There's a quarterly craft fair here in Chicago called Depart-ment (www.depart-ment.com) that I've been participating in for a couple of years now. What I like most about it is that you don't have to spend the entire weekend there manning a booth. Everything is tagged with your vendor ID number and rung out through a central cash register. All you have to do is drop your stuff off and then come back at the end of the weekend to pick up a (big, hopefully) check and any (few, hopefully) unsold merchandise. Because there's no booth, you also don't pay an up-front fee for a booth rental. Instead, the fair takes 15% of whatever money you make (10% if you volunteer to help out for a few hours). It's being held again this weekend, but I simply can't take the time to participate. I'm traveling next weekend for Memorial Day and have too much to do before my trip. If I had a car, it would be different, but trying to get to and from the craft fair location on the train and the bus would easily eat 4 or 5 hours of my weekend, and I just can't spare it. Besides, I find that knitted items don't sell very well in the spring and summer, so I wouldn't make enough money to justify the trip to the venue. The fall show is when I really clean up. So I'll just keep knitting all summer, building my inventory, so that I'll have plenty ready to go for the fall show.
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