Markets and kids?!?!?!

[Marilyn Norgart]

OMG--at the market today I had a family with 4 young kids walk up and the kids were pretty handsy but still kinda careful--there was a mom with 5 kids that kinda pushed into the group...…..Man my soap was flying--I feel really dumb but I didn't know how to handle it--I don't panic but I was starting to. the one kid dropped some and dinged a corner. the mom says "oh did it get damaged" I told her it got dinged and she wasn't controlling the situation so I finally told the kids to be careful.
How do you guys deal with kids picking up product. I made a couple sales cuz the kid picked it up and smelled but...….…..this was so uncontrolled.

 

[Bladesmith]

I had a somewhat similar experience...

My first arts and crafts fair I attended, I was selling knives that I had made. I had each one placed on a flat piece of wood I had processed.

Anyway, there was tons of traffic and it was getting hard to keep up. All of a sudden some little girl runs over to my table, grabs a knife, and starts stabbing the wood block it is sitting on repeatedly. She had separated from her mother who was shopping at a nearby booth. I immediately started heading toward her to try and do something and she threw the knife back at the table and ran off...

Needless to say, after that I decided to change the way I display things. The knife was extremely sharp and that could have been a really bad situation.

Interested to hear what people say. That incident stuck with me.

 

[Marilyn Norgart]

I had a somewhat similar experience...

My first arts and crafts fair I attended, I was selling knives that I had made. I had each one placed on a flat piece of wood I had processed.

Anyway, there was tons of traffic and it was getting hard to keep up. All of a sudden some little girl runs over to my table, grabs a knife, and starts stabbing the wood block it is sitting on repeatedly. She had separated from her mother who was shopping at a nearby booth. I immediately started heading toward her to try and do something and she threw the knife back at the table and ran off...

Needless to say, after that I decided to change the way I display things. The knife was extremely sharp and that could have been a really bad situation.

Interested to hear what people say. That incident stuck with me.

wow--yeah that could have turned bad fast. I think I have decided that I need to say "I would prefer the kids look and not touch" but I made two separate sales from younger kids today...but they were older than the 9 munchkins. maybe I need to just go on a case by case basis

 

[Obsidian]

Put up a sign that says you damage it, you buy it. That way if kids do drop it, the parents can be held responsible.

 

[Relle]

I use to say unless you are going to buy it put it down and go to take it off them while giving the death stare ( works every time). I don't care what the parents think. Older ones seemed to be alright.

As for knives dh always displayed his knives in a locked see through case, never on an open table. Even then when they asked to see them, mostly males, they would run their finger across the blade to see how sharp tbey were . You have to be over 16 here to buy a knife. I wonder who's the silly ones.

 

[Lin19687]

I had that and still cringe at kids.
I tell parents to hold the soaps for the kids to smell.
Had one mothers kid drop a salt bar, cracked off the corner. Told her that was $7. I would have given a discount to her but her kids were all over and she didn't care.
Man was she p.o'd I don't care.

I also started to see some trying to open my new boxes, I had to say please don't open boxes. That woman bought it anyway, 2 bars .
Now I have to put a small sticker on the ends of the soaps now. More work but better then telling them to stop BEFORE they get it open.

You just have to watch what people do.
I have a post somewhere about this too.

 

[amd]

That happened to me last summer too. I had a lady with half a dozen kids under the age of 10 come up to the booth. Fortunately I had my 10 year old daughter with me, so I grabbed her quick and said "gather the kids and hold the soaps for them to smell". That kept them occupied while I made the sale with the mom - although one of the younger kids did manage to stick a lip balm in her mouth. I made the mom buy it - my lip balms are shrinkwrapped, but I still wasn't going to resell that! So if you have someone with you who can run interference gently and firmly with the kids, let them do that.

A friend of mine does doll clothes and she tells me that she'll look the parent dead in the eye and kick them out of her booth, she doesn't need their money. I saw her do it once and she is very firm and to the point "I can't have your kids wrecking my things and I don't need your money. Get out of my booth." The one time that I saw it, the mother got a shocked look at her face, looked at her kids and said "If you want anything, stop touching it." then apologized to my friend. The lady kept her kids in line after that. Sometimes I think people are just so in their own heads they don't even realize what else is going on. So while I don't suggest being as point blank as my friend is, I do suggest taking a moment with the mom and saying "I spend a lot of time making these soaps, so while they may not break they could get dinged and dirty. Please help me by asking your kids to not handle the soaps. If they want to smell them, maybe after you're done shopping we can pick out some for them to smell."

 

[Marilyn Norgart]

its sad that people are so unaware or just don't care what their kids do. thanks for all the ideas--I am going to try to use them....I guess I was just so shocked that my brain didnt work. all I know is if my kids acted like that we went home right away. and today was another market that that didn't happen--so I am right with markets again

 

[Nanette]

If kids come up without their parent, I become the parent and tell them to stop it if they are being irresponsible with the soap. I am the parent to the parents also if need be--kindness added.....