Weekend Conflicts

Dare I Cancel and Forfeit My Booth Fee?

by Loretta Fontaine

hen I was younger, in my twenties, I’d participate in up to 16 shows a year. Then, a typical summer month might have shows scheduled for three of the four weekends. I had a single, carefree life with few obligations.

Today, I’m glad I’ve pared down to a handful of quality wholesale and retail shows. With a spouse and two young kids, weekends load up with parties, weddings and camping trips fairly fast. I try to steer clear of conflicts between shows and family obligations, but schedules can still collide.

Last year I applied to a summer retail show, a splendid Arts Center affair held on the banks of the Hudson River. But after I mailed in the application, I received an invitation to my sister-in-law Suzanne’s engagement party on the same date! The thought of talking ring sizes and making change while my family was laughing and downing gnocchi at a New York City restaurant was not appealing. Dare I cancel and forfeit my booth fee? Should I go for the income but desert the show early to drive 60 miles to the party?

Jill Sharp of Blue Piranha Jewelry in Roswell, Ga. almost always puts her show schedule first when weekend conflicts arise. “It’s my business and I’ve paid out my business dollars for the jurying and the booth fee, added the information to my web site and let customers know where I’m going to be,” Sharp says. “I just can’t cancel because someone’s having a party/graduation, etc. Occasionally I’ll break the rule, but it’s pretty rare. Shows are my ‘face time’ in front of customers and represent 90% of my income.”

Suzanne Gentes of Amherst, Mass. knows she’ll often miss celebrating her husband Bill’s birthday. It falls in February, a busy wholesale and retail time for her business, Süzknits. Frustration added up last year, when Bill turned 50. Gentes’ mother-in-law wanted to throw a momentous extended family birthday party for him at her rented apartment in Florida. The weekend coincided with the retail portion of the American Crafts Council Baltimore show, and Gentes was wait listed for the event.

With seasonal work (Süzknits specializes in women’s outerwear of Polartec® fleece with hand-loomed accents), this winter retail show was a significant one for Gentes. “Women just won’t try on my coats in the heat — I’ve learned that!” she says. “So an opportunity to sell my outer-wear at a quality show in the dead of winter is important! Bill kept getting calls from his mother and sisters about my plans for the weekend. With my schedule up in the air, and my daughter‘s rehearsals for a lead in the high school musical, he finally had to tell his mother we’d celebrate another time.” Gentes did get off the wait list and had an excellent show, and the big birthday bash is tentatively scheduled for Cape Cod this summer.

Gentes finds it a balancing act to plan shows around her family’s schedule. “Family events are never planned as far in advance as show applications,” she says. “But often, family events are more important. I left the corporate world and started Süzknits in 1991 when my son was in kindergarten. He has special needs, Asperger’s syndrome, and I wanted to work at home and be flexible for him.

Her son will be starting as a freshman at Ohio Wesleyan University this fall. When Gentes was checking off boxes for Fall 2005 dates on a show application last winter, she realized she didn’t want to miss Parent’s Weekend. “I called the University to find out the dates of Parent’s Weekend,” Gentes recalls, “and they didn’t immediately know. It took a lot of digging and pushing! I found out just under the wire, before the application’s December deadline!”

My show vs. engagement party dilemma was solved when a rejection letter from the Arts Center arrived in the mail! This counts as the only time in my career I was delighted by rejection! Later, I was able to eat the gnocchi and watch my girls run among the guests seated at linen draped tables scattered with rose petals. As we toasted the engaged couple, I figured I’d make up the lost income some other way!