Ask Kat: Wholesale or Retail Show? What’s the Difference

(This post is part of a new series we’ve started in an attempt to publicly answer some of the mostly commonly asked questions we receive.)

This new question & answer series has been just great and today’s question is fun to talk about!What’s the difference between a wholesale show and a retail show?

As most of you know, the sewing industry has two wholesale trade shows per year…the Spring and the Fall Quilt Markets, and I often get asked, “Why can’t the general public come to the Quilt Market?” As a matter of fact, until I got into this business, I really didn’t understand the fundamental differences between a wholesale and retail show either, and here’s the deal… to the naked eye, the differences are not readily apparent. As a matter of fact, if I showed you a picture of a random show floor, you would be hard-pressed to find a visual cue as to whether it was a wholesale or a retail show! So what are the differences?

• Attendees– In order to attend a wholesale show as a buyer, one must present a valid resale license or certificate.  Some trade shows allow employees to attend along with an approved buyer or store owner, (even though they do not possess the required credentials), however, these non-approved buyers are generally not permitted to make purchases.
• Prices– And speaking of prices, this is a MAJOR difference indeed! Generally speaking, at a wholesale show, one can expect to find prices roughly 50% of the retail price, which makes sense since these buyers are resellers who will be looking to make a profit when they resell the items in their own venue.
• Taxes– So far at least, Uncle Sam only requires that sales tax be paid ONE time per item. In this country its generally assumed that the end-user gets this honor. So with this in mind, sales tax is not collected at wholesale shows, but if attend a retail show, someone MUST pay sales tax. So… if we decide to vend at an out-of-state retail show, we’ll need to get a Tax ID# from that state and pay the appropriate tax to that entity afterward. 
• Sales– Since the attendees at wholesale shows are retailers (for the most part), they generally are not interested in buying single patterns and many would rather just have their order shipped to them after we all go home. Not so at retail shows. It would be a rare sale indeed that included more than one of a particular pattern here, and almost every customer wants to take their purchase home that day, which means that we should plan on bringing a lot more product with us to our first retail show.
• Attendance– There’s no doubt about it, the attendance at retail shows blow the wholesale shows out of the water! For example, the attendance at the Quilt Market in Houston last fall was over 10,000, but guess what the attendance was just one week later at the Quilt Festival (in the very same venue)? 61,116
• Customer Contact-One of the things I enjoy the most about the trade shows we’ve attended is the customer contact. It’s great to get out in the public and hear the comments and suggestions straight from our buyers. The wholesale shows give us a good idea what the retailers like to have on hand in their stores, but I feel like a retail show would give us more of a grass roots reaction to our products. Both are good points of view to tap into.

As you know, so far our only real vending experience has been at wholesale show venues, but guess what? We’ve committed to branching out and trying our hand at our very 1st retail show in 2013. 

We’re REALLY excited about it and we’ll give you more details about when and where this retail show is taking place in our next post in this series, so stay tuned! So…have you ever attended a wholesale or a retail show?If so, which show did you attend? Please feel free to leave your comments in the space provided below 

Check out the best sewing pins with me on Pinterest, join in on discussions or show off your work in our FaceBook Group, or get your daily sewing fix on our Facebook Business Page or get behind the scenes scoops on Instagram, and be the 1st to know about new patterns, discount codes and sample sales by signing up for our monthly newsletter.