Our Top 5 Lessons Learned From Selling at a London Market
1. ✨ Focus Your Assortment Accordingly ✨
Market shoppers are making impulse purchases and although they are usually excited about handmade products and small businesses, they are still relatively price conscious. As a benchmark from Islington Market, there was a lot of resistance to buy anything higher than £20-25 and the fastest moving products were priced at £4-15 each. My best sellers on the day were Greeting Cards priced at £4.20 each.
Top Tips: If you are a more premium brand, like ours, you need to find a balance that doesn't dilute your brand. Think of the market shoppers as a unique channel and only offer products geared toward their WTP. Bring only a small selection of products, maximum price £25 but average price no higher than £15. It helps to pick a hero product that can command an attractive margin at exactly the target price (RRP £4-15). This may be different for markets with more of an international/tourist audience whose WTP would be more tied to expectations in their home countries.
2. ✨ Traffic does not equal conversion - but that's okay. ✨
Markets serve many purposes. Even if everyone who stops and looks at your products at a market actually makes a purchase, you need to understand that you probably won't be making £1,000 in a day. I don't think any stand at our market came anywhere close to that. However, there is great value in face-to-face interaction and feedback (people literally pay for focus groups). Use the time to ask visitors questions about their preferences even if they don't make a purchase.
Top Tips: Bring a bunch of business cards or promo cards and be sure to hand them out to everyone that stops at your stand. Also, use an app like Canva to create signs with your Instagram or newsletter sign-up QR code and place them around your stand where they can be scanned even at a distance. You can even incentivize them by talking about a giveaway you are hosting to those that follow your brand on social media or email. While all customers may not make an instant purchase, they've shown an interest so they may consider an online purchase at a later date. Make it easy for them!
3. ✨ Handmade Products Have Stories - Get Your Pitch Down! ✨
Market customers are excited to meet YOU and to hear the story behind your brand. They have lots of opportunity to come up with follow-up questions. If you did not personally make 100% of your product offering, be sure to know as much detail as possible about the stories of the makers you are promoting. I was very impressed with the knowledge and curiosity of the shoppers who asked me things like what the meaning of a brand name was (we sell Madhu Chocolate, "madhu" means "honey" or sometimes "sweet" in Hindi) and customers who wanted to know the exact village in the Himalayan foothills where the founders of one of the companies we sold from hailed, as she had family from there. If you have any food products be sure to know ALL the ingredients and don't rely on the customer to look at the labels. Any hesitation in answering questions where you don't know the answer can impede a sale.
Top Tips: Be confident, honest, and when you don't know an answer share another interesting fact that you do know. Generally I have found customers are very interested in hearing how many hours it took an artisan to make something or details about the process. If you can display any materials used in the process that is even better (e.g. we had the wood blocks used for block print textiles and explained them to visitors, the stand next to us had the artist live painting between sales)!
4. ✨ In-person Shopping is a Sensory Experience. Engage them. ✨
While customers might be looking at every stand when they stroll through a market, it can be a bit of a visual sensory overload. Think about engaging their other senses. At our market stands that had music, free food samples, burning incense or candles, and mini beauty treatments provided an opportunity to engage with the customer not only through sight but sound, taste, smell, and feel. While whatever is being sampled may not be your "hero" product or even your product at all (e.g. music), it draws a customer in and gives you an opportunity to talk about everything else you have on offer and how it's all linked. We actually found that at our stand and others stands that might have had more of an overall female audience leaning (for example, a skincare stand), that they had a lot of male customers come by when there was an engaging experience!
Top Tips: When offering an engaging experience, think about being as inclusive as possible. For example, we had our chocolate samples available for anyone to take and promoted them as people walked by, even if we thought they were more likely to be a customer of one of our other products. We did find that there were a lot of Vegans and Dairy-Free folks (maybe even as high as 20% of those who stopped by!), so it was unfortunate that all our chocolate bars contain dairy. Had we thought ahead, we might have had some samples of our Chai-Spiced Hot Chocolate out as an alternative since it is Dairy-Free.
5. ✨ Don't be ageist! Pensioners may be your best customers. Mums too. ✨
A segment of customers who generally love a lot of smaller local markets are the 50+ crowd. Generally, they like to shop in person and to shop small businesses. Not all of them are especially tech savvy either and some don't trust online platforms. However, as seen in many reports the Baby Boomer generation has some of the highest spending power. They also tend to highly value quality and craftsmanship and will have a higher WTP and appreciation for premium products. Do NOT alienate or underestimate this customer!
Top Tips - Seniors: Make their shopping experience as fuss free as possible. If you have QR codes, offer a non-technical alternative like a physical email sign-up sheet. Provide a mirror they can use to try something on, as they may not have a smartphone with a camera or want to take selfies to see what something looks like on them. Try to have an extra chair at your stand in case they would like to take some time to look at things and may need to sit down for a rest for a moment from the hustle-and-bustle of the market. Avoid loud or jarring music, pick something upbeat but neutral at a reasonable volume.
Top Tips - Mums: On the opposite side of the spectrum you may have a lot of customers with small children along - be sure to ask them if it's okay before offering the children any food samples. Think of ways to creatively engage children on parts of your stand away from your more expensive items. We did have some children picking up and nearly walking off with our whimsical animal shaped earrings (why wouldn't they?), so we positioned the chocolate samples on the opposite side of the table to create a welcomed distraction for them. It is also advisable to think about offering products for children as you will no doubt have a strong potential audience at a market!
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We learned an awful lot from our experience exhibiting at Islington Square Market's Urban Food Fest on 25th January 2025, thanks to the incredible support of Women on our Way. We very much enjoyed engaging with the other female entrepreneurs that were also part of Women on our Way's cohort at the market. If you would like to share any thoughts, questions, or would like to know more about these opportunities yourself, send us an email at hello@rajanibaker.com.
