Exhibiting at the New York International Gift Fair

Note from Rena: The New York International Gift Fair (a.k.a. NYIGF or the Gift Show) is a twice-a-year event is a massive multi-day tradeshow that exposes 2,800 companies to thousands of retail buyers, magazine editors and trendspotters. It used to be a benchmark that you have reached a new level with your business when you exhibit at NYIGF, though its relevancy in today’s online global marketplace is sometimes questioned. Lisa Jones of Pigeon Toe Ceramics exhibited at this tradeshow for the first time in August, and was kind enough to write up this exhaustive look at the whys and hows of doing a tradeshow event.

Why and When 

Are you looking to: significantly increase the number of your wholesale accounts, expose your brand to editors and writers from major press outlets, or build relationships &/or partnerships with other designers, makers + manufacturers? That’s what happens at NYIGF.

Figuring out when you’re ready feels a lot like deciding when to let go of your day job security blanket and commit to your business full time. The best you can do is make an educated guess, take a deep breath, and jump. Lucky for most of us, we’ve already been through that once and it makes big decisions like these a little less intimidating.

I started to look into exhibiting at a tradeshow about a year after starting Pigeon Toe. I was 6 months past a day job at that point, had a solid and steadily growing wholesale customer base, and a few employees. Wholesale inquiries were suddenly accompanied with a question about whether we’d be at NYIGF. It was that expectation that signaled to me that my tiny vision was being taken seriously on a larger scale, and it was time to get us there. The cost and undertaking did give me pause, but I decided I had to do it at least once to make the most educated decision about their place in my company’s future. By the time we actually exhibited, a year and a half had passed. Planning to do shows like these for the first time takes advance planning, and there’s nothing wrong with taking a slow, well-thought-out approach for your premiere.

We entered this show with over 100 retailers, so my goal was not rapid account growth but was more about filling in gaps in our resale locations (ie more East coast, Midwest and European accounts), building face-to-face relationships with some of the customers and editors that had been buying from us/writing about us from the beginning, and making personal connections with larger global companies I was interested in doing custom design work or collaborative lines with. Financially, I wanted to at least make my investment back, but it’s important to note that over half of the business from the show has happened AFTER the fact (many people do not order on the spot) so don’t be disheartened if you’re still in the hole when you’re headed home. Consider the long-term value of good customers reordering from you for years to come, not to mention the editorial coverage that could drive more retail customers your way and build brand awareness.

Things to Consider

1. Attend and walk the show at least once before you decide to do it. This will help you get the general feel of the show (which will make you more confident when you should up to exhibit), decide on what category to apply under (as there are many), give you an idea of the aesthetic expectations of the booths (and how people display their wares to make them most appealing to buyers), show you what the different type of booths look like (fabric, hardwall, etc), and let you observe the sales etiquette and business logistics of selling on this level.

2. Talk to someone who has done it. There is no supplement for experience, and as nice at the sales reps for the show are, they’re in it to sell you something. I was happily surprised that even business owners that might be considered my ‘competition’ because we work in the same medium were happy to answer all of my mundane technical details (for example, how and what do you display on your price tags?) and quell my worries about the exhibit-related unknowns with their personal experiences.

3. Spending less that $10,000 is probably not realistic unless you live nearby. The farther away you live the more it will probably cost. Things to budget for: Booth display materials (including furniture, paint, signage, flooring, etc), product sample costs, design and reproduction of various marketing and sales materials, freight costs to and from, plane tickets, hotel room(s), food, taxis and subway passes, the salary for a helper (I do not recommend doing the show alone), not to mention the cost of the booth space itself (by and far the largest portion of the budget) and any additional booth costs like a corner location fee, extra lighting, electrical outlets, internet, etc (all of which you can expect to be overpriced).

Don’t worry, you don’t have to come up with all of this at once. The show management company will even work with you to stretch out the booth payment in 3 or 4 increments to lessen the dent in your cash flow. The other costs are spread out months before (plane costs, booth fees + display), during (food, transportation), and after (freight, hotel bills, wages). If you can self-finance this, you’ll be in a much better place when you emerge.

Recommendations for Attending and Exhibiting

1. Applying costs you nothing and you can always change your mind before you sign the contract. Some (I would say the best) sections are juried, so I had decided that if I got into the section of my choice I would do the show. Other sections don’t have entry requirements but the management company will generally advise/encourage you in certain directions, just be cognizant that they might have internal motivations for certain section placement.

If you did your homework and attended then you’ll already know where you want to be. Many categories overlap each other so it’s not as simple as “Oh, I hand-make my work, so I should be in Handmade”. That could be true, but you should take a look at the other brands that make up the category – there were many handmade artists in Accent on Design as well, so the choice came down to aesthetics and context. Your booth/category neighbors will influence how your company is perceived, so choose thoughtfully. Ask your current wholesale customers where THEY think you should be, or what section they shop in most. Keep in mind that the show is HUGE and caters to a very diverse audience, so proper location is everything.

2. I highly recommend designing your booth layout as much in advance as possible. My booth had hardwalls that I was mounting shelving and pipe directly to, so I had to make do with a drawing to scale in Illustrator supplemented with tape on the walls to decide on placement ahead of time for a faster and smoother install. If you’re shipping your materials you should also consider weight, size, and how small it can break down for easier and less expensive freight (I did a post recently about my booth design that you can read here).

3. The official services offered through the show management company are often more expensive, so do your homework. They generally allow outside services, sometimes with fees, but usually just with a small amount of paperwork. It’s usually worth it as the savings can be big. I spent a day calling around getting freight quotes after starting with the official show vendor and found that they were about 20% more expensive than everyone else.

4. Doing this show alone is the worst idea ever. I considered it, and know people who do it, but I have no regrets over the extra cost of flying out an employee. You could work around this if you have friends in the city who you can temporarily employ and I even believe there’s a service for workers that’s offered, but remember that they’ll be representing you and your brand at an important public event, and I think it is hugely helpful to have someone there that is already familiar with the inner workings of your product/company.

Here are the reasons it’s a bad idea to be alone:

-Installation of my 60 sq foot fairly minimalist booth took 9 solid hours of work with 2 people and an install plan down to the inch. I would guess that it would be more than twice that amount of time alone. That would mean one if not two extra install days which makes your whole trip more expensive and time-consuming because you have to arrive even earlier for the show.

-De-install is the worst part of the whole show. Unlike when you arrive, your crate/boxes/pallet can take up to ten hours to be delivered to your booth when the show closes and no one can tell you when. Unlike during the show, after it closes they don’t have security, and it’s total chaos with forklifts everywhere and boxes flying- and it’s really not smart or safe to leave your booth. So you have to wait. Maybe a long time. It’s best done in shifts.

-Unless your booth is located adjacent to the bathroom (mine was – what a blessing and a curse), leaving your booth during the show means there’s no one to greet the Barney’s buyer that just wandered into your booth. It’s a law of the universe that important people always come when you leave your booth unattended. The same goes for getting food. You’ll need to do both during the 9 hour day. Plus it’s nice to stretch your legs from time to time and say hi to other vendors, or just wander and be inspired.

-Sometimes it’s slow and boring, and other times it’s super busy and you have multiple people wanting to talk to you or place an order at the same time, and you’ll wish you have 3 other helpers. By having one other person you double your chances of a potential sale not walking off.

Interacting with Buyers

Here are the most common questions asked by buyers entering my booth:

-Do you have anyone selling your work near [a particular address]? Make sure to have a current list of all your accounts handy.

-What is your opening order minimum / reorder minimum?

-Do you do custom work?

-What is your turnaround time? Pigeon Toe’s work is made to order and we operate on a 4-6 week production schedule. Most people are fine with this timeline and/or want to book out way in the future for orders to be delivered closer to the holidays. Build a schedule in advance and figure out how much work you can conceivably produce in one timeframe, as people will want estimated delivery dates on the spot. Secondly, when you’re booking out your orders leave a little room early in your schedule in case your dream store comes by later in the week and wants to order—you don’t want to give them any reason not to buy like not being able to get product until November.

-Where is your product shipping from/how is it packaged?

-Do you have a catalog? I printed an abbreviated fold-out catalog for this event, having been digital-only previously, and am sure glad I did. Many people are fine going to a URL to download the whole thing, but like to have something to take with them when they go home or back to their hotel room to decide on what to buy. They are not just making decisions about your product, but the whole assortment of their store at once.

-Do you offer terms? You should have a policy in place for this ahead of time. Many bigger accounts only operate on net terms and you need to consider if you can float the cost of an order in exchange for securing a larger company, like Anthropologie.

-What are your bestsellers?

Important note : Half of this show is about sales leads, so if someone asks for your business card, ask for one right back. Some people will say no, or that they’ve run out, in which case I’d ask if I could take down their email address instead. But many others are happy to pass on contact info and it’s an understood and expected exchange of information.

Things I Wished I’d Known

-If you can, store everything you use to ship inside your booth. Maybe your crate is also your table, or you build a shallow wall to hide your boxes and supplies behind. If you don’t have to store your shipping materials, you don’t have to wait all day for your stuff to be returned. I sure wish I’d done that, as we had to wait 6 hours for our empty boxes to come back before we could begin packing up.

- An ‘accommodation order’ is a personal order from another designer or company at your wholesale price. Sometimes you can buy directly off the floor (we did this with our samples so we saved on shipping on the way back), which is not technically allowed but widely practiced, sometimes it’s a order that will ship in a few weeks or months. The first time someone asked if I did them I didn’t know what the term meant. Some companies will do it and some won’t, but it doesn’t hurt to ask!

-When you’re a new, unfamiliar company, some buyers are hesitant to order, especially if your opening minimum is high. They want to see you at the show a few times to verify you’re a legitimate, thriving business. After the first day we started offering a show special at our reorder minimum (if they wrote [placed the order] at the show) so they could try us out without a big financial commitment. Oftentimes the buyer ended up hitting our opening minimum anyway, and the number was just a mental barrier to ordering. It really increased sales at the show and I’d recommend some variation on this idea.

As an alternative, you could put together a bundle of your best-selling products at a good rate so they are not overwhelmed by choice, or offer free shipping if they buy at the show, etc. Incentivize them to try you out, and then blow them away so they reorder down the line.

- There is a lot of information/rules in the manual about what exhibitors can and cannot do for installation and what the labor union workers must do. For example: if your install requires tools, or it would take more than half an hour to do, you have to hire a tradesman, which can be VERY expensive. I went into it fearing I was going to have some large unexpected bills due to this, but if your booth is small they don’t pay any attention. There are some booths at the show that are 400 or 500 square feet that are basically houses built inside the venue; that is why these rules exist, not so they can make $200 installing some shelves for you. I was adjacent to the labor desk and wielded my power drill without interruption. It was a lot of worry over nothing at all.

-Have a policy in place, ideally on the order receipt, about changing or canceling orders at the show. Sometimes buyers will come back the next day sheepish about going way over budget and needing to edit their order down or cancel it. Generally the buyers are super nice and a bit embarrassed- and going out of your way to work with them will pay back in the long term, but you need to institute time limits so they can’t turn around and cancel when you’ve already ordered all the supplies and you’re midway through producing their order back home.

-It’s safe to assume that if someone has their name tag on backwards, or not at all, they are probably from a big organization/company and would like to avoid being solicited. Try to engage or greet them warmly without being pushy. If they’re interested if what you’re up to, they’ll approach you or come back through later to chat.

I hope this has been helpful and informative! I wish you the best of luck deciding the next steps to grow your business. – Lisa