5 Ways to Streamline Your Market Prep

It's likely if you're here reading this blog that you're probably already selling at events and you're looking for bits and pieces of information to help you grow into this area of your small biz.  Or you're interested in selling your handmade products at markets you're probably in the mode of gathering all of the helpful tips and tricks before you sign up for your first event.  If you're brand new to the market scene make sure you download my free "Ultimate Guide to Selling at Markets" to help you become more confident, make decisions quickly, and get the needle moving in your creative side hustle.

Have you ever had a big dream of what a market would look like for you?  A Pinterest worthy setup, inventory that makes you feel like you made enough and made the right things during your market prep season, and products that customers gush about?  But then when it came down to it you were paralyzed by the overwhelm of all of the prep you actually needed to do just to get to market day.  If this scene resonates with you, I have 5 ways to help you streamline your market prep to get you un-stuck and, on your way, to crushing your market goals.

Know your numbers.

You need to know what's selling and what's not.  If you haven't sold at a market before, or only have sold at a handful of shows you will have to test the waters a bit to figure this out.  You can't streamline your market prep until you know what you should be spending your time on making.

Batchwork.

You've heard me use this term before, but that's because it works.  It optimizes your time and helps you hit your inventory goals easier and more quickly.  Head over to this podcast for a deeper dive on how batchworking can benefit you inside of your maker biz.

Have an organized to-do list.

I love free apps like Asana or Trello to keep track of my creative side hustle to-do's.  This will keep everything in one place that's easy to find and you can work on it and update your list as you have time to work on your biz.

Create a vision board.

Seriously it helps to have a vision of where you want to be and what you want market day to look and feel like.  This will help you make any decision you need to make for your products, displays, and booth quickly and efficiently.

You can create a good old fashioned vision board on a poster board with magazine cutouts or just make a Pinterest board like I do.  You can check out mine here for some inspiration and give me a follow so you can stay up to date on what I'm finding and sharing over there!  Simply take a few minutes to start pinning things you're drawn to and like and add to your board as you see pins pop up that fit your market vision.

Know your productive times.

This is key whether or not this is your side hustle or full-time gig.  I used to be able to stay up late to make inventory or do a few power making sessions on the weekends to get ready for markets and it was great.  But now that I'm older and a mom I've figured out that mornings or a 4-hour block (earlier in the day) on the weekends are ideal for me.  I can get much more done during those times when I can focus than trying to piece together times of the day to get products made and juggling being a mom.  Now that I know those ideal times, I don't create products outside of them.  It's not effective for me and I can't be making 24/7 and neither should you.

If you're looking for a good read on how to find your ideal working times, I love the book 'At Your Best" by Carey Nieuwhof (click here to purchase on Amazon).  It breaks down to number of hours in a day you can perform at your peak and when that time is for you.  I can't always implement it the way I want as the mom of a little one but I do notice a huge difference when I can lean into the teachings of the book.

Bonus: Schedule it.

I like to work on 1-2 tasks a month leading up to market season.  This helps me get more done and keeps me organized and on task and I naturally like to bounce around on projects often leaving nothing done.

Here are the categories I like to break my tasks into:

1. Products (1, 2, 3, etc.)
2. Booth displays, DIY, re-fresh, etc.
3. Miscellaneous market prep (shopping bags, marketing materials, sales tax registration, bookings hotels, applying for events, etc.)

I hope that you're gaining some confidence in your market prep strategy and are able to apply these tips to your maker biz to help streamline the time leading up to your next market.  Let's get to crushing your biggest maker goals!

Want to stay in the loop and get my BEST creative side hustle tips and tricks?  Sing up for my email here where I share what's working, what's not, what I'm currently doing, and my market debriefs.  I'll pop into your inbox 1-2 times a month to give you only the best info out there!