Another Small-town Affair

Last weekend, I appeared at Belton, Missouri’s annual Spring Craft Show at the High Blue Wellness Center. Not exactly the kind of place one would expect to go searching for books, but there was a last-minute opening, so I decided to take the chance.

The long and short of it is, not surprisingly, that this was not a chance worth taking. At least for me. For one thing, much to my surprise, there were two other booksellers present, and whereas I was situated in the back corner, one of them was located very near the entrance to the gymnasium. I think the fact it is advertised as a craft show didn’t help either. I had my reservations about that from the start, as folks came no doubt looking for hand-made items rather than mass-produced items like books. Nevertheless, I made one sale to a repeat customer I first met at the Christmas Bazaar in 2024, which is always a gratifying experience. I do not think my increased prices were much of a deterrent either: this simply wasn’t a large crowd, and certainly not one rife with readers. But again, this was not unexpected.

So, in summary, I would not recommend this particular event to any fellow authors, unless you have some very specific kinds of titles that appeal to the target demographic (i.e. primarily women, occasionally with children). Romance novels and cookbooks might be advisable. There were also many older folks, to whom a good nonfiction book or Bible-related materials would probably not go astray. However, since I have none of these to sell as of yet, I probably won’t be returning for a while.