So excuse me being a few days late but here it goes! So this year at ikkicon, rather then just going as a typical anime fan, I decided to run an art booth

I did one at Anime Overload back in august, and while it didn't go as well as I had hoped, I figured a larger con would make things easier. Well...I think that things COULD have gone well, had the people running the con not been total idiots >.> lets put it this way, last year I was on safety detail for them, and I saw first hand how completely UNORGANIZED they are. Just compare them to San Japan, they are the same age, yet San Japan is huge. Like...A-Kon huge. And while San Antonio is a big city, I would think Austin is more then big enough to be able to handle a large con. Anyways, in Ikkicon's 'experimentation' they put the artist alley in with the dealers. Big mistake. Nearly every artist I talked to could barely break even, if they got that much. There was one entrance to the room, and about five exits. When you entered you hit a dealers booth first, then you could go right to the dealers part, or left to the artists part. Now, imagine walking into a room and having a choice to go A. to the right where you see big displays, and massive items or B. to go to the left where you see some things, but not quite as impressive. To put it simply, a lot of people I talked to didn't even know where the artist alley was. After the con there were people saying they WANTED to hit the artist alley, if they knew where the heck it was. There were no signs, and with people spread out in the hall ways, some in the gaming room, and most in the dealers room, it was just a HUGE mess! And because of their bad decision, we didn't do as well as we should have. Most say it was the worst con they had ever ran a booth at. Not to mention dealers being upset that they paid so much more for their booths, and here we were right next to them. Needless to say, it wasn't the best experience ever.
But not to worry! I plan to go to overload again this year

and am improving on my display ^^ I shared my booth with

and her sister this time around, and it was their first time. They had the most adorable buttons and cute prints for sale

Hopefully seeing that we weren't the only ones doing poorly helped keep them from getting discouraged and I hope they will try frequenting cons again ^^ anyways, it was a last minute thing over all, I had more or less given up hope of doing a booth this year, since it was sold out and I had been looking since october. But three days before the con I got a reply to my post and figured, what the heck! Why not? I still had a decent amount of stock left over from overload, so I made a few more as quickly as I could before the con, and considering I only had a few days I would say I did pretty well

and I have been looking into making badges for overload, and hopefully getting more fanart done for prints

just to broaden what I sell ^^ and I will look into getting those 'cube' things to help make my display look even better! So I am still a newbie at this, but I hope in time I will get better, and who knows, maybe people will start to look forward to seeing me at cons ;D anyways, this year I was between

and another girl who was selling prints and commissions. THey gave us good advice and helped us feel a bit better about not doing as well as we had hoped. Over all, I earned back my half of the table, going home with about...$80 or so. Its not great, but its better then nothing ^^ over all I really didn't make anything though because I couldn't resist buying some stuff D8 I got some awesome pigtails, made from those...pipe...things XD not sure what they are called. And I got a GIANT TAILS PLUSHIE 8DDD that one was just too hard to not get, and to help support the artists I got an awesome terriermon hat

and a few little things here and there like buying food, got a badge from the toon twins and bought a button from the girls I shared my booth with XD a cute grim reaper one

anyways, so yah that's about it. I went to a panel to talk about things the con could improve on, and had a few other artists with me to back me up about never doing waht they did this year again. They promised next year the artist alley would be separate from the dealers room again, as it should be! And they would actually use SIGNS so that people know where the heck they are going. There was also an apparent problem with preregistration considering hte line extended into the stair well and was like that pretty much all day D8 just glad I wasn't one of those people! Being in line for three to five hours would have sucked! And they are working on their contract with the next hotel they are at so that we can use the outlets. Didn't I mention that? it was 50 bucks to use ONE outlet >.> yah...so no computer for me =< I wanted to draw for people, didn't happen and I was glad I didn't! I didn't make enough to counter THAT cost D8 so hopefully that wont happen again ;XD
anyways, time to end my rant. I brought a cold home from the con so the past few days have been MISERABLE but I am taking plenty of zinc so hopefully it will blow over soon. To those who were at the con hope you guys had fun and I hope to see you call again at Overload! Also I plan to hit Ushicon this year, no booth just a by stander

anyways hope to see you guys soon ;D and maybe this year will be the year I finally hit A-Kon for the first time 8D hehe ^^
oh and here's a fun fact 8D I went to Iron Artist for the first time ^^ I beat the 'reigning champ' the first time, but lost the second time, so we tied 8D then the other girl who challenged him tied, but I say she won 'cause he cheated D8< he doodled on a sticky note beforehand, CHEATING! Lol anwyays, ciao XD
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