Tammy and Alison travelled to Sydney this month to fly the flag for Tambo Teddies at the Australian Home and Gift Fair held at the Sydney Olympic Park.
Choosing to drive, it was an epic trip as we headed off from Tambo on Wednesday February 19 at 4.45 am. We had a few jobs to attend to in Toowoomba including a Hub team celebration at the Federal Hotel. The 4.45am start was nice and early, but didn’t quite stack up against our 2.00am start on Thursday morning. We crossed the border into New South Wales two hours later and gaining an hour, we only had a further nine hours to travel to our destination.
Thursday was ‘set-up’ day at the Sydney Olympic Park venue, we received a rather anxious call from the venue as we were travelling through Singleton. But with only two and half hours travelling in front of us, we were able to assure the organisers that we would be set up before the ‘curfew’ of 6pm. Eventually arriving at 3pm, we spent a good 30 mins driving around the venue trying to locate the right entrance!
Once inside we didn’t take long to set up our stall which was located in the middle of the Australian Made pavilion. Not having attended a trade show previously, we had settled on a fairly simple site design to showcase our products. Tambo Teddies had arrived and were in the house, ready for day one of the Fair. We headed to our accommodation, had a little issue with the local police (no U-turns allowed in NSW), ordered in a meal and crashed for the night.
Day one of the Fair, the excitement was high amongst our fellow stall holders as we waited for the crowds to arrive. All manner of retailers and businesses wandered through the rows and rows of stands over the next four days. Sydney Gift Fair is one of Australia’s largest retail trade exhibitions. Providing a trade-only platform, buyers and sellers do business, acquire knowledge and network. There was great appreciation of Australian Made products which re-emphasised the importance of this status for our brand.
Luck was on our side again as we were invited to do a television live weather cross on Monday morning for Channel Nine. We welcomed the opportunity to further promote our bears and promote our region. We were also able to attend a couple of masterclasses on Instagram and visual merchandising.
Back in Tambo, we will be judging the success of the Fair for Tambo Teddies as we make contact with all the visitors to our stand and convert them into stockists. We took a couple of orders on the stand and made many contacts and new friends.
We are keen to apply our learnings and to continue to promote our brand across Australia – so watch this space!