The longest hour of the day for me is the one between 8:30 and 9:30 every evening. That's the point where whatever OCD I have kicks in, along with my huge primeval drive for instant gratification. That's the hour before the daily sales report comes in.
One of the things I really like about my booth arrangement with Peddler's Mall is the daily reports. I get an email every evening that recaps the day's sales for me, for every day that I have sales. It's kind of neat for me that, after a year of doing this, I've only had a handful of days with no sales at all. I could actually be doing something right here.
Anyway, the sales email usually comes between 9:15 and 9:30 each night, but I seem to be unable to stop myself from getting on the computer at 8:30 to wait for it. I typically end up mindlessly surfing until it comes. I'm thinking this may be a good time to set aside for blogging.
It's kind of fun to see what sells each day and exciting to see my monthly total increase. I get a real kick out of seeing something that I just put out sell right away. Then there's the sense of relief at seeing something that's been sitting there for ages finally move. I've learned to never say that something will sell right away and to never say that something won't sell. It seems, based on my sell-through rate, that I've got halfway decent instincts about what to put in the booth.
My goal right now is to have a month with $500 gross sales. I'm getting close. Last month was around $450 and right now I'm sitting at $487, with two days to go. I just wish the last days of the month weren't Monday and Tuesday, which are the worst two sales days of the week. I very well could get the thirteen bucks I need out of 'em, or I could have three dollars in sales each day. The unpredictability drives me nuts and excites me at the same time. It's like having Christmas every day at 9:30 p.m.
If I do hit the $500, about half of that will go to my space rent. (I've actually got three spaces now.) Two percent is commission, and the rest will be my money to put back into the booth as stock in September. It's kind of self-perpetuating and self-sustaining right now.
My other goal is to sustain the 400+ gross level through the winter. Last year, I had strong sales through July and August, then they slowly began to slide through the fall. Now that I know what the pattern is, I hope to plan to avoid it. I know one thing I pan to do is work more Christmassy stuff in earlier. Another will be to have more new items that will be suitable for gifts. I'm even toying with the idea of creating some "Give Secondhand" flyers for the holidays. I'm creating a small stockpile of vintage holiday items as well. The ones I had last year sold very well for me.
For right now, though,I'm still pulling for thirteen more bucks in the next two days.
1 comment:
When my father and mother first moved down to Charlotte, NC in the mid-1970s, they had a booth in a market that had been a department store. He loved it, my mother tolerated it.
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