e
Pop-Up Event Showcasing Made-in-USA Goods Clears Up Vendor Accounting Discrepancy
American Field sets the record straight
Last month we wrote about American Field, a traveling pop-up event that showcases "the best of American-made brands." Since some of you entrepreneurs in our readership could benefit from getting a booth at AF's events, we broke down the numbers in their post-event reviews, to give you a rough idea of sales; but some calculations using the supplied figures did not add up.
Enter a caption (optional)To refresh your memory, here's one of the AF graphics we referred to, with our original copy below it in italics:
Enter a caption (optional)It would be nice if they provided just a bit more detail for clarity's sake. The math doesn't add up, for instance, on the Total Vendor Revenue of $236,000 spread over 118 vendors; they have the Average Revenue per Vendor at $1,200—but $236,000 divided by 118 actually comes out to $2,000. That leaves $94,400 unaccounted for, which is a bit too big to be a rounding error.
My first thought was that they were subtracting the price of the booth rentals, but that doesn't work either: Looking at the 2016 Vendor Contract, the smallest booth you can rent in Brooklyn is a 10' x 10' that rings in at $1,250.
Thankfully Mike Stone, American Field's Community Manager, reached out to us to explain the discrepancy. Here it is, in Stone's words:
"The numbers discrepancy on the Brooklyn 2014 info sheet, which shows two different averages, is a result of two different ways that we estimate vendor revenue. The first way is via self-reporting; we ask all vendors to give us their feedback at the conclusion of the event including their revenue to whatever degree of accuracy they are comfortable with.
"The second is via our partnership in 2015 with Square payments, which allowed us some geographical data about how many sales happened over the course of the event in our location.
"Neither of these estimates are perfectly accurate representations of total vendor revenue, but we include them so that potential vendors can understand the amount of buying that goes on at our events.
"These should have been cross-checked to match up on the info sheet, but instead showcase two results. In the future we'll include more clarity as to how we calculate our numbers, as they are intended to be a helpful tool for our vendors and members of our community and not a point of confusion."
Hopefully that clears it up for any of you who were thinking of applying for a booth but left uncertain by the numbers, and hopefully the data sheets from future AF events will make things even more clear to potential vendors.
Speaking of future events, the remaining American Field showings for this year are:
Washington, D.C.
Oct. 15-16
Atlanta
Nov. 12-13
Nashville
Nov. 19-20
Brooklyn
Dec. 3-4
-
oFavorite This
-
Q1Comment
Directory Company Profiles
Core77
Industrial Design
Resources
Industrial Design
Resources
-
Core77 Directory
Find the Best Industrial Design CompaniesGo -
Formation Design Group
Formation is a product design + development company focused on human centered design innovation. To ...
-
Fresco Design
Fresco supports world-class brands with world-class design. Based in the Boston area, a leading inno...
-
Alternatives
We're a full-service branding and creative agency. We specialize in building brands, companies and o...
-
Sprout Studios
Sprout Studios is an award-winning, concept-to-launch design studio deeply rooted in technology and ...
-
Bluemap Design
BlueMap design is a multi-disciplinary product development firm. Founded by Simon Yan in 2001, the f...
-
Unbox Product Design
Unbox is a full-service design, engineering, branding, and custom manufacturing firm. Unbox works wi...
-
Tandem Product Design
With a stellar record of design and engineering successful products with World Class brands since 20...
K
{Welcome
Create a Core77 Account
Already have an account? Sign In
By creating a Core77 account you confirm that you accept the Terms of Use
K
Reset Password
Please enter your email and we will send an email to reset your password.
Comments
This event is a total sham. We participated in this event twice in 2018. once in DC last May and a second time in Boston in September. Both times they were extremely unorganized and lacking in marketing materials. The event attendance was extremely low. The worst I’ve ever experienced at any event. We have been participating in retail events of this nature for over 10 years and have never paid so much for such little square footage of booth space to receive such little value. When we expressed our concerns to the show organizers as they asked for our feedback, we were quickly dismissed and given excuse after excuse as to why perhaps our experience and low sales were such. Because we had so much downtime due to low traffic, I, the owner of my company, had the time to talk to all of the vendors individually throughout the show hours (as there weren’t many vendors either). Over 80% of the vendors expressed disappointment and mentioned that the owner had completely changed his staff and it seemed to them that perhaps the event was declining in attendance and not performing as it had in years past. Whenever an AF recruiter approached me to purchase booth space back in January 2018 I was very hesitant as I heard mixed reviews from past vendors. When I expressed my concerns about applying they were very quick to make every guarantee possible to get me to sign up for three events. THREE. The third event I signed up for was for DC during their holiday market this past December. After low sales at DC and Boston markets in spring and fall due to poor attendance and marketing, I politely asked for a refund of my deposit for the 3rd event. I was promised a refund after the new year in 2019. I have contacted Mark Bollman himself and his team over five times via email and phone and was even told by him in an email that if I am not patient then I will not receive a refund at all. I was told that these things take time and that I should be grateful that I’m even getting a refund. Last I checked it’s pretty simple to process a refund. It’s a matter of clicking a few buttons. It’s been nearly 5 months since we were promised a refund and have yet to receive it. We paid thousands of dollars to this company for a product that we did not receive. They have been unhelpful with logistics and very dismissive of their vendors. And they in fact do not sell all 100% American made products at their events. Because they were Low on vendor applications, they had companies selling window treatments and boutiques selling fast fashion products made in China. They are not who they say they are and it is a disservice to small businesses that they prey upon.