Selling art at craft fairs

I wish there was a magic answer to this. If there was then there would be a lot of talented artists who would be a lot wealthier. I've had lots of people say they like my paintings, but not actually buy one. How do you get people to put their money where their mouth is? Part of the answer is to build up a reputation about yourself and feel confident about your work. But how do you do this? I pretend that I'm confident even though I don't feel it and try to remain positive. Confidence is infectious, if you are unsure about what you're selling others will pick this up. Your work may stay exactly the same, but if you have lots of people saying good things about you and perhaps even a gallery who will exhibit your work, then you are halfway there. Unfortunately, most artists don't start with a gallery to promote them. Many artists begin as self-representing artists and some prefer to remain so. In other words they promote, organise, paint, talk, do everything themselves. Some exhibit with other artists, others choose to exhibit with craftspeople.

The standards of art and craft fairs can vary wildly and can range from a day at the local church hall to several days in a marquee or exhibition space. I have found a few things to note however, when trying to sell paintings, sculptures or prints at one of these events. The main difference is whether it is a local craft fair, or one that attracts national attention. In other words, how many customers will you get through the doors? You can usually tell this by how expensive it is to book a space.

If it's only £40 a day, the level of advertising is probably very low key and it is doubtful that people from outside the immediate area will travel there. If it is £100+ a day, hopefully this is not the case and the craft fair attracts people from outside the immediate area. However, just because a fair is busy and expensive to take part in doesn't mean that your paintings will sell. You also have to take into consideration the type of people that go there. Are they necessarily interested in art? And how much are they willing to spend? A good idea is to attend the venue of where you think you might exhibit and see what types of products are being sold there. Then ask yourself these questions. Are there any artists? How many? What types of work are they selling? Do you think your work would suit this venue?

A Damien Hirst creation only sells within a certain context. And it goes without saying, a cutting edge installation piece will not sell at a craft fair, although it might attract a lot of attention! The types of art that sell at these places are usually decorative paintings, prints and photographs. Most are usually realistic in style, although I do see the occasional abstract paintings on canvas. What type of subject matter sells is harder to answer. But I've seen alot of animal themes (tigers and elephants seem to be very popular!) and typical landscapes and floral portraits. However, you can't always make assumptions about what people are actually going to like.

How you display your work is as important as how it is created in the first place. Unfortunately, the way I've displayed my work has been compromised at times. In other words, things didn't look as good as I wanted them to. What I think I did wrong was to try and cram as much as possible into a small space. Sometimes, less is more. The more you cram a space with stuff, the harder it is for people to see anything, as it can look confused and jumbled. The best displays I've seen are ones where paintings were placed next to others that related in colour, tone or theme in some way. You have to think of yourself as the curator of your own work. The backdrop is as important as the paintings themselves. A white or neutral background is the best as it doesn't distract from the work. An obvious thing to point out is that pictures should be straight and evenly spaced. You'd be surprised at how many aren't and a crooked picture is more distracting than you think.

How long is a piece of string. The one thing I do know is that art is a slow seller. It's a bit like furniture, not something that people buy everyday. It as a luxury product and those who purchase original art can at times be few and far between. The other thing that makes it a slow seller is the price. If people are coming to a craft fair just to spend £5, they are not going to buy a picture for £500. That's why you need to consider where the craft fair is situated. Do the locals have money burning a hole in their pocket? Or do they have very short arms and deep pockets?

The first craft fair I ever did was quite disheartening to say the least. I stood for three days and only sold one painting. Most of the other artists were selling reproductions of their work at cheaper prices, so I'd completely misjudged that people wanted to buy original art or even knew the difference and how much they were willing to spend.

It is good to have a range of things at different prices. This way you can tell what people are willing to spend. You could have expensive originals, reproductions of originals and even cards to sell. At some fairs I made more money out of selling cards and reproductions, than I did selling original paintings. It is good to offer people the choice as long as you make it clear what is an original or what is a reproduction.

One way of coming up with a price is to work out how much the materials cost you and add to that the time in hours that it took you to make the object. Pay yourself a good hourly rate and make it worth your while. You also have to consider the costs of doing the fair and take that into account too.

Another consideration you will need to make is, how are people going to pay you? Gone are the days when people routinely carried their chequebooks around with them. If the item is over £10, will people have the money on them to pay. I have partially resolved this problem, by offering to accept a deposit and then letting them send me a cheque later when they get home. I can then post the item on to them later. More established artists invest in terminals and accept credit cards but you will need to have an established level of sells before you do this. There are also alternatives, such as using a mobile phone to accept payments.

You will certainly need public liability insurance and also insurance for your stock and to cover your vehicle. Hopefully you will never need to use these, but it is reassuring to know you have some sort of backup if things go wrong.

You have to try selling at a fair more than once before you begin to sell. I didn't sell at my first fair, but I learnt so much from just doing it. I learnt about display (from looking at what other people had done). I learnt about what types of people go to the fairs and I learnt what subjects are the most popular. I also learnt that you can't just give up. You have to keep batting on...