2023 Show Dates!

[Gwydion]

It is in a school and tends to be a bit spread out, a bit like Crusade at Penarth went before it closed. It's not impossible to find stuff but there are odd bits of the show in other buildings and rooms.
I don't mind ferreting about but you don't just walk into one massive hall and that's it. I suspect some visitors get a bit lost. Maybe that disperses the footfall for some traders.

[Orcs]

Those are good numbers actually, 20+ visitors per trader tends to be where you can make a decent amount of sales. 

That's an interesting statistic

[Leon]

That's an interesting statistic

I've found it's a reasonably accurate way of judging a show over the past 10 years or so.  If you go to a smaller event with 300 visitors and 30 traders, you've got no way of making any money at 10 punters per trader.  But something like Partizan where you've got 1100-1200 visitors to 40 traders is 25+ per trader and makes it a profitable day.

20+ seems to be the cutoff point, anything less than that and you're going to struggle and 25+ is where you can feel the difference.  There are obviously other factors (travel, hotels, pay-day timing, have you got the right products, etc) but it's a good overall metric to use.

That's one of the reasons I think Salute was so good this year.  Previously they'd have had 170-ish traders sharing the 5000-6000 visitors (which is a healthy 30+ per trader) but this year there were only 125-130 traders there, bumping the 'per trader' number over the 40+ mark. 

It's something that some shows don't seem to pay attention to, and they just cram as many traders in as they possibly can and then wonder why nobody has a good day.  As an organiser you have to let the visitor numbers dictate the trader numbers, not the other way around.  We've had a policy with Battleground to only bring in 1 new trader per 25 extra visitors, to ensure that we're not diluting the spending power in the event and damaging the traders sales.

[paulr]

Very interesting, I suspect some organisers would think that more traders will encourage more visitors

The traders at our shows in New Zealand should be pretty happy as there are typically 1-3 traders and 100-200 participants but only a few visitors

[Leon]

Very interesting, I suspect some organisers would think that more traders will encourage more visitors

For me, it's quality rather than quantity that attracts more visitors.  You could easily pack a UK show with 10-20 resellers of the same plastic kits but I don't think it brings more people in.  All you end up with is the same product on half the stands, all competing on price and ultimately not making any money.

It's something I've actively worked on for Battleground, trying to make sure we've got as much as possible represented at the show.  So we've got 6mm, 10mm, 15mm, 20mm, 28mm, scenery, MDF, books, painting services, plastic kits, 3D prints, 2nd hand, etc.