Circa by Connie Swaim Crystal prisms, Masonic items and glass punch bowl ladles were the items most asked for during the 10 days I worked recently at my mom’s antique mall. Crystal prisms we had, Masonic items we had, but it turned out that nothing we had matched what anyone wanted and we didn’t have one glass punch bowl ladle. I counted six people who asked for Masonic items and five who wanted punch bowl ladles. Another trend was turkeys. We sold a lot of turkeys in those 10 days from ceramic figurines to planters to candles. Last year we had a lot of turkeys, thinking that since the Parke County Covered Bridge Festival is just a little more than a month before Thanksgiving, people would want turkey items, but no one bought any last year. This year they were all the rage. I also sold about 20 aprons. This is the first time I’ve ever actually sold any aprons. I wonder if the great article Barbara and Ken Beem wrote on aprons earlier this year sparked a collecting trend. Oddly enough, I sold all the aprons on one day of the 10-day festival. They all went to different people, but no one else even looked at the aprons during the rest of the event. It was like one day was national "I have to buy an apron day." All the aprons were $6 or less. They did look great hanging on a clothes line outside the mall. One thing that didn’t sell was Fostoria glass. I bought about 40 Fostoria drinking glasses in different patterns earlier this year. I bought them inexpensively and I thought I priced them that way. This wasn’t early Fostoria, more like 1970s or ’80s Fostoria. I had sets priced $15 for six glasses. I even put up a sign pointing out these vintage glasses were less expensive than buying new. No takers. I should have invested in turkeys. Another dealer said he was writing down his sales for each day of the festival to see if he could see any trends, but we decided it was probably hopeless. Even if there was a trend in sales this year, who is to say if it would carry over to next year? One thing about this industry, it is just hard to predict what people want. If it were easy, we would all be rich. I sold about $1,060 worth of merchandise during the festival, which is about $200 more than I sold last year, and is actually about the best I’ve ever done during the festival. But, I sure did get there the hard way. The most expensive item I sold was $70, after that it was $40, then a $30 item and pretty much everything else I sold was priced $10 or less. That was the big trend I saw as I spent the days writing up sales from all the different booths. Lots of stuff was selling, but you could write numerous tickets, wrap several items and find when you totaled it all up that the person had spent about $20. Very few pieces of furniture sold and if something priced $50 sold, we began to consider that a big-ticket item. Buyers just seemed to want inexpensive items. One dealer and I discussed how we weren’t even really very proud of the stock we were offering and that we just hoped no one we respected in the industry asked us which booth was ours. But, you have to sell what people are buying, even if it is $1 at a time. Ever since last year when I found a scenic Weller vase for $2 during the festival, readers have asked if I’ve found any more incredible finds. Every year during the Bridge Festival, my mom, her business partner in the antique mall and I spend the first Friday of the event going to flea markets and yard sales. This year was no exception. I didn’t find any fantastic pieces of pottery, but I did find a nice Steiff donkey. I was at a location where several different vendors had banded together offering about seven selling spots. I was walking by a table when I saw a donkey enclosed in a plastic bag. The bag was sweating and there was condensation on the inside. I mainly picked it up because it looked like an early toy donkey and I hated to see it ruined by the moisture building up inside the bag. As I was looking at it, I thought it was awfully cute and it was only $7.85. While I was trying to determine if the moisture had done any damage to it, the sun glinted off of something metal. There was a small tag in the donkey’s ear and upon closer examination I saw it said Steiff (sadly, I now have to take off my glasses in order to really read things like the Steiff button in its ear). Oddly enough, the sellers were antique dealers who had a booth in a few antique malls. I think they may have sold the donkey as they found it and never took it out of the bag to really examine it. Even more sadly, I had to give the donkey to my mom. Mom collects Steiff animals and she doesn’t have a donkey. She took one look at it and said, "You aren’t going to sell that are you?" So, I handed it over – Merry Christmas early Mom. |