Stock Was Flying, but Not in a Good Way!

“Everybody talks about the weather, but no one does anything about it.” Since we started selling at Elephant’s Trunk Flea Market, we haunt weather apps days in advance. New England weather and a lifetime’s experience inform us of the futility of bothering until a couple days before, but it’s habit. The weather impacts the number of customers we can expect. More importantly, a miscalculation can render that 80-year-old piece of ephemera into soggy scrap in seconds.

We bought a tent to act as a fly before we started selling, and have brought it with us every weekend since. The plus is it gives protection from the sun and keeps most of the rain off. We also use it to display our banners, helping us with branding. The minus is a tent is one more thing to bring, set up, and break down. It also occupies space in the car we could use for stock.

As we found out last Sunday, there’s also wind, and your fly may live up to its name. We decided to set it up, although we expected 20-mile-an-hour winds. What we got were gusts of 40. Although our tent is vented, there are limits. Zander had to grab onto the frame to keep it from pulling up stakes and taking off like a kite. Fortunately, Valerie, an Elephant’s Trunk staffer, and a goodhearted passerby all pitched in and we were able to get the fabric off the frame before it tore loose.

We were lucky. A vendor on the same row had a 20’ x 10’ fly. When the wind blew, he started to take it down but the wind shredded it. A merchant across the way lost hundreds of dollars worth of china when a gust got under the tablecloth and flipped them off the table. Valerie spoke to a seller who’d witnessed a fly smack into a glass front bookcase; incredibly, nothing was broken. That same vendor told Valerie of another vendor earlier in the season who’d used a beach umbrella instead of a fly who wasn’t so fortunate. Her umbrella took off like a missile and came down on a table in the next row and had to pay more than $300 for destroyed merchandise.

Tomorrow there’s a 0% chance of rain, and we’ll pack accordingly. Stores don’t have to deal with problems like these. Hope to see you at the Trunk!