy to engrave (Lichtenberg) them and a couple plan to come Saturday to buy a 12' walnut LE slab to make a bar on their deck.

[Sixacresand]

Good advice from Member WDH, Make a few slabs, benches short enough to fit in a lady's SUV.  It worked for me.  

[WV Sawmiller]

   Unless a special order or anything I do not plan on my making any more benches over 3' long. The last I made were 3 from an 8' maple and 3 24" ones from a 6' RO slab. Of course a specific slab might tell me to do otherwise.

[WV Sawmiller]

  Still paying off. A couple came today and bought a couple hundred dollars worth of walnut. They came last week looking for a live edge slab to make an outdoor bar on their deck. They saw my benches and asked if I also sold slabs. The lady found a 14' LE Walnut 8/4 slab a little over a foot wide. She plans to attach it to their deck. She decided she probably needed to add some legs so she bought a couple of 3X3s I had in stock. The lady was as excited as a kid in a candy store. I showed her a finished BW bench w/tung oil finish. I even threw in a cup or so of tung oil in a near empty bottle. I added a little from a new gallon jug. Customers like them are the reason I enjoy this kind of work.

  Now I have 3 small RO benches/tables to take to the market tomorrow to have a contact do lichtenburg engraving on them. Two are a custom order from last week and the 3rd was what was left of the 6' slab. I have another customer from the FM meeting playing phone tag with me so hopefully more sales are coming.

[maple flats]

Maple,

  You talk about re-stocking 5 times in a month. Did that prompt you to increase to amount of syrup you left there? Its a crap shoot and you never know how much to leave and don't want to leave too much due to extra risk and you don't want to leave it where it won't sell but you don't want to run out. Of course no matter how much you stock you may have that special customer come in who is going to buy up all you have there - How many of us have done that and emptied the shelves in a store when we found something special? I wiped out our local grocery store's stock of grits when they finally stocked them. That is the customer we are all looking for.
Just replying to an old question, and an update. I only was allotted 1 shelf and I filled that shelf every time I went to restock.
Update, In July 2018 that shop moved to a far more accessible location, from an old 1 room school house, to a recently closed home center building (put out of business by Lowe's, couldn't compete).
This new location has proved to be a Godsend. The first month they were open my sales exceeded my best ever previous month by more than 2x. I also got more space, and the owners run the business well. That next Christmas, sales for November and then December again exceeded any previous month. This trend continues, even into 2020. In fact my 5th best ever month was April 2020. In previous years April has been fairly slow, but with so many working from home because of Covid 19, it seems they were now doing breakfast at home instead of at a diner or drive thru quick serve. Nov 2020 has thus far been my best ever month for syrup sales at that location, and December looks to be real good too, except I'm almost out of syrup. The last time I stocked the shelves I filled them completely, but was displaying fewer choices. In most sizes I had run out of Golden and Amber. Dark (my best seller) filled the otherwise empty slots. While most prefer Dark some want the lighter grades. My month end sales may slip as a result.
Going back to when I said I restocked 5x a month, that was when I got less shelf space. Now, in average off season months I only need to restock once a month, this year, starting in Nov, 2x and Dec will be 2x. I now have 8' of deep shelf space at chest high level and 8' of bottom shelf for backup stock, fully displayed.

[WV Sawmiller]

@maple flats ,

   I appreciate the update and am glad to read this has been working out for you. I like the observation/opinion that the virus keeping more people home and eating breakfast together has been a boon for your business. Maybe you should post this info over in the sister thread about how the virus has impacted your business if you have not already done so. (Or maybe it is already there and I just missed it.) It is good info to share with others who might want to make adjustments accordingly to their operations.