Help! Vendors required!

Hullo loyal BUCKers!

We are currently suffering a worrying lack of vendors who have registered to sell stuff at BUCK. I've been scratching my head at why this is, and we reduced our vendor registration fee to boot, but haven't really seen much of an increase in uptake. Coupled with this, I've had people asking me if there will be things like We Love Fine shirts on sale, to which the current answer is "no", simply because we don't have anyone who wants to sell them.

Selling merch at a convention is a great way to make money. You know the niche market that will be there, and you generally have a good idea of what will sell, for what price, and at what amount of profit. It really is an opportunity (in this very community) to get your name out there too.

Unfortunately, it has come to the point at the moment where we are unsure of whether we will have to just not have a vendor section at all this year. It costs us extra for the venue to allow us to have people selling things, and if we only have about 3 or 4 vendors, it's not really worth the expense or the hassle for us, or for the vendors.

To rectify this, I need two things from those of you who are considering selling merchandise at our event. Either:
1) Register as a vendor ASAP, so we have a better idea of numbers, or:
2) E-mail me ([email protected]) telling me what we can do to make our event more attractive to travelling salesponies nonpareil.

If you would like to sell something, and have never done this before or are unsure about how to go about it, pop me off an e-mail and I'll be happy to give you advice!

Help us help you help everyone. <3

UPDATE:
Please see our website vendors page for details on who to email an application to:
http://www.bronyuk.org/con-info/vendors.html

Your tickets cover both days of the convention.

Vendors need to purchase an attendance ticket. This costs £20 per person.
They also need to purchase a table ticket. This also costs £20. Each table can have up to two people.

Thus if you want a table, it will cost £40. If there are two of you on your table then it will cost £60. If you want to share a table, then it's £20 each and £20 for the table (ie £60 total: £30 each, splitting costs).

We are charged by the venue for having vendors. This is why we are charging tickets for vendors. Depending on our budget status, we are trying to absorb some costs (we already absorb the google fees on tickets) so that more vendors can afford to come, hence the reduction in price.

If you have already purchased a vendor ticket at the previous rate then please contact us. However, much like aeroplanes or hotels, we may offer different rate tickets at different times. This does not necessarily mean that just because a ticket changes price later, you are entitled to the price difference. Likewise if ticket prices go up, we will not come and charge you the extra.

PS: Also note that the merchandise doesn't specifically have to be Pony related. If you think you have something people might like to buy, then contact us.

Many thanks
Mavro.

I have to echo this. I have a steadily growing army of mini ponies and I need to find homes for them!

Perhaps now the John De Lancie news has broken you'll get some more uptake.

I'll be spreading word of the vendor oppurtunities to UK bronies on Etsy.com; hopefully that'll get a couple if extra vendors. Part of me is actually tempted to make posters to attract more!

Working on it!
Just have to hope you guys still have tickets and space come payday!

It would suck to lose the vendors, for me swag is a big part of these conventions

I notice that by "vendors" a lot of people seem to think of folks selling official and unofficial pony merchandise, when really it doesn't have to be so specific.

Artists could sell pony artwork that they've already made, or alternatively take commissions for custom/OC artwork.
Modellers could sell models and customs they've already made, or again take commissions to be made at a later date.
Other than just shirts, you could sell jewellery, hats, mugs, lamps, picture frames, clocks and anything even tangentially relatable to ponies.
Perhaps sell dog tags with "Rainbow Dash" embossed into them? Or Fluttershy cupcakes? Paint an epic mural and sell it for a few hundred quid!

The possibilities are endless!

I did briefly consider applying for a vendors ticket and selling my pin badges, keychains and all my spare offical merch but I dont want to tie myself to a table during the convention.

This ^

You don't have to man the table for the duration of the con. You could be on for a few hours, the pack up (or semi pack up, so long as your merch is safe), and wander the con. Repeat as required!

^
Best way to vendor at any event, come prepared with a 'Back in __ minutes' sign and use as required.

...or if you're good at seconds, 10 seconds flat

Just dropped an email off to see if I can get a release date for the royal wedding items, would love to get hold of them for you guys in time for BUCK.

no sorry, this will be my first convention of this nature and I really just want to enjoy myself and not have to worry about dealing with customers.

Finished the poster, attached here. Will re post on the art related part of the forum with an action plan to spread the word, hopefully Aware that some content on the poster is unconfirmed so will change it if requested.

Looks cool but I have 2 nit picks if youll hear me out.

1. I had a little trouble reading the font, minor I know but just thought Id let you know.

2. It mentions Faust and Strong but I thought they hadnt been confirmed as guests?

Likewise, the font for the body text is far too thin to be easily legible.
Personally I would also get rid of those information boxes, reducing the content to some lines below the title section. The current design looks much too cramped and could use a bit more whitespace.

I think you making promises buck cant keep tara strong is at EFNW and Faust isn't confirmed. The poster is good but false advertising is not.

Et Voila, Version 2.0! Thanks for the feedback all.

Much better! As for Tara Strong and Lauren Faust, we all know that Tara Strong is going to be at EFNW (and chances are, is that her schedule is wrapped around it, so I don't think she could quickly fly out there to Manchester), but by the looks of things, it looks like that Lauren Faust is going to be hard at work on other projects (more cartoons? Like a Faust) at the time, so I don't think she'll be able to make it, but at least we'll have John de Lancie. Maybe next year, we could get more top guests onboard, if BUCK doesn't collide with EFNW this time. We can only hope

That's amazing! A couple of issues:

1. We're not Bronycon UK, and we can't use that name. We're officially called "Brony UK Convention" or "B.U.C.K."
2. If you could headline it with "Britannia needs" or "B.U.C.K. needs", as it reads a bit odd without that right now. Maybe if you have that second one, have our full name somewhere in the info text underneath.
3. Maybe take the underline off the red text
4. Uncondense the very bottom text (the venue)
5. Not sure I like the nails; see how it looks without them

Would you mind if we spam this all over our usual publicity circuits (we'll credit you, of course)?