Last Minute Craft Show Prep

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Yesterday my wonderful sister-in-law watched my kids all day so I could get some stuff done for the Rocky Ripple Festival.  I know I've said it before, but it is amazing what I can get done in an empty house!  I got everything tagged and ready to sell.  I also made some cute aprons - whatever's left after Saturday will go up in the shop next week after I bribe my little model with suckers.  I couldn't help but make myself a little apron to wear while manning the booth too.

I do have to run to Cash and Carry and pick up bags for those hundreds of sales that are surely coming my way.  I've been trying to prepare myself for the worst and hope for the best - even if I make (God forbid) no sales, at least it's practice selling at a craft fair, and it's getting my name out to people.  The weather is supposed to be beautiful - sunny and 72 - so if nothing else, I'll get to enjoy being outside all day.

Today I'm going to pile everything I need in the kitchen so Kenny can help me load my car tonight.  I went through this ridiculously comprehensive list yesterday and made my own (somewhat) shorter list of things to bring.  Let me tell you, I love a checklist - they make me feel organized.

Disappointingly, my SEO experiment seems to be headed toward failure.  My views are back down to where they were, and yesterday was even slower than normal.  It may be a combination of factors, though - yesterday I didn't add a new listing until almost noon, and my traffic peaks at 9 am.  Then, I was having Photoshop issues and didn't get my second listing up until 6:30 or so.  I'll give you a more detailed recap next week.

This weekend will be slow for views for sure - I'm going to put my shop in Vacation Mode Saturday so I don't have to worry about selling something on Etsy while selling the same thing at the festival.  For those unfamiliar to Etsy, Vacation Mode makes your listings inactive for a set period of time so no one can view them.  I'm pretty sure that's going to put quite the damper on my weekend page views.

Speaking of vacation, I'm not sure what to do when I'm actually on vacation.  Do I leave the shop open with a note that I won't be able to respond for a few days?  Or do I put the shop in Vacation Mode?  I probably won't have much traffic coming through when I'm not posting new stuff, but I'd hate to miss a sale.  I know sometimes buyers don't even read the shop announcement, so should I put a note in each listing?  If there are any Etsy sellers out there with advice, I'd love to hear it!

Look out for the Show Recap on Monday and have a good weekend!