5 ways My First Retail Show was an Epic #Fail

I walked in real cool, unprepared, but green and eager. I thought I had a product that would just sell itself. Was I so wrong? I knew absolutely nothing and it showed. ?

1. No tablecloth, no show - My table was sad, real sad. I wished I had paid attention in home economics on how to fold a t shirt. I never got hired in high school to work on the cool retail stores, so I never had first hand experience. So there was my merch on a sad little table, no skirt, no special fold. A friend whispered, “Lisha this is presentation basics 101”. I felt like a fool.
2. Your online presence doesn’t translate offline? - I thought my social media presence would take me far, but LinkedIn isn’t like real life. Adding a few hashtags just won’t cut it. Nobody knew who I was, except my child. I didn’t know where to start to explain who I was and what was I selling.?
3. Stay at your table? - Truth is I didn’t want to stand at the table by myself, with all the action happening around me. There was a live concert, wine sampling, cake sampling, how could I focus!
4. Cater to your audience -? The event was a fun family friendly creatives event, not my techie audience I’m used to. So I should have made my concept more relatable to the audience. Oakland people have much pride so every merch that had Oakland on it was a natural winner.?
5. Selling Skills are important? - I barely looked people in the eye when they came to booth and I’m horrible at small talk. This was a fatal flaw.?

At the end of the event, I only sold one T-shirt to my friend who took pity on me.?

Dusting off defeat, wiping my tears, and picking up my pride, please come join me on Wednesday. I promise I’ll do better.?

RSVP

Love,

Bell