UKIAH COUNTRY PUMPKINFEST 2010
On Sunday afternoon, I left my booth and walked around. I saw a bunch of people crowded around a booth. Some were sitting on the street while others were standing and a lot of people were up on the sidewalk. Foot traffic was stopped going both ways as people stopped to watch this whimsical performance by these exotic BELLY dancers. Yes, Ukiah does have talent. Definitely a performance to behold!
If you have comments, suggestions, etc., please email me at comments@starvingvendors.com Please, no spam or solicitations. There was much more happening at this event than what I have described below as this review is through the eyes of a vendor. It was a pretty good event for the local crowd and there were plenty of activities and entertainment that I wasn't able to witness.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Left home around 1:05pm. As I approached the Winton Ave. overpass I saw that traffic heading north on the '880' was almost at a standstill. There happened to be an overturned truck down by Marina Blvd., so I decided to drive down to Foothill Blvd. to get to '580.' That got me around the backup but driving through all those red lights and stop signs can be a pain in the butt.
I HIT SEVERAL POCKETS OF TRAFFIC on the way up. Backed up coming off the San Rafael Bridge heading over to 101 because of construction. Another time up near Rohnert Park due to more construction and narrow lanes. Also near Santa Rosa. Thank gosh I left Hayward kind of early before the commute traffic made an early Friday getaway. The drive up to Ukiah on 101 was much more scenic and relaxing than my recent trips down 99, 101 and 5.
BACK TO THE 60'S. As I approached Cloverdale, I noticed a van coming up on my left side.It was one of those Westfalia vans and it had hundreds of daisy's and other colorful flowers painted on it. Very appropriate for Mendocino County.
I RECALLED SEVERAL SHOWS I HAD DONE up in these areas. There were the Holiday shows at the fairgrounds in Santa Rosa, which were overfilled with vendors and few made money. That was around 9-10 years ago. There were those two Mother's Day shows in Windsor which had three-foot wide aisleways. How the hell do you get in and out? I never did the Cloverdale Citrus Fair and I have no intentions on doing this event held in April. Always rains and the kids just hit the carnival rides. As I passed through Hopland I still get visions of the lady letting her dog lick her ice cream cone and then she licks it also. Yummy Yummy.
UNDERCOVER BOSS. Drove over to Carl Jrs and ordered some burgers. The line was slow and we ended up waiting about 10 minutes behind another car. Suddenly I see him pulling away without paying or getting his food. Uh ohhh. I pulled up to the window and waited..... waited..... waited. Finally the guy inside steps over to the window holding a tray with 3 drinks on it. "$5.29," he said to me. "No," I told him. "Looks like we need an Undercover Boss here. The guy got pissed and left." He asked me what I ordered and I told him. Can you imagine waiting 15 %$(&#ing minutes just for a drink. I'd be long gone too. He then brought my order and I paid for my food and I disappeared into the dust.
CHECKED IN AT ECONOMY INN just around the corner from the festival. What a bargain. This place is only $39 a night. Motel 6 works out to around $60 per night. Saved forty bucks. Microwave, Frig, TV with a bunch of channels and no static or snow, Free Wi-Fi. Saved six dollars. Nice. I recommend this place. This is Friday night and there's only 5-6 rooms occupied. Hopefully the cows will not arrive tomorrow and we could have two nice peaceful nights here. FLASH BULLETIN AT 8:35PM. The cows have arrived at the motel. Hope to get some sleep.
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Saturday, Oct 16 ALARM CLOCK WENT OFF AT 6:00am. The numbers on the clock were so big and bright that they lit up the entire room. Looked like Times Square. Oh gosh. I was sleeping so good. Didn't really sleep too well and probably got 4-5 hours solid sleep. Watched the ball game last night. The Rangers let a 5-0 lead slip away to the Yankees. They blew chances to put more runs on the board. HEADED OUT OF THE MOTEL and drove a few blocks down and made a left and hooked around the show area and came out near our booth. Still dark. How I hate setting up in the dark. There were a good number of vendors already setting up but I was able to get close to my spot and parked alongside the curb. There was a sense of urgency because I figured that vendors would be coming through very soon. Wasn't too bad but there was a lot of congestion down on the other end and that is what I always try to avoid by getting to these shows as early as possible. |
We unloaded the van and immediately set up the canopy and grids and then took out the rest of the stuff from the van. Our space was a tight 10x10 and I really didn't like it. No choice. Had a great spot last year right at the end of the row and had two sides open.
WHERE'S WALDO. Hell with Waldo, where's my damm sausage? Even though it is 'smothered' with onions and peppers, trust me, that thing was small.
WORLD'S SMALLEST SAUSAGE. Went over to one of the food vendors and ordered a Bratwurst with onions and peppers for $7.00. The lady handed it to me and I looked at it. I could not see the sausage. I pushed aside the onions, etc., and after a minute of searching, I was able to locate it. EUREKA, I found it. Must have been less than 4 inches long; almost half the size of the roll and I paid seven dollars for this thing. Disgusting. Sorry people, I guess you have no shame. Gosh, you should take a look at one of Lockeford's Sausages and compare that to yours. Big ass sausage and it's hanging off the sides of their huge rolls with sauerkraut piled on top. All for the bargain price of $5.00. If you base your sausage on what Lockeford offer's, than the value of yours is $1.50.
THERE WERE PEOPLE ROAMING AROUND between 9-10 and I did pick up some early purchases. The parade began around 10:00 and we had a decent-sized crowd after that. Quite a number of people walking up and down the street but not really a buying crowd. If you have items under $10 you didn't do too bad. Vendor's selling items over $30 saw sales few and far between. Virtually all my sales were $8 and $10 and ended up doing better than most of the vendors. I think that vendors selling jewelry did rather poorly.
I DON'T THINK THAT I HAVE EVER SEEN so many people pushing strollers. Wow. One right after another sometimes. I saw actual lines of 4-5 strollers in a row passing by my booth.
Sunday, October 17
WORD OF THE WEEK: plethora. definition: A superabundance; an excess of. I will now use the word in a sentence. There was a plethora of grossly overweight individuals at the festival.
SHORTENED HOURS from 11am-4pm. Approve or disapprove. There are some shows that you prefer to have 'regular' hours from 10-5, but this is definitely not one of them. Always have a late crowd on Sundays and you naturally assume that these people are attending church or family functions. In many cases here, had to be sleeping in from their nightly bouts with marijuana. You definitely did not have a buying crowd on Sunday and it's nice to not prolong the agony of a very slow afternoon. Indeed you did have a number of vendors who had a decent afternoon, but the rest of us had raunchy and obscene sales numbers. Mine were down 70 percent from Saturday. If you did bad on Saturday, then you did absolutely horrible on Sunday.
THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE did a good job putting on the event. Crowds came out with the parade on Sunday and I really have few complaints about the show. (read below) The people here DO NOT have much disposable income, period. I call them 'the people that time forgot.' It's not a bad little town and one of few cities around with an actual downtown area and there really aren't too many vacancies along the streets.
THE AMAZING MAGNO-MAN. A 52-year old guy came into my booth and began looking at my Fedora's. He took off his hat and removed some kind of skull cap which happened to have around 100 tiny magnets connected to it. "You see, when I buy a hat, I need to be able to fit this inside." I looked at him. I said nothing. I was frozen with sheer amazement. He then grabbed one of my hats and placed his gizmo inside. "What do those magnets do?" I asked him. "They help with circulation," he explained to me. "Ohhhhhh," I said not really knowing just what to say. I was pretty much speechless as I had never seen anybody with magnets attached to their head like this. But then again, this is Ukiah and I guess this is one of those stories straight out of the Marijuana fields of Mendocino County. He wasn't able to find a hat that suited him. Just be sure to stay indoors during a thunderstorm.
THE MOTELS here are pretty cheap and I saw many along the main street offering rooms for under $40 and they make Motel 6 look quite expensive. However, as I drove up and down 'the strip' on Saturday and Sunday, I would only see 3-5 cars in their parking lots and that is not a good sign. Don't understand why people would come here anyway. Tours of the marijuana fields? Dunno.
CHAMBER OF COMMERCE IS NOT Disabled-people friendly and I am very concerned about an incident that happened at 10:50am on Sunday and I really question the intelligence and decision-making abilities of a number of individuals connected with Ukiah's Chamber of Commerce. My wife left our booth and had to use their bathroom facilities which was located 40 feet from us. They had them open to the public on Saturday and once again on Sunday. This was great for my wife because she is disabled, suffers from a number of ailments and has to walk very slowly with THE USE OF A CANE. Very difficult for her to walk two blocks to use the porta potties. When she entered the Chamber's office (which had its door open) and proceeded to walk toward the back the young lady at the desk told her that she could not use the bathroom until 11:00. This was amazing. What the hell happens at 11:00 that is so special that you can't let a half-crippled lady use the facility? She said that they were not open until that time BUT the door was open and people were able to go inside. Yes, the show starts at 11:00 and you don't want to 'be open until 11:00 but she forced my wife to leave and walk an additional block and a half to the porta-potties. Damm. She could see that my wife could barely even walk and she was so insensitive toward a person that is disabled. This is very disgusting and uncalled for as the Ukiah Chamber of Commerce really dropped the ball on this one.
HAVE NEVER SEEN SO MANY PEOPLE PUSHING STROLLERS. One right after another passing my booth. Sometimes 4-5 right in a row.
THE WEATHER HELD OUT during the remainder of the day and it was pretty much cloudy throughout the afternoon. I heard reports from other vendors that it was raining in San Jose and the Bay Area. Later on I found out that it rained in Santa Rosa also and there was mention of possible rain here in Ukiah and that would have proved to be disastrous.
THIS WAS A NICE FESTIVAL FOR THE LOCAL COMMUNITIES, but as I stated, not necessarily so for the vendors. Had a number of activities for the kids but I think that we came out short on the food end. Not really a great selection of food and these vendors should have prospered if their items were pretty decent. However, many vendors will think twice as to coming back in following years. I don't like the cramped up 10x10 space I had and would like to see more aisleways or the booths set up in quads. This area has no money.
BY THE TIME 2:30 rolled around, I was glad to start packing so we could roll our butts out of there. At 4:05, I went out to the parking lot and hopped into my van and followed my neighbor down the street and parked alongside the curb and loaded up and was out of there at 4:58 and headed for the highway. Not as much traffic as I expected and made it home by 7:10. Just a bit over two hours to drive the 140 miles. Not bad. Got to listen to the Giants game on the way. Too bad they lost, but I guess the main objective is to take one of two on the other's turf.