FEATURES
This page describes many of the features contained
within the website with explanations of each menu item. There are
eight categories in the menu.
Home is the entry page for the
website. This is the introduction and it contains information
about Starving Vendors and what it is all about. You will notice
that I have listed quite number of links to my show reviews, etc., and
you may follow them if you so desire. My original idea with this
is to allow search engines to crawl through the website using these
links and get these particular pages listed on the web. The search
engines can not read the menu you see above because it is written in
JavaScript.
The second is called the Main Menu and contains a number of menu items.
The first is called
The
Frugal Vendor and I explain a number of cost-cutting
measures we have taken by combining trips, eliminating shows, etc. and
also describe ways other vendors have cut their expenses. It looks
like we all have to be frugal (polite term for 'cheap').
Membership is the next item on the menu and I have just
added that page to be humorous while poking fun at businesses that give
away (or sell) merchandise and solicit membership. Just for fun.
Features is this page and ex\plains each and every page on the website.
Whatz New
tells about some of the recent changes and addition to the website.
Will be updated at least every week to point out what is new here.
The News is a
page dedicated to recent events and things that are happening and of
concern to us vendors. Several stories added each week.
After awhile I'll move them over to the
Old News
page, which is where I will keep all the old stuff, not deleting it from
the website. Kind of like an archive. Maybe I'll rename it
The Archives after I get things rolling along.
You may
Contact Us using the email address provided on this
particular page. No spam, please. The last menu item in this
section is call the Resources. You can get links to
Weather
forecast websites.
Motels lists
number of major motel chains through which you can make reservations,
etc,
Want to find out where to get fixtures.... such as grids, hooks ,
shelving, etc Check our
Fixture Suppliers and you will find
listings/websites/addresses for a number of these located in Hayward,
San Jose and Sacramento. More cities to be added. Every show
I go to, somebody is always me where to get grids or other things
Well, here you have it. A very handy resource.
I have listed several publications/websites in
Publications-events and these are good resources
for learning about shows and events However, one that stands far
above anything else I have ever seen is The Craftmaster News. I am
always telling people that this is the publication that you must
subscribe to. This my fellow vendors, has to be the BIBLE of Show
Listings.
Whenever we travel through the mountains on our way to events in
Northern California, Nevada and crossing over the Grapevine on our way
to Arizona, I always check the
Highway Road Conditions (during the winter and spring
months). I really do not like getting stuck in the snow up in the
mountains. A couple years ago, heading out to Tyson in January, we
encountered heavy snow for several hours and were stopped on top of the
mountain. So, you need to be prepared and make sure that you save
the two links listed. In the future I expect to add more links in
other states to obtain their road conditions..i.e. Nevada, Oregon, etc
Next, we have our
Gas
Prices, which has become of extreme significance this year
because prices have been souring and vendors are getting totally screwed
by this and the economy has turned sour because the higher gas prices
have a big domino effect. Of course, there are cheap brands out
there and I usually get Chevron. COSTCO has some of the least
expensive gas I have seen and I will provide a listing of all the
COSTCO's in California that have gas stations. It looks like it's
anywhere from 8 to 14 cents cheaper than most stations.
RV Dumpsites
is an external link and it shows sanitary dumpsites for motor homes,
etc. all over the United States. This comes in handy if you do a
lot of Dry Camping. When we are in Tyson Wells, we park out in the
BLM and make a trip or two to The Pit Stop on Highway 95 on the
Quartzsite side of Interstate 10. Nice. Sometimes they will
dump for you and they also have water available.
The next feature of Starving Vendors is our Guide to Shows.
Eventually, we will have hundreds of event listings along with a lot of
information and reviews about shows in CA, OR WA, NV and AZ. The
first item here is
Events
and that has five items on its submenu.... We have listings for
Promoters and that gives out necessary info to contact some of the
larger promoters. I expect to list dozens of promoters, etc. here
in the coming months.
Next we have pages that show event listings...
Oregon County Fairs lis an external link that ists all the county
fairs in that state and has been of great value to me, as this is where
I have located several fairs which I ended up doing.
Arizona Shows are listing of events in the state, which I am listing
myself and will take awhile to get frequent updates.
California Shows are more event listings that I am compiling myself.
Miscellaneous Events are listings of several individual events which I
find quite fascinating and could prove to be quite interesting to go to.
One of them is the Ostrich Festival in Chandler and I do not recommend
this show to any vendor. The listings here are only good for
visitors and probably not very profitable as vendors. External
links lead to the
Gold Coast Pirate Fair in Ojai, CA. Also,
Civil War Enactments seems pretty
interesting and I have mentioned The
Ostrich Festival in a
negative fashion in many areas in this website and proclaim it as one of
the greatest disaster shows I have ever done. It still sucks.
The next section of the menu under Guide to Shows
are the Reviews. I am constantly adding shows to this section.
I have reviews of some shows last year in this section that are real
doozies and I want people to know the truth and what they can expect to
encounter. The first seven shows listed (there will be a separate menu
for this soon) are shows that were pretty bad.
The first show listed comes
under the name '3:10
to Yuma, Yearly Events and this
describes a number of events held in Yuma, which haven't been too
profitable for many vendors. The '3:10 was a western movie many
years ago, but it just so happens that is the time we leave in the
morning for Yuma and pretty much the arrival time that same afternoon.
Weird, isn't it? So, I just couldn't resist using the terminology.
The next 6 events listed were pretty bad and there are a couple more
doozies listed. You'll enjoy reading the reviews. The
Mt. Shasta 4th of July event was nice.
At the very bottom of this menu is a page called
Mini-Reviews of Events 2008. These are smaller reviews of
other shows we had done earlier in the year. I transferred these
over from our other website.
Next item is our
Show
Schedule. The name of our business is DandL CREATIONS
and we do some 40 events throughout the year.
The next two items are our Show Reviews and these are external links
leading to our main websie for events we did in
2007-2008 and also
2006.
Voice of the Vendor will be listing other vendor's
comments about events they have done.
Real Stuff is the next menu and this has a number of pages. The
first is called Tales of Woe and gave it this name because I am telling
about absolute nightmares. These consist of
Highway 126 Nightmare which seemed like my own
personal visit to The Twilight Zone. Also, The
Chandler Ostrich Festival, which turned out to be
one terrible trip to hell.
Nightmare in Tucson explains just how useless it is
to travel 800 miles to do an event - never again!!
Next up is the
Bitter Business Bureau which is a take-off on the
Better Business Bureas located all over the place. We given
'honorable membership' to a number of events and promoters who are
exceptionally bad and uncaring.
Bites and Pieces provides a number of stories of interest
regarding problems facing vendors and which I have encountered.
Check out
Flying Canopies, where you can read about a lot of shows where
canopies went airborne and explains about the dangers of the wind.
Tricks
of the Trade has some advice for vendors...take it or leave it.
Doing Business contains info about publications and other businesses
(store fixtures, etc.)
Nickel and
Dime Crapola describes unnecessary permits, etc., that vendors are
being forced to pay for.
I have written
The Voice to describe issues that tork me off and
are not really related to vendors.
Scavengers are Us tells about people walking around going
through peoples' garbage, etc. Kind of humorous, but I wonder if
people do indeed make a lot of money in this way.
Sad but True is hilarious as it depicts what telephone,
etc. connections look like in India, as we are all quite aware that many
of our high-tech companies have re-located to India, unfortunately.
In the coming months, I expect to provide loads of information on
companies re-locating to India, which I despise.
Window Dressing tells how some events just merely use the
vendors as 'window dressing.' You know that an event doesn't look
too good if there are no canopies with vendors. There are a number
of events that just use the vendor to 'dress up their' event and there
is no way vendors can make any money because they are 'pushed' off to
the side.
Food and Travel is the next section and I am going to have a lot of
information regarding food items in various cities and special dishes
worth recommending. Will also describe 'tourist' activities in a
number of areas where vendors particiipate in events. Right now,
you can check out the
Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich, which is a really great meal
in itself. If you came from the East Coast and had one of the
'real ones' you would know what I am talking about. This page
describes the sandwich and how to make it.
Philly Cheesesteaks Sandwiches/Northern California lists
establishments where these delicious delicacies can be had. There
will be other links to places all over SOCAL and the Central Coast, etc.
My Websites and Blogs are links to other webs and blogs, etc, that I
have. Go check them out!!!
Starting Out describes how to start a business in the State
of California.
