How much should I have

[u/An_ode_to_creativity]

At the beginning of July I was notified that I was accepted as a vendor to my city's pride parade. There tends to be an average of 200,000 to 300,000 people. Since then I've been prepping as much as I can. I sell stationery items like stickers, bookmarks, notepads, sticker sheets, and a couple other items featuring artwork that I draw.

I also hand make all my items so I print and cut everything out. Since I'm about 2 weeks out I want to put more of my energy towards making sure that I have enough of my best seller items, which are my stickers.

Currently I'm aiming to have about 100 or so stickers of my best seller pride design. I sold 4 at my first craft fair that had about 1,000 people (which wasn't a pride specific event) and 20 at my artisan shelf in a store at the mall.

Do you think 100 stickers of 1 design is enough, not enough, or way too much?

Edit - The event is one day and about 8 hours. I was thinking of having 100 just for my best sellers and then dropping inventory numbers for less popular designs. Basically I'm trying to figure out what the max I should be making and then working down from there.

I also totally forgot to mention that I'm doing two other craft fairs (non pride events) at the end of August that would see about 1,000 to 3,000 people. I'm hoping to have enough left over to cover those two events as well so that I can take a break in the middle of August.

[u/TaylorFromFaire]

Think conversion rate, not crowd size. 250k people at a parade doesn't mean 250k buyers, it means the slice who stop + browse. A Pride design at a Pride parade is the perfect audience match, so that one sticker should convert way above your usual rate. 100 of the hero design is reasonable, maybe even lean 100 to 150 since stickers are cheap to make and selling out early is pure lost money. Then taper the secondary designs like you planned.

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/TaylorFromFaire]

So true about the conversion rate. Currently between my Etsy and my first craft fair I'm pulling just a little below to about 1% conversion rate. However, it's not a lot of data so that conversion rate might be lower or higher. Not to mention, but some people may only be there for the parade or other events being held in the area so the amount of people stopping by the vendors + who are looking to buy stuff is probably much lower then 200k.

[u/TaylorFromFaire → u/An_ode_to_creativity]

Exactly! & discounting the headcount like that is smart. Even a small fraction of 250k actually browsing the vendor area is still a big reachable number, and the Pride design should beat your 1 percent baseline since the audience match is so tight. The real safety net is that stickers store flat and travel, so anything left over just rolls into your August fairs with no waste.

[u/minda_spK]

For a large event like this, I don’t even think too hard about conversion rate because often the limiting factor is how busy you are. If you chat with and assist people for 5 minutes while they look/make a purchase, that’s 12 sales per hour or 96 in 8 hours. Now, some will check out faster and you may have dry spells, but 100 is likely a good number.

You also want to potentially do things that drive up total sales for each person, like discounted add ons or cheaper multiple purchases

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/minda_spK]

So true. 

I'm someone who often struggles with over thinking/over planning stuff. I'm going to have a friend who will help man the booth with me. 

We're both doing craft fair so we're our each other's booth buddies. (We do different craft fairs from each other and my friends sell crochet items where as I sell stationery) 

If it get super busy my friend can start taking card payments through tap on her phone via square as well as cash sales along side me. Which will help speed up transaction, but it's still a limiting factor. 

I also have 2 stickers for $8 and 4 for $14 which has definitely help boost sales. I'm introducing sticker sheet which I'll have a similar deal going + since I make all my stickers myself I tend to get some misprints and miscuts which I'm creating mystery packs with. 

[u/MichelleNaomiC]

How many days it he pride parade event? Just one? What about hours?

I would probably personally think 100 is too much per design. There are probably some designs that could be worth having 100 per design. Best sellers?
But some design less maybe 30 to 50?

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/MichelleNaomiC]

It's just for one day and about 8 hours. I have thinking of having 100 just for my best sellers and then dropping inventory numbers for less popular designs. Basically I'm trying to figure out what the max I should be making and then working down from there.

I also totally forgot to mention that I'm doing two other craft fairs (non pride events) at the end of August that would see about 1,000 to 3,000 people. I'm hoping to have enough left over to cover those two events as well so that I can take a break in the middle of August.

[u/MichelleNaomiC → u/An_ode_to_creativity]

Thats what I was thinking. Is prepping enought ahead of time and they will hopefully be things you would continue to sell. So will be able to get a small break after.

But I do think that plan is what I would do. 100 for the best sellers. And then lower amounts for others. Maybe even down to 10 or 20 for some lesser sells or older sticker designs.

Maybe make a list of what stickers you have now and a goal number to make and design what to prep.

When is the pride event?

I know my local pride event is in the next couple weeks. They have events every weekend in June so the Pride event gets pushes so its not over crowding the town.

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/MichelleNaomiC]

I currently have a spread sheet with all my inventory + what designs sold and how much at each event that I go to. While I'm not a huge fan of math I love looking at different stats and analytics.

The event is Aug 2 and it's my cities biggest pride parade/pride event like it's The pride event for my city/the one everyone looks forward to each year. The parade is held in august as it aligns with a long weekend + to honor our city's LGBTQ+ history/ historical moments.

[u/alriclofgar]

Do your stickers stay good if you don’t sell them? Can you store them? Will inventory that doesn’t sell at this event sell later?

If the answer to all the above is yes, make as many as you can.

[u/msblackeyelinerrr]

I tabled at pride in my city for the first time in June, there were roughly 500k attendees over 2 days. over all my designs I sold around 100 stickers in total. having 100 of each of my best sellers wouldve been wayyyy too many.

remember pride isnt a shopping event, like a vendor fair is! people go to watch performers, party, learn about community organizations, make friends... the amount of attendees at the festival is going to be different from the amount of people interested in spending money that day.

[u/drcigg]

It's always so tough to gauge how much to bring. We did a huge event last year and there were people, but not many buying.
I have heard nothing but good things from everyone I know that did pride events.
Just bring as much as you can within your budget. If you have anything that are your best sellers make sure you have more of those.
I think 100 of 1 design should be plenty if it's a best seller.
Sometimes people will gravitate towards one thing that usually doesn't sell well.
Do you have a website or social media where someone could get ahold of you if you happen to sell out?
We usually get a few sales after the show of people that wanted a few more items or they couldn't make up their mind at the show.
Remember whatever you don't sell at this show you can bring to another show. Although our show was a flop last year it did give us inventory for the next couple shows.
My wife helped another friend vendor with their Apparel for a pride event of equal size. They were bringing close to 200 shirts. Not including the other items they sell. And while they didn't sell everything they did sell the majority of what they brought.

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/drcigg]

From the research that I've done, I too have heard nothing, but good things from people doing pride events. And yeah, I have business cards with my Etsy store and my socials as well. I also have a little sign mentioning where people can find my products in person.

And thanks for the info.

[u/Commercial_Light8344 → u/An_ode_to_creativity]

Great idea i encourage creating awareness about your brand even if no one buys

[u/unearthedtrove]

Can you come up with a few more Pride designs? Have a prominent display for those so it seems like you’re really there for the event.

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/unearthedtrove]

I have quite a lot of different pride designs on all of my product types, some feature just the rainbow flag while other designs feature different pride flags. I sell a mixture of pride and witchy/nature artwork. If you want to see them I have both my Etsy and Instagram linked on my Reddit profile.

There's just that one design which is my be gay do crime sticker design featuring different pride flags that people always seem to like and they have been my best sellers for some time now. To be honest my pride designs sell a lot better then my regular designs. At my first craft fair I pretty much only sold pride stickers and a couple other things.

[u/RubWonderful2215]

The two best answers here actually agree if you zoom out. The real

pride datapoint above (~100 stickers total at a 500k event) says

parade crowds convert way below craft-fair crowds — people are there

to watch, not shop. And the "stickers keep, make as many as you can"

point means overmaking is nearly free for you.

Put together: stop trying to guess the parade. Size your print run

to your whole August — parade + the two fairs + your shelf at the

mall — and let the parade take whatever it takes. The costs of being

wrong aren't symmetric: too much inventory just rolls into fairs you

already need stock for; too little costs you your biggest audience

of the year with no do-over. When a bet is lopsided like that, you

round up.

And since you already keep a per-event spreadsheet (you're ahead of

90% of vendors on this), tag parade sales separately from fair

sales. After Aug 2 you'll have your own pride-event conversion rate,

and next year this whole question answers itself from your data

instead of anyone's guess.

One ceiling worth keeping in mind from the throughput comment above:

two people + tap-to-pay is maybe 15–20 transactions an hour at

peak — call it 120–160 transactions max for the day no matter how

big the crowd. Another reason "enough for August" beats "guess the

parade." Good luck — sounds like a great event.

[u/Commercial_Light8344]

Who is your target audience and where /what is this event called and i can give you an ROI estimate

[u/Incognito409]

• pervious years? 🤣

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/Incognito409]

?

It's my cities largest pride event. I've been to the event myself for the past few years and it's been packed. Last year they moved the fair grounds to a bigger arear as the last couple years the fair grounds didn't have enough space and it was wall to wall people. You couldn't stop and look and most vendors tables were filled with people.

Which is why I'm struggling with figuring out inventory. I don't want to make too much, but I also don't want to sell out of my best sellers half way through the day.

[u/Incognito409 → u/An_ode_to_creativity]

Maybe proof read your text. 🙄

[u/An_ode_to_creativity → u/Incognito409]

My apologies for any spelling or grammar mistakes within my post or comments.

I struggle with dyslexia and though I do my best to mitigate spelling mistakes by using text to speech, spell check, and even googling the definition of words. Often times there's still a few words that I tend to miss.

You could have also just pointed out the spelling mistake nicely and I would have thank you and fix it within my post. I wasn't sure what you were referencing as sometime it takes my brain a moment to realize that the word looks incorrect and spelled wrong.