Indigo- The 3rd day!

The third day is  a very slow day, people come in later than the other 2 days, everything is more relaxed and casual, lots of walkers and yes you still can get some sales, but expectations for this day shouldn't be that high.
People take more time to really observe the booths, you can provide a better attention if a customer is interested in the collection and definitely is a good day to engage in conversation with other studios.
Most of the people is open to conversation, some of them come to you just to say hello and even to give you a little compliment.
I love this side of the show, I think although we are competitors, we can also share a nice and friendly conversation at the end "sun shines for everyone". 

At 5:45pm of last day everybody is running around stripping out stands and leaving to prepare for their next show. 

Removing our pretty decorations out.

A very lonley place!

Indigo : The second day

The second day is normally less stressful, still customers are walking around and stopping by at the stand, but is way more relaxed that the first day.
I immediately ran to see the Indigo Influences area, where you can see every studio work in the screens in a video that is running all day long.
You can not see this video before the show and first day is too busy in the stand to even think in going out of it.
To get your work in this area you have to submit designs according the Indigo macro trends a moth before the show. You never know exactly which of the submitted work is going to be selected by the Indigo team to be displayed in that area.
For this season I have submitted around 20 designs from my own designs and from my guest designers. 

I was extremely happy to see  3 of my designs running in the screen representing Believe Creative studio for Macro trends.
I also was extremely happy to see also  a design created for Believe Creative Studio collection by  Bethan Janine Westran, one of our fabulous guest designers  being printed and displayed as a representation of the Enchanted and Mysterious Macro-Trend.

Indigo Influences - Trend Area

Second day is also student day. Designs students over the world come to the show to gain some insight on the trends and the activities in this market. I love to get approached by enthusiastic souls making all sort of questions, being extremely curious and interested on how something is developed but it has unfortunately another side: some of the students came in groups gather around the stand to have a great conversation between each other about all the topics imaginable, except design, they are really interested in getting your business cards, goodies and candies;  "students happenings"  around the booth are definitely not good for business.
I have seen customers walking away from the stands because of this reason. It is a sensitive topic, because in one end I want to inspire the younger generations and I want to communicate my passion for this work but  in the other end this is sometimes just not good if you are expecting to still attract  new customers in the second day of the show.

This year the second day was very special because I became 40! so yes I was a very happy seller.

Happy 40th!

Lovely cards and a lovely present a "Swedish dala horse"

Indigo-Part2 : The crazy and exciting first day of the show

Indigo is divided in 3 days, each one is completely different from the other which and I will describe them over the following post. 

This season Indigo-Paris  was visited by over 14,000 visitors from around the world. With 194 studios exhibiting their collections. 

The first day is totally busy, since the opening of the show you see lots of people walking in the isles.The energy is great, everybody is "shiny". Is wonderful too see also the great work most of the studios put to decorate their stands. 

You can see that some of the visitors have already appointments set up with the studios, you see people walking around, most of them with a plan in mind,some of the buyers even carry a list of the studios to visit as well.
To me this day is very exciting, I happily wait, smile and do my best to provide answers and to show the collection at their customer pace.

Is kind of hard job, even though you wish to explain every bit of a single design, you have also to try to put yourself  on the other side of the table to understand the buyer. Luckily I have the opportunity  back in the day to be in that side and I know how challenging and  tiring can be to watch hundreds and hundreds of designs during the show.
In my opinion as a seller you have to be fast when showing the collection, be open to engage in conversation and open to explain or answer any question asked by the customer, but you have to try to read the body language of the buyer and understand if they need you to slow down, if they want to spend more time in a particular  design or if they just want  you to finish as fast as possible.

At the end of the first day I was completely exhausted, is lots of emotions and energy going on, I was very tired of working on the collection, the trip, building the stand… oh gosh I am getting the chills just to remember how tired I was.

The first day                                                     Image from Indigo website.

The first day                                                     Image from Indigo website

Our participation in Indigo- Paris- Part 1: The stand

Finally I am back after few days of obligated time off after one of the most exciting yet busiest times of my life.
There is so many things that happen in september:

• First of all we had one of my dearest friends visiting from Mexico, she is the amazing and talented Aide Dorantes.
• My husband Vincent and I celebrated our 2nd anniversary as husband and wife.
• I celebrated my 40th birthday and we participated in Indigo -PV for second time this time in collaboration with 16 fabulous guest designers.

There is of course too much to tell and too much to share so I decided to make it in parts.
First I want to tell you about the stand:

In my previous participation in Indigo-Paris  in september 2011 I honestly focused only in designing, designing, designing.
I spend almost 4 months sitting in our kitchen and garden tables hand painting my designs, a week before the show I visited Indigo -Brussels were
I realized I have forgotten to think about the stand, for me was as simply as displaying my prettiest work in the wall, but during Indigo -Brussels I was blown away with some of the work the studios did to decorate the stand.
I came home and went shopping for details to give the stand a more personal look. Of course pink elements were in my priority list.
I took me 2 or 3 days to gather all together and I think at the end the stand was nice, but compared with the other studios was not an eye catcher.
That time I saw people covering walls with very expensive huge size prints, color curtains, lamps, wallpapering all the stand and even having a living room ambiance.
So I though, next time I will be at that level.

Believe creative studio Indigo -Paris 2011 stand

This year I went to the extreme: 4 months previous to the show I started to think what I want for a stand, I knew few things
1. Pink should be involved
2. I wanted an eye catcher stand
3. I Wanted lots of details but everything had to fit in our car including me, my husband and my friend, the collection, my outfits including birthday sparkling ballerinas and tiara.
4. I wanted something personal, I wanted to include pictures specially from the ones I mainly design for :the little ones in the world.

I truly spend days and nights thinking about the stand and every detail I needed to cover.
I was so obsessed about it that for weeks I focused only on it. I make some very rough graphics on how it will look.
I bought papers to wall cover part of my studio to try which one we liked the most and I spend hours in the shops looking every little detail even coordinating napkins which by the way I just stored because we barely used them.
I also needed to keep in mind I had somehow to display a selection of the designs that were the most representative of the collection without delivering everything at once to the customer.

I got amazing pictures from my lovely nieces and also amazing shoots from the boys of Ana Berger , one of our guest designers.
At the end, I did loved the stand, I think it really represented Believe Creative Studio style and  our soul as a brand.
I think walking trough all the isles and seeing fabulous and well planned stands ,ours was popping out thanks of the stikking pink paper we used as a wallpaper.
At least I think people will remember that : the pink stand.
To mount the stand we spend around 5 hours between 3 people , is honestly a bit of a heavy task, and it was really hard because that day (18 of September ) was our wedding anniversary and after we finished
We were so tired and hungry that we needed to eat anything… what was our immediate option? Burgers in Mc' Donald's… seriously???

Anyhow, we have to do what we have to do, this as any other job require sometimes little sacrifices which at the end payoff when you see the results and even better when you are happy with it.
Hope you like it as well.

Some notes for next time:
1. Try to find a balance between not even thinking that stand decoration is needed and obsessing about it.
2. Find and decide in few main elements and stick to them, even if later on I find the coolest ever.
3. Still think eye catcher stand.
4. Reflect the soul and brand identity.
5. Be efficient and reuse
6. Make reservations for dinner in a decent restaurant so we have time pressure and nice reward after the hard work.

at our arrival- blank stand

Aide cutting paper to wallcover the stand

last piece is covered... no more paper available!

finalizing details

the perfect team: Vincent too tall me too short

chairs and tablecloth

Love to see the name of our studio displayed in this way

Adorable giveaways

Vincent & Rosie: proud, happy and in love