INSIDE with the Festival Nomad (No. 35)

 Over the years I have attended, worked with and organized hundreds of festivals and events. With this new series, "INSIDE with the Festival Nomad", I want to give you an "inside" look at some of the festivals and events that I have been involved with or that I have visited. Along the way, I have had a lot of fun and sometimes frustration, but I have never been bored!

Working the Show... (Part Seven)

12.  Traffic Jam...

Did you ever have one of those days? Judi and I were at the Hamilton Copps Coliseum and we had just finished exhibiting at the Hamilton Sportsmen’s Show. It was a small show but well attended and we had made a small profit. Even our take down and pack up went fairly smoothly. While Judi was completing our packing, I went to get our van. It was an old van but performed perfectly. I was allowed to drive around the circumference of the arena close to our exhibiting area. Again, everything went smoothly. We were able to pack the van up in record time, and were ready to go. We put our seal belts on, put the key in the ignition, turned the key, and nothing happened. NOTHING! And I mean Nothing! No Engine roar, no click, click, click. Nothing! The problem was we were sitting in the middle of the Coliseum's circumference isle and no one could pass us. Other exhibitor vehicles started lining up behind us. It was, to say the least, an embarrassing situation. Finally, a group of exhibitors helped us push the van backwards to the freight elevator. From there, another exhibitor gave us a boost and our engine finally started. Now it was late and I had to leave poor Judi sitting on a dark, cold, and snow blown winter's night, right on the curb outside Copps Coliseum. I couldn't risk shutting the van's engine down. She seemed to be happy when I returned. I thought it was because we were finally able to load the remainder of our exhibit into the trailer attached to the van. It wasn’t until much later, that she told me that while she was waiting one of her favorite childhoods T.V. Stars, Paul Michael Glacier, (from Starsky & Hutch fame) had been walking around (checking out the facility for an upcoming movie). Tired but both happy with the outcomes, we were headed on our way home!

INSIDE with the Festival Nomad (No. 35)

 Over the years I have attended, worked with and organized hundreds of festivals and events. With this new series, "INSIDE with the Festival Nomad", I want to give you an "inside" look at some of the festivals and events that I have been involved with or that I have visited. Along the way, I have had a lot of fun and sometimes frustration, but I have never been bored!

Working the Show... (Part Six)

11. Beware of the Big Rush... Watch Out for The Waves!
One of the things that always frightened Judi and I was “the Big Rush”! This occurred at the end of a show when all of the exhibitors were trying to get to their trucks first. As I mentioned before, the Big Rush for Judi and I, never really happened, because we always had to take our time to carefully systematically repack the fragile paintings. So imagine, if you will, Judi and I calmly standing in our booth, wrapping fragile, expensive paintings, when all of a sudden a large boat looms in the distance! "The BOAT is coming straight towards us at break-neck speed. The boat is on two dollies and is being propelled by four strapping young men. All of whom, seem to be oblivious to the carnage they are about to create! As the boat nears, we brace for the worst. As the boat comes towards our booth, the crew makes a sharp turn towards the exit. The boat however has other ideas and decides that it was going to tip into our booth and onto our fragile, expensive paintings! Then, with a loud thump, the boat comes crashing off the dollies and crashes onto the cement floor! Judi and I gasped! A miracle has happened! Somehow the young men have been able to control the crash and it misses our paintings by mere inches!" It was a harrowing experience, but one that actually happened and one that we were eventually able to laugh about. And actually, the biggest laugh was, that Judi and I, once the catastrophe was over, packed up all our paintings, loaded our van and were on our way before the “boat people” “got afloat”! So much for the BIG RUSH!!!

INSIDE with the Festival Nomad (No. 35)

 Over the years I have attended, worked with, and organized hundreds of festivals and events. With this new series, "INSIDE with the Festival Nomad", I want to give you an "inside" look at some of the festivals and events that I have been involved with or that I have visited. Along the way, I have had a lot of fun and sometimes frustration, but I have never been bored!

Working the Show... (Part Five)

I've just completed telling you about some of our "set-up" experiences. Now let me switch to some of our more interesting "take down" adventures! If setting up was hard work, then taking down was maniacal!

9.      The End Is Near!
You can always tell when a show is nearing its end! The “animals” get restless! By “animals”, I mean fellow exhibitors. I am not saying that all are “animals”, but many are! They are the ones who start taking down the booth an hour before the closing of the event. This, even though the contract that these exhibitors signed, and agreed to, clearly state that they can’t. The most obvious ones don’t care who they annoy or block. We’ve had buying customers in our booth, while a neighbour vendor took down their booth. We have even lost sales because of these actions. And, if you say something to the offending vendor, they look at you as though you were saying something very offensive! Go figure!

10.  Boxes... Size Does Matter!
Once the show is over, it’s time to take down and pack up. Packing up is always a challenge, especially in the art business. You can’t just shove a framed piece into the first box you come across. First of all, the paintings are all different sizes, and secondly, they are delicate and can easily be damaged. When you consider that each framed piece is probably valued in excess of $300, the damage costs could add up quickly. So, even though we were tired, after a long show, we would always stop and take the time to first of all find the correct sized box, and then wrap each painting up carefully. One of the tricks that we discovered early in our exhibitor days, was to mark the boxes clearly with the name of the painting. We also learned that it was wise to store the boxes neatly as we were unpacking them. However, even the best plan can go astray, especially when the booth is very busy and you have a number of people wanting to purchase products. Sometimes the wrong box is given to a purchaser in the rush to assist everyone quickly. This, of course, plays havoc when taking down and packing up. Obviously, the main compensation for making this type of error is that we’ve sold a painting … one less to lug home!

INSIDE with the Festival Nomad (No. 35)

 Over the years I have attended, worked with and organized hundreds of festivals and events. With this new series, "INSIDE with the Festival Nomad", I want to give you an "inside" look at some of the festivals and events that I have been involved with or that I have visited. Along the way, I have had a lot of fun and sometimes frustration, but I have never been bored!

Working the Show... (Part Four)

7.    Timing Is Everything!
Even if you have carefully planed everything, arrived at the show early and have plenty of time to set-up, don’t be too sure! As they say, what can go wrong, will go wrong! I can remember a number of shows where Judi and I were scrambling to finish setting up the booth before the start of the show. You just can’t predict what roadblocks are going to be thrown your way! Things like the electricity we had ordered and paid for, not being there! And then having to chase the show management and show electrician to solve the problem. How about other vendors using your space as storage as they set-up their booth! One time we forgot to pack some of our tools and had to scramble to borrow from other exhibitors. Probably the most common of delays is self inflicted, not acknowledging how much time it actually takes to set up a great booth! You always hope that you will learn by past mistakes, but!!!

8.    You Want Me to Park Where?!
Once a show set-up has been completed, the final challenge is finding a convenient parking spot. Not all events are parking friendly to vendors. This is especially true in some of the bigger shows! In many of the events we have participated in, we had our own booth, walls, backing, tables, etc. These needed to be assembled and set up first. Because of the possibilities of theft, we kept the art in the Van until we actually needed to hang it. This meant that we needed to keep the van near by until the initial work was completed. Because of this, we were one of the last ones to try to find a parking spot. By this time, all of the good ones were taken. This often made for challenging and sometimes, “creative” parking. But believe me, all of the forgoing was a dream as compared with the “TAKE DOWN”!!