Remembered to pop a new battery into my camera and bring it again today.
Yesterday was not quite the worst ever day of sales I’ve had, but it was a very close second. Since this is not an inexpensive show, it was highly distressing. Not that I wasn’t getting all sorts of compliments on my work. Compliments were to be had in plenty. But sales? Not so much.
So what do you do when your work is ‘rejected’? The very first thing you do not do is get depressed. All too easy a response, believe me!
The first thing to remember is the statistic given in the marketing course I took back in the mid-90’s. For every sale there are (on average) 26 non-sales.
The next thing to remember is to read between the lines – so to speak – and analyze exactly what people are saying.
Ok, one of the things they were saying was that my prices were too high. Given the multitude of scarves I’d seen at the mall priced at $15 each last week, I could see that response coming a mile away.
So, ignoring the ‘too high’ comments, what was the next most common response? “I love your scarves. I wear mine all the time.”
Hmm. Okay, they already owned one (or more) of my scarves.
What is the message behind this comment? Very likely the message is that the market here has become saturated. Everyone (or nearly everyone) who wants one of my scarves and who can afford to buy one, has already purchased.
The market for placemats got saturated here years ago – I routinely have people come into the booth saying that the placemats they bought from me 10, 15, 20 years ago still look like new. Today I had a lady come in who was wearing a scarf I wove back in the 1980’s. Her comment? “I just wash and wear it, it never wears out!”
There are a million reasons for someone to not buy your product. When the market becomes saturated, it is time to move on – time for me to dream up a new product. Or face more ‘rejection’ the next time I do this show.