Our vendor room filled almost immediately this year. It is small so we don’t really advertise how to become a vendor – it’s highly competitive and we get many more submissions than we have spaces for.

We ran vendor room differently as promised. We received applications for a month and then Susana and I sat down and figured out who went where. We only had one who had to be put on the waiting list (at first).

I sent out emails with payment instructions and gave all the vendors two weeks to pay to lock in their spaces. One vendor asked for an extension which I was going to very reluctantly give, but I didn’t get back to him soon enough so he paid. I feel terrible but it means that I have to be strict with the unpaid vendors because THAT vendor paid even when he was having some trouble doing so.

Two vendors missed the deadline. I sent out a fairly stern email telling them their space was forfeit unless they paid by 7pm on 6/19 (today). That gave them 22 hours to pay from the moment I emailed them. (I think this is more than fair considering they had two weeks to pay and haven’t. I could have just canceled their spaces. I gave them a second chance.)

No response so far. (UPDATE: one has paid as of 11am.)

If they don’t pay, this evening I’ll send out emails telling them their space has been forfeited. They can request to be put on the bottom of the waiting list if they would like.

I hate doing that, but we’ve added like 4 more vendors to the waiting list in the last two weeks. WE DON’T ADVERTISE THE VENDOR ROOM and we still end up with many new vendors every year trying for spots.

I really need a bigger vendor room. I’d really like 30 spaces instead of 19. I still want to limit the vendor area, but I think we can support more than 19 spaces. This would allow some of the vendors who want 3 spaces to GET three spaces. I think increasing to 30 spaces would allow us something like 4 or 5 more vendors which isn’t really a lot.

But . . . where?

A question for next year, I suppose.