The Hucknall Handmade Craft Fair......

Well it's been and gone and i'm still recovering!!
Thought i'd got everything organised the night before...packed all my treasures away.........had my list of people attending ready to sort tables out so that i didn't have cardmakers next to each other etc! Guess what forgot it!! Luckily i only live2 mins away so my lovely hubby ran back for it (he did do a lot of running about all day). I wanted to try to get the hall and outside eye catching but with everything else (sorting teas/coffee/hook a duck/tombola/my table) but it didn't work out as planned.
My mum was supposed to be sharing a table with me so she could man it while ikept the other stallholders happy, but she was late and realised she needed a table for all her things so i'm afraid to say my table was bare til the very last min (and after wasn't manned very much either).
After alot of running up and down we opened to the public........no mad rush but a nice steady flow of people in and out in the morning. My daughter, her friend and my best friend were manning the tombola and hook a duck, and they did a great job. I must let you know that the stallholders generously donated one of the items to the tombola which we ran in aid of 'When you wish upon a star'. I think i went with this charity in the end because my daughter has a couple of friends who have benefited from this and to give children who are ill a dream come true is AMAZING. We raised £60 for them which i have to send a cheque to them.

By 1pm the 'steady flow' had dried up, i felt very responsible, so got my daughter to go into town to give flyers out, but is was very quiet. I facebooked it to everyone to no avail.
The stallholders were very good but some did start to pack away around 2 ish.
A lady that worked in the John Godber centre had given me some info on a fun day that is happening in September, which is good as they are not charging for, so this was a good.
As a 'organiser' it was very stressful and at the end of the day i wasn't sure i wanted to do it again, especially as one stallholder came up to tell me that she had not made her stall fee back and i think she wanted me to give it her back.
But when i got my evaluation forms back from the stallholders i felt a bit better as they were all pretty good plus got some great ideas and advice about how to make it a better event! Plus quite a few put their emails where i'd asked if they would want to know if i did another event, so it couldn't have been all bad.
A few stalls had made quite a bit of money too so at least the customers were buying.
I sold 1 item and got a order for 1 too plus alot of my cards were taken.
My mum that was selling cupcakes and had wedding/b'day cakes on show and tasters did very well, she had taken quite a few orders.
After talking ALOT about it with my hubby and susiej who had helped too i think i may just be a glutton for punishment and do it again!!!!!!!!!
One very good part of the day was meeting fellow Folksy people and all the other lovely stallholders (which i promoted folksy to) and buying Waldo the Worm (well my mum did)and my youngest loves it.(and it's signed :0)
Anyway i hope you have enjoyed reading the trials of organising a event and realise you need to be thick skinned (which i'm not, but trying too)
I will get all folksy people who attended on here too asap, gonna find all the links now!
Sam xx