Last September we vended our first-ever pop-up market. The Punk Rock Flea Market YEG was at a small bar venue in North Edmonton called the Aviary. The place was packed, it had cheap beers, a great turnout, and we sold a ton of tees.
A few weeks ago in April, we had our second market and somehow it was even better. This time it was put on by the folks from @megacurse at the Steele Heights Community League. This place was probably about twice the floor space of the last one, yet maybe even more packed with punks. It also had a food truck and plenty of parking.
Booth spaces were your standard 6ft width. I didn't make any major changes to our setup this time around, but I plan to make upgrades as we go along for the upcoming markets. My main focus will be on better ways to display the designs, pricing, and availability, as well as a more organized inventory setup.
We released the new "Goin' Nowhere" tee at this market. I wish I had printed more because those bad boys sold out fast. We'll have more for the next one, and most likely one or two other fresh designs.
Some local journalists were there filming and doing interviews. Once again, we met a ton of awesome punks and weirdos, both customers and vendors. It's so cool to see all the stuff these creators and artists are making, and amazing to see the community come out and support.
We were a little low in certain sizes on many items and missed a few sales as a result, but we still did even better than the last market and better than expected. This was probably due to it being a bigger market, therefore more customers, as well as some pricing tweaks. We sold out of a bunch of items and will have to restock for next time.
Customer feedback has been great, people love the designs and the quality of the garments. One common request has been more shirt colour options for some designs, or making some tee designs available on hoodies or vice versa. We'll be considering some of these in the future.
Some takeaways from this event would be to get business cards, so many people asked for business cards; display pricing so customers don't have to ask; and perhaps, see if I can come up with a better way to transport and organize the inventory rather than a bunch of cardboard boxes. Something that makes it easier to find the item I'm looking for and speeds up the payment process.
Huge thanks to my partner, Jessica, for making most of the sales and all her help, the friends who came out to support, the team at @megacurse and @punkrockfleamarketyeg for putting on the event and having us, as well as all the rad volunteers and vendors for making it a success.
Coming up, we'll be vending at the pilot Punk Rock Flea Market (@punkrockfleamarketyyc) in Calgary on June 22. Super stoked for this one, it's going to be a great way to kick off summer.
Cheers 🤘
Jesse