So, where have I been? I had been working like crazy to get ready for a stamp show I participated in last weekend. If I really had my act together I would of posted about the show BEFORE it happened as well as afterwards. It was a small show here on Long Island. I did it once about 5 or 6 years ago. I have been so busy that I haven't done it since. I have wanted to give it another shot for the past 2 years. I was at the point that I would never be ready to do it unless I just committed to doing so. I ended up being 90% prepared which wasn't too bad.
I am so very fortunate to do doing something I absolutely love. I think my only complaint is that I miss the customer interaction. It isn't really even a complaint, just something I wish I could experience more. This is one of the main reasons I have been wanting to do the show again. It is a one day show and is about a half hour from me. It has been silly to not do it.
I didn't have a lot of time to prepare for the show and I was trying to do it on a budget. The shows are expensive to do. I didn't want to spend a lot of money on displays since this is the only show I would be doing. I also needed to do something different and that was me. I decided to incorporate some of the antique pieces I have in my house along with a bunch of shabby white frames. I was pretty happy with how most of it turned out. My booth landed up being larger then expected when I got there. I had planned everything for a smaller booth. I gladly took the extra space but it made things look a little "light".
The show was so rewarding. It was great to hear everyone's feedback about the stamps, booth displays and samples. I can't begin to tell you how much everyone loved the samples. There were cameras and cell phones snapping away all day. It was no surprise to me since I know how talented the girls on my design team are. I just wish they could of heard and seen all the excitement over their work. :)
I have some crappy photos to share. The lighting in the room was pretty dark. I took a few photos with and without the flash. I was also limited to the distance I could get on certain sides of the booth since I had other booths right next to me.
You can click on all the photos to see them a bit larger. I used about 6 frames to hang all the packaged stamps. The larger stamps and stamp sets were stacked on the tables with indexes. I used an antique seed box to display all the flower and nature type stamps. I then used a little iron garden gate as a card display. Next to that was the center display with all the Noteblock stamps. This shabby shelving unit worked great to display all the Noteblock stamps and samples.
Notice anything new in the photo above? Hmmmm.
This was the other side of the booth. I landed up with an extra 8' table that I was not expecting. I tried to spread out what I had. I used a bunch of wire locker baskets for some of the overstocked stamps I was trying to move out. The printers tray displayed sentiment stamps. The library card catalog held journaling and label stamps.
The card displays are something I will have to work on for next time. We got it to work but it needs some tweaking.
I spy with my little eye...some more new things. :)
I hope you have enjoyed the photos from the past two days. I'll get back to showing off samples now...lol. If you have read through the whole post then you know to expect a blog post with some exciting news real soon. ;)
