The Road to STGCC: Anatomy of the TOYSREVIL Booth F51
And having the corner booth at the end of Artist Alley was "perfect"! I had wanted a space away from the din and from the onslaught of traffic, and somewhere where like-minded folks can drop by and chill.
A "mama shop" is a term locally known in Singapore, as a shop run by Indian internationals ("Ma Ma" is a somewhat "derogatory" slang describing our Indian-brothers ;p). And essentially it is a convenience corner store, totting all manner of household items and other daily sundries, chief of which was a children's part of the store, which had candy, toys, and comicbooks dangling from clips tied on string etc! This known as a "Warong/Warung", as my Indonesian friends call it :)
Shown above-left is a sketch of the booth, which I had used to show as visual reference to my collaborators, for the theme I had home to achieve. One aspect of the toy-exclusives I had wanted to portray, was the concept of "bagged with header-cards".
The result of my "Cosplay-themed Booth", is seen for Booth F51 at the recent weekend's Singapore Toy Games & Comic Convention @ MBS. And while it may not have looked a 100% like the 'mamashop" of my youth, I reckon I did a decent job of making it happen - of course with the good graces of my collaborators who choose to play again with my scheme LOL. Also I would like to give major thanks for G&B Comics for providing me the chinese comics to give away for free! Alas I couldn't manage to add in more dangly lines to clip the comics from LOL
Another aspect of the booth, which I really wanted (which was also the original concept of the booth, when I decide to go for one two years ago while lying in Stroke recover bed in the hospital), was to have a communal-ish coffee-table set-up, where there would be a small round table - for signings and simple sit-arounds - and stools, like you would literally be having a cup at a local "kopi tam"!
Got the black stools from IKEA, and managed to find a foldable table and stuck my blog-logo on it, and there we have it! Although admittedly, I have to find a way to tweak the logo such that my blogname/nick can be seen tho when stuff is piled up on it LOL
If I decide to go for another booth next year, I'll look towards doing up the space with another theme, because while this was fun, it was a massive endeavor to get going - check out the trolley of "props" I had prepared the night before! I seriously doubt that I'll ever do this again! (Although, never say never, tho …). If you've stopped by my booth F51, I'd love to hear some feedback from YOU as well? Was it comfortable for you to shop? Was it too menacing an effort, compared to a traditional desk laid in front of you, with a person looking at you from behind said table?
But why so much effort and trouble for a 'petite' 2meters x 2meters Artist Alley booth? Because I'm not a 'retailer' per se and do not know how to grasp the concept of "spend less money on decor and earn more profit from sales", and that that's how I roll. If I'm not happy with my own booth, how dare I expect folks to like it too? Heh.
I'm proud of myself, my family, and my collaborators for making this happen tho - so THANKS, everyone!
