What sells??

[Emmma]

Hey there! I’m considering selling at my local farmers market or makers market. I’m fortunate to live in the Bay Area and people generally have an appreciation for hand-made goods. I’m wondering if a more seasoned seller can give me some insight on what items are most popular? 

[Mark C.]

Mugs are the best

[Hulk]

"

...and bowls aren't bad.
Try cruising the market(s), see what other vendors are featuring?

[Min]

Small pots like mini / prep bowls sell well for me also. Plus a few types of bowls, serving, noodle, dinner or Buddha / Pho bowls etc.

[Callie Beller Diesel]

Everyone has beaten me to the best suggestions! Start with small everyday purpose items, and see what the customers are asking about. 

The easiest thing to start with is some small and medium bowls, about 2 dozen mugs, some spoon rests or ring dishes. I found it goes more smoothly to start simple, and expand the variety over time. I try to show up for my weekly market in the summer with at least one or 2 new things, so that people have a reason to come see what’s new. Try to think about what produce is in season for inspiriation. If garlic is coming into season, have some garlic keepers on hand. In the spring you want to have berry bowls. Check out what the farmers are bringing and see if you can compliment that with your work.

Regarding a farmer’s market specific setup:

For a farmer’s market, because you’re setting up and tearing down every day, a pretty but simplified display that’s as wind proof as you can make it is best. It’s a lot of work otherwise, and you can wind up really fatigued if you’ve got too many fussy details. IF you do small table signage make sure it’s not going to blow away somehow. You can write in chalk on a dark tablecloth (it rubs off easily), make small wooden signs, or have small dry erase tags in clip stands that can be shifted around easily. You want to have a setup that can be condensed as it sells down and still look cute, so having some placemats to create distinct areas and group things together can be helpful.

For starting, the brick and board formula for making different levels/shelves  on a table is tried and true for a reason: it’s pretty lightweight, collapses down easily, and is stable. I find most people err initially by not having enough height on their tables. You can either add a shelf or 2 in height, or put your table on bed risers to get things more towards eye level. Lots of people will start with cute packing crates as dual purpose table risers and transportation, but I find they’re rarely tall enough, and don’t Tetris as well with your other bins and items. 

For packing material: you will probably go through more packing paper than bags. I find most people bring their own bags/baskets, but they need some tissue or newsprint or something for padding. If you’re using tissue paper, leave it in the ream packaging! (Ask me how I know). For bags, it’s still a good idea to have a few on hand, but you don’ t need to do a big bulk buy or anything.

Get a small clipboard for your email signup list, and either some business cards, or make a sign that people can photograph that has your socials/website/email. I also made up a small “care for your new pottery” card to tuck into the bag that people find helpful. But you don’t have to have those the first week. 

Most of us here will recommend a Square tap reader for payment processing. The option is there to just type in the price and let it run, but I strongly recommend setting up an items menu so you can track your item sales. It’s easier to do if you enter a few new items at a time rather than trying to do a giant batch once you’re more established. I also use it to record cash sales, and let the machine calculate tax. Square is a till system, and it generates incredibly helpful reports that will tell you how much of what item you sold on what day, as well as a cash/card/tax breakdown. You can use this to make bookkeeping easier, and create your production lists next year.  No they don’t sponsor me,lol!

Remember the sunscreen and hat!

 

[GEP]

Agree with everyone above that small, functional pots are the best sellers. Mugs, small bowls, small dishes. 

In my experience, cups do not sell nearly as well as mugs. In North America, people want handles. 

But making these forms does not automatically mean they will sell. Your pots also need to be well-designed, well-made, and correctly priced. If your work doesn’t meet these standards, it’s not going to sell no matter what forms you make. 

Originality really helps too! If your works looks like everybody else’s, that’s also tough to sell. 

[Min]

Who is selling and how they interact with customers makes a difference too. A cheerful attitude, open to chat without hard selling or being in a prospective customers face, being happy to answer questions, even if they are odd (yes, that will happen), staying off your phone etc all help. When I have help my daughters sell really well, my husband, not so much. 

[Stephen]

It’s a very short selling window and lots of locals buying weekly produce. Mugs and bowls are probably best but we did a ton of farmers markets in the Seattle (over a 100) area and $300-$400 seemed to be the top  range with a couple hundred often if the weather was bad, and it often was.

We are in Texas now and do a local farmers market Sept through May in a tourist area and we sell both pottery and lasered items and do more like $500-$1000 with around $600 being average but pottery is just part of the mix. Pottery alone at a farmers market we found was just hard to get numbers in such a short selling windows.

Pottery by itself at shows that are not art and/or craft centric are tough. Plenty of people but just a few hours and so many are just out and about and browsing. Mark C Used to drive hundreds and thousands of mile to and from far ranging shows to make his business work. If you go to most fairs and farmers markets one thing will stand out, there are seldom many potters and often there are none.