How to Plan and Sucessfully have a BYC ChickenStock by Jessica K.
I would First recommend that you start a thread in the chickenstock section of the BYC forum, make sure to label it for your state and surrounding areas, to see how many in your area would want to attend and are interested. Invite others to help plan your chickenstock, ask for ideas and things that people would be interested to see or do at a chickenstock. Do alot of research, ask questions, a good source of information for chickenstocks is the other threads on the forum. So check out what other people did for there chickenstocks, make a list of questions to ask others who have already held one. Once you have gotten a idea of the interest in your area, find a good location to hold your stock that is a good central place for everyone, And that is a generally easy place to find for those that are not real familiar with the area. I would recommend a large fair barn or livestock arena something that has some covering just in case the weather decides not to cooperate. I also recommend finding some folks in your local area to help with the planning, ask for volunteers to help with the set up on the day of or before, good groups to contact for this is your county 4-H and FFA groups. at teh oklahoma chickenstock we had several different things going on. we had a raffle table of chicken and non-chicken related items, good things for raffle are breed club hats and items, magazine sub., chicken knick knacks, kitchen baskets comprised of spices, pictures, cutting boards, towels, etc..... also small items such as ty chicken beaine babys, statues, t-shirts, just anything you can think of and you will find also that some of your people who will bring chickens to show may also donate things for the raffle too. for the raffle table I recommend setting it up some where there will be alot of traffic, now you can have someone setting at the table selling tickets or you may want to have the concession stand folks do it, although I would recommend having someone man the table as sometimes you will have young children who will move the tickets from bag to bag. set your raffle items up on the table and label each item with a number then at the edge of the table tape little brown lunch sacks along the edge and label each with a number of an raffle item. you make want to offer a $1.00 raffle, 5.00 raffle and a 10.00 raffle for larger items. use different colored tickets to keep track of which it which and make sure that you label each item stating that it is either 1, 5 or 10.00. we offered a deal on our tickets you could get 5 $1.00 tickets for $3.00. you will tend to sell more doing it that way. On the concession I would offer something simple such as Hotdog, nochos with cheese, can coke, and bottled water, coffee, and tea. small snack bags of chips, and those austin snack crackers, and small bags of cookies. in the process of buying the food I did find that you may want to price it before buying at a wholesale place such as sam's club, while the big cans of nocho cheese and 3 lb boxes of chips are good to get there the hotdogs and buns were cheaper to buy a wal-mart for $0.58 a package of 8, and buns for $0.64 a package. So do keep that in mind when shopping for your concession stand food. also clubs like the 4-H and FFA will also sometimes be willing to work the concession stand for you, in exchange for keep the profits from what they sell, and will most of the time take care of all the food and pricing the menu for you, to get in contact with the groups in your area try contacting the local extenstion office in your area.
Now to draw in a larger crowd you may want to offer arts and crafts, I would put a ad in your local newspapers asking for local arts and crafts venders to come down and set up. also go to some of the festivals in your areas and find out who puts them on and ask the director for a list of venders to contact. also while at a local festival handout flyers for your event and let them know the are welcome to come down and set up a booth. for my first stock I offered free booth spaces and let each vender know that next year we will be charging a small fee if we have to rent the barn again, something in the range of $15.00 to $20.00 which is not much for them for the return that they will make in sales at the event. Make sure to find out if the location you are having your chickenstock will have tables and chairs for set up or if you will need to provide talbles that way you can let the venders know if they will need to bring tables or if you can provide them.
At your stock you may also want provide some free product information from some of the leading poultry product producers, and breed information. you can find alot of this kind of information on the web read to print off. also contact some of the feed companies, hatcheries, and poultry product companys and let them know that you are holding a chickens show event and a lot of them may offer to buy a booth space and send you products and info to set up for them. and sometimes send you items to sell or raffle off in exchange for sponsership and product promotion.
this is a work in progress and I will be updating routinely as I go along
I would First recommend that you start a thread in the chickenstock section of the BYC forum, make sure to label it for your state and surrounding areas, to see how many in your area would want to attend and are interested. Invite others to help plan your chickenstock, ask for ideas and things that people would be interested to see or do at a chickenstock. Do alot of research, ask questions, a good source of information for chickenstocks is the other threads on the forum. So check out what other people did for there chickenstocks, make a list of questions to ask others who have already held one. Once you have gotten a idea of the interest in your area, find a good location to hold your stock that is a good central place for everyone, And that is a generally easy place to find for those that are not real familiar with the area. I would recommend a large fair barn or livestock arena something that has some covering just in case the weather decides not to cooperate. I also recommend finding some folks in your local area to help with the planning, ask for volunteers to help with the set up on the day of or before, good groups to contact for this is your county 4-H and FFA groups. at teh oklahoma chickenstock we had several different things going on. we had a raffle table of chicken and non-chicken related items, good things for raffle are breed club hats and items, magazine sub., chicken knick knacks, kitchen baskets comprised of spices, pictures, cutting boards, towels, etc..... also small items such as ty chicken beaine babys, statues, t-shirts, just anything you can think of and you will find also that some of your people who will bring chickens to show may also donate things for the raffle too. for the raffle table I recommend setting it up some where there will be alot of traffic, now you can have someone setting at the table selling tickets or you may want to have the concession stand folks do it, although I would recommend having someone man the table as sometimes you will have young children who will move the tickets from bag to bag. set your raffle items up on the table and label each item with a number then at the edge of the table tape little brown lunch sacks along the edge and label each with a number of an raffle item. you make want to offer a $1.00 raffle, 5.00 raffle and a 10.00 raffle for larger items. use different colored tickets to keep track of which it which and make sure that you label each item stating that it is either 1, 5 or 10.00. we offered a deal on our tickets you could get 5 $1.00 tickets for $3.00. you will tend to sell more doing it that way. On the concession I would offer something simple such as Hotdog, nochos with cheese, can coke, and bottled water, coffee, and tea. small snack bags of chips, and those austin snack crackers, and small bags of cookies. in the process of buying the food I did find that you may want to price it before buying at a wholesale place such as sam's club, while the big cans of nocho cheese and 3 lb boxes of chips are good to get there the hotdogs and buns were cheaper to buy a wal-mart for $0.58 a package of 8, and buns for $0.64 a package. So do keep that in mind when shopping for your concession stand food. also clubs like the 4-H and FFA will also sometimes be willing to work the concession stand for you, in exchange for keep the profits from what they sell, and will most of the time take care of all the food and pricing the menu for you, to get in contact with the groups in your area try contacting the local extenstion office in your area.
Now to draw in a larger crowd you may want to offer arts and crafts, I would put a ad in your local newspapers asking for local arts and crafts venders to come down and set up. also go to some of the festivals in your areas and find out who puts them on and ask the director for a list of venders to contact. also while at a local festival handout flyers for your event and let them know the are welcome to come down and set up a booth. for my first stock I offered free booth spaces and let each vender know that next year we will be charging a small fee if we have to rent the barn again, something in the range of $15.00 to $20.00 which is not much for them for the return that they will make in sales at the event. Make sure to find out if the location you are having your chickenstock will have tables and chairs for set up or if you will need to provide talbles that way you can let the venders know if they will need to bring tables or if you can provide them.
At your stock you may also want provide some free product information from some of the leading poultry product producers, and breed information. you can find alot of this kind of information on the web read to print off. also contact some of the feed companies, hatcheries, and poultry product companys and let them know that you are holding a chickens show event and a lot of them may offer to buy a booth space and send you products and info to set up for them. and sometimes send you items to sell or raffle off in exchange for sponsership and product promotion.
this is a work in progress and I will be updating routinely as I go along