Ren Faire Update

[revchris]

We're alive and back in the land of computers.

First weekend went well. We don't remember last year's numbers, but we think that this year is starting out better.

We did Saturday on about 2 hours of sleep each. Friday we set up the tent, set up the displays, and then decided to sleep in the tent (they told us we'd have to pay to put the camper in the campground this year, so we decided to save the fee). Got to bed around Midnight, fell asleep around 1. About 3am we woke up because it was raining inside the tent.

New cotton canvas on an untested tent design can lead to leakage issues. We changed around some of the pole heights to improve drainage and then spent the rest of the night switching off between who was napping and who was poking the pools forming on the roof. Fortunately it stopped raining around 7 and we were able to get everything cleaned up and set out for opening day. We're going to be setting the tent up this week and working on it before second weekend starts. There's a good chance that we're going to continue to camp in the tent, as it does seem to be big enough for us and all of our stuff (and we can keep an eye on it if the weather is bad). We're probably going to think about getting a pair of single air mattresses instead of the collection of camper parts and other stuff we've been using. I've also been practicing the rope tensioning ceremony. There are 14 ropes that have to be re-tightened throughout the day. We also ordered more tent stakes from the blacksmith and are using them on some of the displays when the wind picks up.

They've put up a lot of new buildings this year, now have running water and flushables, and even have grass on most of the site. We're right inside the front gate (about where we were last year), and get a reasonable amount of traffic. We think the big front opening of the tent helps that too (techdragon, we've had a lot of compliments about the tent so far). We also get a lot of other visitors because we seem to be the only vendor near us who payed the extra charge for power, and we have fans running for us and the customers.

Saturday night there was no rain, and we slept the sleep of the dead for about 9 hours. I spent part of Saturday spraying the roof with two cans of waterproofing stuff, and it seems to work - Sunday we woke up to condensation on the inside of the tent.

We did a bit better Sunday than Saturday, even with the fact that Sundays always start slow (church, usually), and it was a windy day, which generally lowers sales levels. After closing we piled most of our stock and displays into the sword guys' shop and packed the rest into the camper and truck (we're also starting to think about a roof rack for the truck because right now we're using the camper mostly to haul tent poles, and the massive amount of extra stuff we always seem to bring).

Big sellers at the fair far are the pirate hair jewelry and ear cuffs, but I also sold (finally) one of the chain mail belts (to a woman who is going to use it for neckline trim on the garb she's making) and a dog collar. I had many people looking at the flogger, several of which said that the price I had on it didn't seem unreasonable, so we'll see how that goes. I also had a request to talk money on the copper chain of state I loaned to the fair last year (I asked about it this year since I didn't get it back, and the guy wearing it is willing to return it, but also wants to talk about buying it). We also had several people looking at teeka's pearl and glass chain of state, so it could be a good year for big-ticket stuff.

I have pictures, but they'll probably wait about a week until I'm home and have time to edit them down.

Comments

[alyska.livejournal.com]

glad the first weekend went well -- i was hoping it would!

it was humid something fierce at the market on saturday.