Holiday Crafter's Faire.
Nov 14-15, 2009. Held at the Pavilion located
inside the (Berrysessa) San Jose Flea Market.
1590 Berryessa Road, San Jose, CA 95133
This is the 13th year for this event and perhaps the
5th time that we have done it. At one time
this particular flea market was considered by many
to be the largest Flea Market in the United States.
Of course, this was probably arguable, but who
knows? Nowadays, I don't really think anybody
cares about this since we are in a very struggling
economy and the vendor's are departing for greener
pasture's or wherever they are able to relocated.
This property is being sold (or has been) and this
once thriving flea market will be no more. You
can search the web for more info since details are
quite sketchy at this time.
This annual event was held at the
Pavilion iin the center of the San Jose Flea
Market. This was the 13th year for this
event and I would estimate that they had
around 70 vendors; half of which had
jewelry. Way too much. I think
that the promoter's do pretty good in
setting up the event, but there is only so
much you can do. Event is held within
a Flea Market so you are going to get people
with FMM (Flea Market Mentality) and the
crowd is demographically-correct. The
middle class just does not frequent this
Flea Market like they used to.
The FM was slated for demolition and I had
the idea that the vendor's there (outside
the pavilion) were just basically waiting
for D-Day. However, it doesn't appear
so. The crowds weren't too large on
Saturday but we did have some traffic flow
on Sunday, and people just were not buying.
I suppose a majority of the depressed
vendor's did not even make $100. Most
did make the booth fee, by default.
There are individuals who claim they did
okay and that's fine and dandy. I
don't know what their definition of 'okay'
really is. If you are trying to
make a living off your products, forget it.
You'll make your booth space and a little
bit of burrito money, but that's about it.
Doomed. Bye-bye Balboni. |
Friday, November 13. Good ol' Friday the 13th.
I didn't walk under any ladders; no black cats ran
in front of me; no accidents, etc. Just
another hum-drum kind of day. Make it
through another Friday the 13th safely. Knock
on wood.
Drove down to the Flea Market before noon time and
as I made my way over toward the Pavilion and saw a
bunch of empty, vacated stalls. Not a good
sign. Maybe they only do the flea market on
weekends. Soon to find out. It looked
like a lot of people in the 'permanent' spaces have
departed.
I drove into the pavilion and set up my canopy.
I have two spaces and I wanted to spread out.
Didn't want to set up two booths though. We
quickly put the canopy up along with the grids and
then placed all of our merchandise inside and
covered up. WIll return in the morning.
THE WEATHER looks pretty good but they previously
did mention 'showers' over the weekend. That
forecast no longer holds true and it will be in the
60's and sunny, For November, that is fantastic
weather especially the 'no rain' part. Oh
oh.... keep reading.
Saturday, November 14. Checked the forecast
just before leaving and it said sunny with
temperatures around 62 for both days. Sounds
great. I headed out the door and saw that the
street in front of my house was wet. There was
no sign of rain in any forecast that I saw.
What the heck!!! Went out to my van and got
inside and noticed that we had a heavy mist or a
very light rain. I left home around 6:30 and
arrived at the Flea Market around 7:10. I
decided to drive to the parking lot located on the
other side of the place so I would have a much
shorter walk. I was the first one in the lot
and ended up with the Numero Uno spot. I
walked over to the entrance and down tire-kicker
alley. I saw that they had
around 6-8 posts sticking in the ground, thus
blocking any vehicle that would enter from the back.
This snuffed out my plan of parking back there on
Sunday and driving in from that side. Now I
would have to enter the Flea Market with my vehicle
through the main entrance, which will be packed with
cars, trucks and vans when then open the floodgates
in the dark later on Sunday. Then, I'll have
to zig-zag my way through the aisles over to the
pavilion to load up thus affecting my clock-like
precision in exiting procedures.
It took me several hours to set up and by the 10:00
starting time, I was pretty much ready to go.
However, the people were slow in getting their butts
out of beds possibly because of the morning drizzle.
Who wants to come out in this crap?
WENT OVER TO THE SNACK BAR and picked up one of
their Grande Burritos (78 pesos)
and it turned out to be pretty good...... as
far as a Flea Market goes. Also got a cup of
fries which were still good even after all these
years and I had a Pepsi to drink. Altogether it
was a decent lunch, not befitting a king but rather
a Starving Vendor. This burrito gets the Betty
Crocker Gomez/Starving Vendors Seal of Approval.
SALES WERE EXCRUCIATINGLY SLOW FOR ALL OF US.
I counted approximately 70 vendors and maybe more
than half sold one type of jewelry or another.
Never saw a percentage of this many booths with it.
One vendor was claiming prices to be 50 percent off.
I have a problem with people who post signs that
their jewelry is 50 percent off. This can be
quite deceiving to Average Jose and Plain Jane as
most customer's tend be be a bit on the 'naive
side.' Most vendors know this trick.
Raise your prices and then claim that you are
selling it for 50 percent off or whatever. Not
really that many employ this trick though.
Gamesmanship? I think that it's very deceiving
but I guess all's fair in "Love, war and the art of
selling." I would prefer to mark my things up
a little more and then allow the customers to have
the satisfaction of negotiating a lower price.
However, I myself don't really employ this practice
either.
There was a drink vendor, Java JZ Mobile Cafe across
from me on the opposite side of the pavilion. They
had an extensive menu of iced and hot coffees along
with a splendid selection of smoothies. There
were many delicious-looking items on that menu and I
spent a few minutes just picturing what several of
them looked like and imagining how they would taste.
Many excellent choices and I had a hard time
deciding. As I waited in line a middle-aged
lady of South American descent placed her order.
She pulled out a twenty dollar bill and placed it on
the counter and the guy said "that's seven out of
twenty." She then reached inside her purse and
pulled out twenty cents and placed it on the
counter. No comment. Just another
priceless Starving Vendor moment. I waited for
my mocha which turned out to be excellente!!!.
That's a picture of my Mocha on the right. On
Sunday, I stepped over there for a Strawberry-Banana
Smoothie and that was great too. I'll bet this
guy kicks butt in some shows. He definitely
get the Starving Vendor's Golden Seal of Approval.
THE PEOPLE. Here's some shots of the people
walking around. We did get a larger crowd
during the PM on Sunday, but they had FMM.
MUSIC. Seasonal music played throughout the
day over the loudspeaker. Not much variety since it
was basically the same music played over and over.
Periodically, we were entertained by the three guys
in flannel shirts whom I shall refer to as 'Flannel
Jesus' as they strolled about the Pavilion
Christmas-type songs while strumming their guitars.
I guess that you can probably hire these guys for
parties and social gatherings?
.
Sunday, November 15. Weather was very nice and
no sign of rain. Crowds were low during the
early part of the day, but picked up as the day went
on, both in the Pavilion and out in the Flea Market
Area. Contrary to what I was told, there's no
real signs that this place is closing down. I
asked a number of people and they knew nothing.
Out in the Flea Market area, all appeared normal.
I didn't see enormous amounts of empty spaces and
the crowds during the afternoon were not very large,
but I thought you had a decent turnout for
mid-November. Complete Flea Market Mentality
all over the place along with Mexicans who come here
as more of a social thing and to do some cheap
Tijuana priced shopping. Gone are the glory
days of this Flea Market.
SLEEP AND SLIDE. In the morning, I uncovered my
canopy and stretched out my white cover
approximately 40 feet across the ground. I
looked at it and imagined setting up some kind of
slip and slide for the kids on it. Neat.
Bring over a water hose and spray some water on it
along with some soap and then let the kids have at
it. What else are you going to do in this
place? Charge them $5 for half an hour or
something. Good way to make some money.
Sounds like fun? Oh well.... just an
idea.
I recall
buying one of the slip-n-slides at Toys R-Us
ages ago and hooking it up to the water. Loads
of fun for the kids. You could also fold it up
(canopy covers) even further and sleep on it....
so thus, we can call it SLEEP AND SLIDE.
After all, we had kids racing up and down the
pavement in front of the booths on their skateboards
and rolly shoe things all day long so why not put up
some kind of amusement?
THE PROMOTER'S SET UP AN AREA within their booth for
the youngster's to sit down and do some holiday
drawing and coloring. Great idea.
ANOTHER SHOT OF 'THE PEOPLE.' Whoops......
no people, huh? Sunday AM Doesn't
the top of the Pavilion look like a spider-web?
FOOD REPORT. Went to get some food around 1:00
and the line at the snack bar was quite long as it
was burrito time, I guess. Went hungry for
much of the afternoon and then went back around
3:00. Got a cheeseburger which was okay,
at least for a Flea Market and a thing of battered
onion rings which turned out to be grotesque, barely
edible and felt the taste for several hours later.
Dumped half of it out. Slices of onions dipped
in the batter and fried. Not like those big
onion rings you get at many places which are much
better. Either way, they are not healthy.
Greasy.
THE DAY JUST DRAGGED ON AND ON throughout the day as
people just walked around the booths buying very
little. I guess I had a few hours with no
sales during the afternoon 'high-foot-traffic'
period.
I BEGAN PACKING UP AROUND 3:15 and timed it
perfectly, finishing up at 5:05. They told us
that we could bring our vehicles in around 5:30-5:45
and that was fine with me. I had decided to
park in the back lot after all since it would save
some walking. At 5:20 I left my space and
headed over to my van. I drove around to the
front of the Flea Market and went further down
Berryassa and did a U. I drove to the entrance
and waited in line with 5-6 other vehicles for
roughly 5 minutes and then we were in. I made
my way down the aisles not having to zig-zag around
vehicles. Mostly a straight shot down Aisle B
and over to row 13. No problemo. I was
just about the first one in there and I pulled right
up to my space and began loading. Soon, there
were vehicles coming in left and right and quicly
there were vehicles all over the place. That
is why I strategically plan my escapes from this and
many other events. I was finished at 6:02 and
departed. Clockwork baby, clockwork.
IF YOU HAVE ANY COMMENT REGARDING THIS EVENT
(or anything else) please submit below:
