cpw
Babbling Farker
We sold just over $2000.
Vending first festival, a few questions
- Thread starter cpw
- Start date
Jacked UP BBQ
Babbling Farker
I vend for a living, however you were able to pull off 55% profit off of those sales is amazing. You must be a slave driver! hahah I cant even get my net profit percentage into the 40's unless I get into the high teens in sales. Good for you man. COngrats on the win too!
rgrizzle
Full Fledged Farker
That's awsome I've been keeping an eye on this thread. I have my first event starting this Thursday running until Saturday. I went today and bought 300 take out containers and 400 untinsel packages plus about $200 more dollars of supplies hopefully this will get me through the first day and a half. I'm glad things went well any other info would be great. Like prices. Menu ect.
JimmyDAL
is one Smokin' Farker
Congrats and keep it going!
cpw
Babbling Farker
That's why we were able to make a profit....we all worked for free, this was basically just a way to keep the pot full for the next competition. If we had to pay ourselves, we wouldn't have made much profit at all (if any).
Our menu was pretty basic: PP sandwich for $6, PP sandwich + 1 side $7, and a PP plate (meat + 2 sides) for $8. Drinks for $1.
For sides, we did coleslaw (which was super easy to keep up with), baked beans (which were a little harder to keep up with) and chips (we bought a 50 pack box that we ran out of).
The other issue was reheating the pork. We cooked it all beforehand and froze it. The plan was to reheat in boiling water, but we never had a chance to time how long it took to reheat (got too busy too quick) so we were running out of pork before the next batch was hot.
Bbq Bubba
somebody shut me the fark up.
rgrizzle
Full Fledged Farker
your meu and pricing is right n line with what I was thinking. Thanks
cpw
Babbling Farker
I remembered
but by the time you had mentioned it, we had already purchased the supplies. Luckily the guy we borrowed the trailer from sells regular nachos so nothing will go to waste.Bub-B-Que
MemberGot rid of the matchlight.
I have done 5 small festivals this year like the one you are talking about. Have one this weekend that's both Saturday and Sunday actually and it's the last one of the season for me.
The way I like to judge how much to make goes off a lot of what is mentioned above by everyone but I will add in my check list below:
-Projected Attendance (I've found its normally about 80% of what they say and even though rule of thumb is 1/4 per person, I normally do 1/3 a lb per person on meat)
-How late in the festival/ craft show season is it?
-Weather Forecast!!!
-Ask the event staff what previous attendance has been in the past 3 years. Then ask for a food vendors number who has been there before so you can call and ask them (has it gone up, down or stayed the same?)
- How many food vendors and how close are they to you?
-Are there food vendors there also serving BBQ? (sometimes it's a festival no-no to allow more than one but it happens)
-Check the festival map, where is my spot? (is it a good location or did they stick me in a corner?)
Once I weigh all of these points then I try figure on how much to make. Keep the number a little conservative because it's better to fire up the cooker Saturday night to make more than it is bringing home 30 extra lbs of pork in Sunday and not having the freezer space. 80% of the time we have been spot on. Festival goes from 10a-5p and were sold out by 4 and cleaning up as much as possible without breaking everything down to go home. However I will say I have been burned once or twice as well. Rain rolled in on one and the other there were twice as many people that attended than was expected and we sold out 4 hrs before we could leave. Doing festivals like these are a gamble sometimes if it's your first go around and I will also throw out there it's good to keep record of how much you sold and what sold the best. One show you will sell pork like it's the last time people will ever get a chance to eat it and then the next you will sell a side worth of beef.
If you get to the festival and it's not what you expected it to be and there's not as much of a crowd try to find a way to stand out above everyone else if possible. You want (good) attention brought to your set up. A few things that have helped me has been posting on a dry erase board during the slow selling times (2-3 pm) that it's ''Happy Hour!" 1$ off all sandwiches and platters. You may pull in a few extra customers that way. Also I like to try BBQ trivia with people as they walk by. And last but not least a good game of Rock, Paper, Scissors for a $1 off is a oldie but goodie. 2 out of 3 wins (always lose on purpose to help make the sale)
As far as sides, the thing I have found is if you have fresh cut FF on your menu, that's the #1 seller with a platter. Make sure you designate someone to handle just the fryer and pay them well because they're going to work like a rented mule! Potato salad normally is the last thing to sell along with baked beans and Slaw reigns supreme right behind the fries along with small bags of chips.
From the drink perspective I normally get 2 cases of water, 2 flats of Coke, 1 Diet and 1 12 pack of Sprite for a 2 day festival.
I hope this all helps you out and good luck!
The way I like to judge how much to make goes off a lot of what is mentioned above by everyone but I will add in my check list below:
-Projected Attendance (I've found its normally about 80% of what they say and even though rule of thumb is 1/4 per person, I normally do 1/3 a lb per person on meat)
-How late in the festival/ craft show season is it?
-Weather Forecast!!!
-Ask the event staff what previous attendance has been in the past 3 years. Then ask for a food vendors number who has been there before so you can call and ask them (has it gone up, down or stayed the same?)
- How many food vendors and how close are they to you?
-Are there food vendors there also serving BBQ? (sometimes it's a festival no-no to allow more than one but it happens)
-Check the festival map, where is my spot? (is it a good location or did they stick me in a corner?)
Once I weigh all of these points then I try figure on how much to make. Keep the number a little conservative because it's better to fire up the cooker Saturday night to make more than it is bringing home 30 extra lbs of pork in Sunday and not having the freezer space. 80% of the time we have been spot on. Festival goes from 10a-5p and were sold out by 4 and cleaning up as much as possible without breaking everything down to go home. However I will say I have been burned once or twice as well. Rain rolled in on one and the other there were twice as many people that attended than was expected and we sold out 4 hrs before we could leave. Doing festivals like these are a gamble sometimes if it's your first go around and I will also throw out there it's good to keep record of how much you sold and what sold the best. One show you will sell pork like it's the last time people will ever get a chance to eat it and then the next you will sell a side worth of beef.
If you get to the festival and it's not what you expected it to be and there's not as much of a crowd try to find a way to stand out above everyone else if possible. You want (good) attention brought to your set up. A few things that have helped me has been posting on a dry erase board during the slow selling times (2-3 pm) that it's ''Happy Hour!" 1$ off all sandwiches and platters. You may pull in a few extra customers that way. Also I like to try BBQ trivia with people as they walk by. And last but not least a good game of Rock, Paper, Scissors for a $1 off is a oldie but goodie. 2 out of 3 wins (always lose on purpose to help make the sale)
As far as sides, the thing I have found is if you have fresh cut FF on your menu, that's the #1 seller with a platter. Make sure you designate someone to handle just the fryer and pay them well because they're going to work like a rented mule! Potato salad normally is the last thing to sell along with baked beans and Slaw reigns supreme right behind the fries along with small bags of chips.
From the drink perspective I normally get 2 cases of water, 2 flats of Coke, 1 Diet and 1 12 pack of Sprite for a 2 day festival.
I hope this all helps you out and good luck!
