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Skyrocket Your Sales at Events | Winning Strategies for Your Freeze-Dried Business
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May 15, 2025
Are you a small business owner looking to thrive in local markets and farmers' markets? In this video, I dive into the essential tools and strategies that can help you stand out, attract more customers, and increase sales. From where to find events in your local community, to the differences between indoor and outdoor events, and from inventory management to sales strategies, I cover all the bases to ensure you're fully equipped for market day success. Whether you're a seasoned vendor or new to the scene, these insights will help you navigate the bustling world of local markets with confidence. Don't miss out on these valuable tips—watch now and take your freeze-drying business to the next level! 🌟 In this video: * Things to Know 1:51 * How to Find Events 3:44 * Forecasting Inventory 5:43 * How much can you make? 7:15 * 3 Rules to Follow 14:19 * 4 Strategies for Success at Events 16:17 * Avoid These Mistakes 18:09 * More Videos 19:44 Events can dramatically increase sales for your freeze-drying business and having the right equipment is pivotal to making sure you have all the product needed. Whether you are just starting out or want to expand your freeze dryer equipment, I recommend Harvest Right Freeze Dryers. Click here to look at freeze dryers - https://affiliates.harvestright.com/1974.html Use Square and their tools to make transactions easy at your next event: - Square: https://square.sjv.io/davOP7 - Square Chip Reader for Events - https://amzn.to/3h4cbNX Here are several other videos you should watch related to running a freeze-drying business:
View Video Transcript
0:00
how much money can you make at Live
0:01
Events selling freeze-dried candy and
0:04
freeze-dried products well in today's
0:05
video I'm going to share with you how
0:06
much money I made at a local Holiday
0:09
Market here in Boise Idaho using my
0:11
freeze drying business and hang on till
0:13
the end of this video because I'm going
0:14
to share with you things that I would do
0:16
differently if I was going to do my next
0:18
event coming up next year that would set
0:21
you up for success to make more money
0:23
more conversions and be more successful
0:26
in your freeze drying business hey
0:27
everyone I'm David with the freeze
0:28
drying business and we're f focused on
0:30
connecting the freeze drying business
0:32
Community with the tools and resources
0:34
needed to grow a sustainable business
0:36
you're going to be spoiled today because
0:37
I'm going to share with you my Square
0:38
account where I'm going to show you how
0:40
much money I made per day at this
0:41
two-day event as well as the different
0:44
types of categories of products and then
0:46
how much total gross money I made so
0:48
that you're more equipped to go do more
0:50
live events in your local area and make
0:53
money as a freeze drying
0:56
business all right first let's just talk
0:58
about live events in General whether
1:00
it's a farmers market a holiday market
1:03
because this video is in December so
1:04
we're just wrapping up Christmas holiday
1:07
bazaars things like that events are
1:09
happening all around your local area and
1:12
there's an opportunity for you to
1:13
connect with your community and show
1:15
them what you've been creating in your
1:17
freeze dryer and there's a lot of fun to
1:19
that because you get to see the reaction
1:21
of chewing down on that freeze-dried
1:24
fruit that they' never tasted that
1:25
texture before or eating that
1:27
freeze-dried Skittle or freeze-dried
1:29
chareston shoe whatever you're making in
1:32
your freeze dryer this is the fun part
1:34
so live events are a great way for you
1:36
to sell direct to Consumer it's a great
1:39
way for you to be seen out in the
1:40
community get a lot of brand exposure
1:42
and it's just another sales Avenue
1:45
Beyond just social media your website
1:48
wholesale and other different ways that
1:50
people can buy your
1:51
[Music]
1:53
product other things to know about Live
1:55
Events is it's much more labor intensive
1:58
most of the time you're having to be on
2:00
site at that booth at that table inside
2:03
outside there's a lot of different
2:04
elements that you're going to have to
2:05
deal with when you're going to a live
2:08
event like that now I've done indoor
2:10
events and I've also done outdoor events
2:12
I don't do very many in my freeing
2:14
business because I have a small family
2:16
and I just don't have the time to
2:18
dedicate to a two-day event a week-long
2:20
event sometimes not even a full Saturday
2:23
but it's been beneficial for me to do a
2:25
couple because one there's a lot more
2:27
people doing freeze-dried candy
2:28
freeze-dried businesses is in the local
2:31
area and it's a great way for me to get
2:32
exposure and make sure I'm
2:34
differentiating myself in the market and
2:36
the same goes for you now live events
2:38
are structured differently based on
2:39
where you're at and where I'm at but you
2:41
should know that the event coordinator
2:42
typically is going to charge you a booth
2:44
fee that Booth fee is going to run you
2:47
for the rental space they might charge
2:49
for electricity they might charge for a
2:51
corner Booth an inside Booth different
2:54
types of sizes of booths but generally
2:56
that's how they're going to charge you
2:58
for that fee the another way that they
3:00
can charge as well is have a more
3:02
smaller Booth fee and then they can also
3:05
charge you for more commissions they
3:08
might be more in control of the actual
3:10
collection of the transactions from
3:12
everybody that attends and all the
3:14
consumers are going in and out in the
3:15
same direction and the event coordinator
3:18
is handling all those transactions now
3:20
the nice part about that is that they're
3:22
going to handle the sales tax for you so
3:24
you don't have to worry about that but
3:26
they are going to take a small
3:27
commission from you maybe that's going
3:29
to range from 5 to 20% maybe even 30%
3:32
but generally speaking the more popular
3:34
the event the more prime location the
3:36
event is located they're going to have a
3:38
higher commission and a higher Booth fee
3:40
but you're going to have a lot more
3:42
opportunities to sell to your
3:44
[Music]
3:45
consumers so once you decide that you
3:48
want to do a live event you're going to
3:49
want to start researching where those
3:51
Live Events are and which one's the
3:52
right fit for you now personally for me
3:54
I try to go for indoor events because I
3:57
want to get out of the elements and
3:58
especially with freeze-dried handy
4:00
specifically and also freeze-dried fruit
4:03
the elements that are going to impact
4:05
those products the most is going to be
4:06
heat and sunlight and so I default to
4:08
the indoor events where there's a
4:10
temperature controlled area and also I'm
4:12
out of the elements so you know you're
4:14
not U having to deal with wind for your
4:16
booth and your canopy that might blow
4:18
away you're not dealing with different
4:20
types of rain and cold and sleep and
4:23
hail and all that type of jazz so I like
4:26
going towards indoor events sometimes
4:28
those indoor events are smaller
4:30
sometimes those indoor events are going
4:32
to charge a little bit more for those
4:33
booths but I would look at indoor events
4:36
to start with that's just my personal
4:37
preference now typically there's more
4:39
outdoor events than there are indoor
4:41
events also outdoor events have less of
4:44
a commission or less of a booth fee just
4:47
because there's not as much of a fee to
4:50
rent the space for that event
4:53
coordinator think about renting the
4:55
fairgrounds or renting some type of big
4:57
building with a warehouse to fit all
4:59
these these different vendors it does
5:01
cost a lot of money so therefore their
5:03
Booth fee and their commission that they
5:04
might charge from you is going to be a
5:06
lot higher so outdoor events are
5:09
beneficial in that way now where do you
5:11
find these events I would start looking
5:13
at Facebook if you have a Facebook
5:15
account you can look at events that are
5:17
upcoming next year next month things
5:20
like that you can click on their website
5:22
click on their whatever their hyperlink
5:24
is in that event and see if they're
5:25
accepting vendor applications and it's
5:27
important that you put your application
5:29
in far ahead of schedule because
5:32
typically you might be the first freeze
5:33
drying business applying and that
5:35
catches the eye of the event coordinator
5:38
but also you have a lot more lead time
5:40
to know whether you're going to be the
5:41
selected vendor at that
5:44
[Music]
5:45
event one of the most commonly asked
5:47
questions that I get about Live Events
5:50
is how much product should you bring to
5:52
the event how do you forecast it I asked
5:54
myself the same question when I first
5:56
started and as a general rule I found to
5:58
be consistent around 5 to 10% of
6:01
products should be brought based on the
6:02
estimated attendance now that's a
6:04
general rule that I go by I feel like
6:06
it's very consistent across everybody
6:08
else that I did in fact I did a poll
6:10
recently on the YouTube channel here
6:12
that I asked people is that a fair kind
6:14
of forecast and most people agreed with
6:17
that in fact there was about 86% of
6:19
people agreed with that now it might
6:21
vary based on the size of the event and
6:24
it also may vary based on the largess of
6:27
the attendance so for example a large
6:30
County Fair might be a week long and
6:32
they may estimate a 100,000 people go
6:35
through there but is 100,000 people
6:37
going through the booth area or just
6:40
attending so you are going to have to
6:42
kind of fluctuate in terms of that
6:44
forecasting model based on the size of
6:46
the event but in general I'd probably
6:48
bring at minimum 5% to those types of
6:51
events now let's get to the exciting
6:52
part I'm going to spoil you with a lot
6:55
of transparency of my square account I
6:57
may not show you everything but I am
6:59
going to show you how much I made I'm
7:01
going to show you the categories and
7:02
count and kind of give you some
7:04
commentary about what I saw coming out
7:06
of this event but I hope you enjoy this
7:08
and I hope it's going to excite you for
7:10
potentially what you could make in your
7:12
local area doing Live Events next year
7:14
let's dive
7:15
[Music]
7:17
in I'm going to share with you how much
7:19
money I made in gross sales as well as a
7:22
breakdown of the categories of items and
7:25
the individual items that I sold at a
7:28
live event with my freeze drying
7:30
business just a couple of weeks ago as
7:32
of the start of this video I'm going to
7:34
share all this through the point of sale
7:35
system I use called Square you have a
7:38
lot of different option when it comes to
7:40
POS systems and one of the ones that I
7:43
think is easy to use is square it's a
7:46
great way to download an app that then
7:49
you can connect to a card reader and
7:51
also something on the iPhone and Android
7:53
devices where you can scan people's
7:55
credit cards now what I really like too
7:57
is as you're going to see in the screen
7:59
share I have ways also to set up for it
8:02
to collect tax for the state of Idaho
8:04
and you can do the same thing for your
8:06
state if you require to have to collect
8:08
sales tax from people now what you're
8:10
seeing on my screen is my Square account
8:13
and I've got a couple reports that I'm
8:15
going to share with you about what I did
8:18
at this event and as you can see here is
8:21
I made
8:24
$16.97 per average gross sales meaning
8:27
every transaction that I did I sold
8:28
about one to two items because all of
8:31
the item prices for my products that I
8:34
sell is between $9 and $10 and for this
8:37
event I did candy and fruit for $9 and
8:41
then I did Ice Cream whether ice cream
8:43
sandwiches or ice cream Scoops for $10 I
8:46
also did um$ 139 transactions or sales
8:50
and I made almost
8:53
$2400
8:55
$2,359 is the total now you see that
8:58
there's a dis discrepancy over here it
9:00
says the total collected was 2500 now
9:04
that's because there is a subtraction of
9:06
the amount of sales tax so in total I
9:10
collected 2500 but after taxes taken out
9:14
I grossed 2359 now scrolling down here
9:17
you can also measure if you had this all
9:20
set up you could collect um all of your
9:22
cash and record that but you might want
9:24
to notice this right here
9:26
$797 is the amount that square took in
9:29
transaction fees so this is the way that
9:31
square makes money so it's free to use
9:34
square but they do take a fee for part
9:38
of the processing for those credit card
9:40
charges so that's how much they took
9:42
from me I have candy as a category fruit
9:45
ice cream and then I also listed Taffy
9:48
now Taffy could be in the candy category
9:50
but I put it separately because I had
9:53
previously been selling Taffy and I
9:55
wanted to see based on the different
9:57
flavors that I had for for Taffy which
10:00
ones would sell the most and kind of
10:01
keep track of that so there's a lot of
10:03
different ways that you can customize
10:06
your uh transactions here but uh in
10:09
total as you can see a 100 bags of my
10:12
candy items that I brought and a total
10:15
of 46 fruit 76 ice cream and then I sold
10:19
25 Taffy so 125 items in total candy the
10:24
next category that I gross the most was
10:26
76 in the ice cream category and then
10:28
with fruit I sold 46 I actually think
10:32
that this was phenomenal with my ice
10:34
cream side this is one of the reasons
10:36
why it might be beneficial to go into a
10:38
commercial kitchen and be able to be
10:40
licensed to do TCS type items which is
10:44
the temperature controlled substance
10:46
type of items which includes ice cream
10:48
and I really pushed that I did a lot of
10:50
samples of that so if you actually
10:52
calculate
10:53
247 total different items that I sold
10:57
and divided that by the 450 items that I
11:01
brought estimated wise to the first kind
11:05
of couple days of the event that's
11:07
almost a
11:09
61% sales conversion on the amount of
11:12
inventory that I brought I think that
11:14
was phenomenal and um I think you should
11:17
probably aim for about 50% sales if you
11:19
can as well and I think 50% is a great
11:22
Target for you to try to sell in terms
11:24
of the amount of inventory you brought
11:26
and the amount of inventory you grossed
11:28
again that really comes down to are you
11:31
the right salesperson are you somebody
11:33
who can get out in front be personal
11:36
talk to people get them to taste
11:37
something and if you're not get somebody
11:39
at your booth that you could pay or get
11:41
some family relatives um friends that
11:44
are are very personal are people who
11:46
love to get out there and talk to people
11:48
and that can really boost the sales all
11:49
right so now let's take a look at the
11:51
individual items because I think that's
11:54
important so what I'm going to do is I'm
11:56
going to filter the amount of units sold
11:58
alberry ice cream because I'm in Idaho
12:01
from tillamuk tillamuk ice cream is what
12:03
I do 22 individual bags and I charge $10
12:07
per bag so that's 220 bucks Charleston
12:09
shoes this was the money maker as well
12:11
as caramel M&M's I really pushed these
12:14
in terms of samples caramel M&M's are
12:17
rare to find a lot of people just stick
12:18
with the gummies and the Skittles and
12:20
things like that I wanted to go
12:22
something way different and this is
12:24
definitely a product that not many
12:26
people do so um I think I did well there
12:29
Charleston shoes I'm I'm going to
12:31
mention this uh later on in the video
12:32
but man sampling something that is a
12:35
very relevant to specific demographics
12:38
like Charleston shoes for kind of that
12:40
older generation who was familiar with
12:43
more with that candy man that really
12:45
resonated well and um did really well
12:48
with that candy I sold a lot of Jolly
12:50
Ranchers in there Skittles and then it
12:53
went down to the Huckleberry Taffy and
12:55
uh and my top fruit was pineapple I
12:57
figured this would be the case with
12:59
pineapple because not many people do
13:01
pineapple it I did a video on this and
13:04
I'll include a link in the video
13:05
description of my pineapple how to
13:07
freeze dry pineapple video but not many
13:09
people do it because it takes a long
13:11
time to freeze dry I knew that pineapple
13:14
still has a great taste and I wanted to
13:16
give people that taste at this event so
13:18
I'm not surprised that I sold the most
13:20
pineapple out of all the fruit that I
13:22
brought which was raspberri strawberries
13:24
a strawberry banana blend and also
13:26
apples and that was over I'm going to
13:28
say it's over a two-day event because
13:30
the the first night on Friday was more
13:33
of like a paid entry I think I made
13:36
maybe 200 bucks that night which uh you
13:39
know I didn't really want to include
13:41
that as per se so this is I would say a
13:42
two-day event $
13:45
22360 about1 18 hours total of being
13:48
there from going and setting up to being
13:51
at the event to closing down I spent
13:54
about 18 hours there hey if you're
13:56
really liking this video hit the
13:57
Subscribe button I'd love to be able to
13:59
do more videos and if you have more
14:01
comments or things that you wanted to
14:04
see and you want me to do more of these
14:06
videos comment below in the video I'd
14:08
love to know what I can expand on and
14:10
what you'd like to see more so let's get
14:12
back to the other side of the video and
14:15
I'll fill you in on a little bit more
14:16
tips and tricks from this
14:20
[Music]
14:21
event so now you know how much money you
14:23
can make at a live event even in a small
14:26
setting where there's 5,000 people in a
14:29
let's go ahead and recap what we've
14:31
learned so far about Live Events to set
14:32
you up for Success so number one is to
14:35
forecast your inventory to bring to an
14:37
event based on 5 to 10% of the total
14:40
estimated attendance so again if you
14:42
have 5,000 people that are estimated to
14:44
show up bring about 250 to 500
14:49
individual pieces of product so that you
14:51
can sell that in any variety also aim
14:54
for 50% sold of the inventory that you
14:57
bring you can do it and I know you can
14:59
do it because I did it through samples
15:01
as well as being approachable at the
15:03
booth get out there talk to people make
15:06
sure they know who you are and say hey
15:08
have you ever tried freeze dyed ice
15:10
cream have you ever tried a freeze dyed
15:12
Charleston Shoe hey do you like taffy oh
15:14
if you tried freeze-dried Taffy these
15:17
are all the things that you got to be as
15:19
a salesperson sell your business sell
15:21
what you're doing because a lot of
15:23
people don't know what you're doing and
15:25
I want to also provide you some feedback
15:27
that I got from this holiday event the
15:29
thing that I changed with my talk track
15:31
is I said have you tried this and I
15:34
named the product hey do you like taffy
15:37
oh have you tried freeze-dried crunchy
15:39
Taffy it doesn't stick to your teeth hey
15:42
have you tried freeze-dried ice cream oh
15:45
no I've got tillamuk freeze-dried ice
15:48
cream I've got chocolate peanut butter
15:50
freeze-dried ice cream hey have you ever
15:52
tried freeze-dried pineapple most people
15:54
have tried freeze-dried strawberries and
15:56
freeze-dried apples and freeze-dried
15:58
raspberri berries but if you tried
15:59
freeze-dried mangoes these are the
16:02
different things that get people to come
16:03
in to take a sample and go wow that is
16:06
great now it does need to be good but
16:09
you can try a different type of approach
16:11
rather than just saying you want to try
16:13
freeze dried candy most people have
16:14
tried freeze dried candy and they're
16:16
going to pass on you so change up your
16:17
talk
16:18
[Music]
16:19
track all right here's four tips for you
16:22
for your booth going into next year or
16:25
your next live event is number one I
16:28
would try to pay a premium to get that
16:30
corner Booth I really liked that I had
16:32
done the in between booths and the
16:35
square booths but this corner Booth man
16:37
it was so sweet I loved how the traffic
16:40
flowed through it and I felt like I
16:41
could have a lot more room to talk to
16:43
customers number two is I would make
16:46
sure that you have promo cards business
16:49
cards things that you can hand them and
16:51
say hey follow us on Instagram go to our
16:54
website we ship we'll ship all across
16:57
the state we'll ship all across the
16:58
country if you can tell them what you
17:00
can do after they have already bought
17:03
your product my next tip is to make sure
17:04
you have plenty of totes that can
17:06
transport all of that product very
17:08
easily that you can put underneath your
17:10
booth if you want recommendations of
17:11
what I use I've got some links of
17:13
different totes from Amazon in the video
17:15
description here and the third thing is
17:17
to find some way to display your product
17:19
now I had the peg boards I found a
17:23
$75 pegboard foldable collapsable type
17:26
of display that I would advise investing
17:28
in one of those if you want to do the
17:30
pegboard or you could just find some of
17:32
those wired racks that is accordion type
17:35
style and then you can hang it with
17:37
hooks or clothesline Clips things like
17:40
that just find something to display your
17:42
product not necessarily for people to
17:43
grab them off of but just so you can
17:46
have more of a display of what the
17:48
product looked like on top of that with
17:51
your booth keep it clean and simple
17:53
don't over clutter your booth space keep
17:56
things more organized where you have a
17:59
clear area where people can take samples
18:01
if you have a corner spot where you can
18:02
have two different areas for samples do
18:04
that but then also just feature your
18:07
different products that you want to sell
18:09
and rotate them out as you
18:11
[Music]
18:12
go hey a common pitfalls that I would
18:15
avoid if I were you going into a live
18:17
event that I've made but now I've
18:19
corrected don't bring a ton of varieties
18:21
of Taffy a ton of varieties of Skittles
18:24
a ton of varieties of fruit things like
18:26
that bring things that you like but also
18:29
that you can sell now if you're
18:30
interested in top sellers that I would
18:31
start out with selling you can go ahead
18:33
and use the video that I'm showing right
18:35
now and that video is my top 20 items
18:38
that I would start selling as a freeze
18:39
drying business and I'll also include
18:41
the link below in the video description
18:43
one of the things I learned very quickly
18:45
is that different demographics know what
18:48
different candy and ice cream and things
18:50
like that taste like for example the
18:52
older demographic kind of knows what a
18:55
Charleston shoes is but the millennial
18:57
gen Z type of crowd doesn't really know
19:00
what a Charleston chew is because it's
19:01
not as a common candy bar right now as
19:04
it was for Snickers and Twix and things
19:06
like that so what I did at this event is
19:09
I had samples of the Charleston chew
19:11
that was freeze-dried but I particularly
19:13
said hey have you ever had a Charleston
19:15
shw yes I have and I made sure I
19:17
tailored it to the demographic that I
19:19
saw that I know would resonate with that
19:21
particular candy and therefore they
19:23
bought more of the freeze dried charlson
19:25
cheu than the younger demographic and
19:28
same goes with like Skittles and things
19:29
like that is you kind of need to tailor
19:32
the tasting and the sampling to the
19:34
demographic don't stop here I've got
19:36
another video of a different event that
19:38
I did that was an outdoor and indoor
19:41
event this past summer you can check out
19:43
what my booth setup was like there see
19:45
you on the next
19:46
[Music]
19:54
video
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