Leesburg Fine Arts Festival

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=90 BGCOLOR="#006699" TEXT="#080000" background="05bfd5a3.jpg"> <div> <B>Leesburg Fine Arts Festival</B></div> <div> <B>6260 N.W. 19 Street, Sunrise, Fl. 33313 Toll Free 1-877-512-3333    Email: </B><A HREF="mailto:mike@mikealbin.com" TARGET="_top" TITLE="mailto:mike@mikealbin.com"><U><B>mike@mikealbin.com</B></U></A></div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=210 BGCOLOR="#FFCC66" TEXT="#080000" background="05cd2043.jpg"> <bR> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Mike Albin.Com "><U>Mike Albin.Com </U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="wd.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Web design"><U>Web design</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="ma.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Marketing Articles"><U>Marketing Articles</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="sr.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Show Reviews"><U>Show Reviews</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="mt.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Marketing Tools"><U>Marketing Tools</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="l.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Links"><U>Links</U></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" height=390 BGCOLOR="#777777" TEXT="#080000"> <div> 2004 Leesburg Fine Arts Festival</div> <div> March 27-28, 27th Leesburg Fine Arts Festival, Leesburg, Fl. Contact: Leesburg Center for the Arts, P.O. Box 490043, Leesburg, Fl. 34749.</div> <div> This show is located on Main Street in Historic Downtown Leesburg.  The streets are very well manicured and a great location for an art show.  Set-up is on Friday night after 6:00 pm and was very well run and organized.  There are 12 foot wide spaces with lots of room for storage behind each tent.  All 150 artists booths are located on Main Street with no one on side streets.  Parking is close by and free.  My first impressions of this show were wow, these people really know how to put on art show.  </div> <div> Saturday the weather was perfect, temps in the 70's and blue skies. Attendance at the show was probably 5,000-7,000 people, mostly retired with very little wall space and even less cash for spending on quality art.  I spoke with 30-35 of the artists at the show and found only two that had done the show more than once.  One was a potter that said most of her sales at the show comes from seven dollar candles, the other a wind chime maker selling items in the twenty dollar range.  We made one sale the entire weekend for a grand total $825.00.  </div> <div> Saturday night there was a fabulous artist dinner and $15,000.00 in award money was handed out.  The show also claims to have another $10,000.00 in patron purchase awards.  The only problem I saw here was the patron awards were all in twenty-five dollar certificates and were spent on items in that price range.  </div> <div> Sunday again was another fabulous weather day and crowds were about the same.  Most of the artists I spoke with said sales were very slow.  The crowds diminished around 4:00 pm and I passed out fast audits to five artists.  One metal sculptor rated sales of $826.00 a 4, another sculptor rated sales of $1900.00 a 4.  The other three were a photographer, a potter and a glass artist all rated sales a 1, ranging between $500.00- $1000.00.  Four of the five indicated they would not return for another try.  Most of the artists I spoke with said they would not return.  The crowds were very tight with their money.  </div> <div> All of the artists I spoke with had good things to say about their treatment at the show, the staff, organization, artists amenities and layout.  It really is a shame with people working so hard to put on a quality show, the public just did not come out and support the show with purchases.  There was a good size farmers market at the show with lots of fresh fruits and vegetables and where a ten pound bag of potatoes was selling for one dollar!  I saw lots of potatoes going by our booth and very little art.  </div> </td> </tr></table></body>