Junction Arts Festival, September 8-9, 2007
http://www.junctionartsfest.com/2007/
Leon Emmet of Hairy Tarantula was kind enough to accept my irascible self as a means to promote T$ during this two-day event. I attended Saturday and Sunday afternoons.

Highlights

I spoke with dozens of people, store merchants, stall holders and consumers about the merits of T$ as a means of supporting the local community.
I made new contacts with local consumers and received an invitation to bring T$ to the Kensington Market.
I ended up with $T225 less than when I started. Of this I sold $T120 that I can recall, and most of the rest I spent locally or gave to people to spend locally.
I laughed a lot and had a lot of fun.
Again, I feel that a Street Fest is a difficult place to exchange dollars; it is a great venue to discuss T$ with passers by.

Hours

I was on the street from 11;00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Saturday, and from 11:30 a.m. to about 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Maryan took over the stall on Sunday afternoon.

Flyer

We printed 400+100 flyers for the event. Leon will use any excess at the BIA office and in his store. I fell behind schedule and did not get as many logos as we had hoped. Nonetheless by Sunday we had on our printed list the following vendors:
· Global Aware Kensington Kensington Market
· Big Daddy’s DVD Shop 3044 Dundas Street West
· Pandemonium Books & Music 2862 Dundas Street West
· Pascal's Baguettes and Bagels 2904 Dundas Street West
· Latitude 44 Gallery, Framing & Decor 2900 Dundas Street West
· ($T not applicable on consignment artwork)
· Hairy Tarantula Games and Comics 2949 Dundas Street West
· (10% off all books bought with $T during festival)
· Agora Mediterranean Market Café 3015 Dundas Street West
· Panache Art Gallery & Custom Framing 2946 Dundas Street West
· (10% off all purchases made with $T during festival)
· Ian's T-Shirts (at Hairy Tarantula for festival)

Merchants

Thanks to Leon Emmett’s work-in-advance, we had several merchants listed who, we could tell consumers, will accept T$. I spent T$ at Pascal’s and Agora, and plan to spend T$ at Panache this week.

Pascal’s

Saturday morning there was some initial hesitancy on Pascal’s part to accept T$. I countered this by repeated trips buying coffee for stall holders. A coffee/juice/pastry shop is a good target when conversing with residents and consumers.
By Sunday Pascal was keeping two sets of bills in one till, and trying desperately to make changes from his stash of T$; he became frustrated when he couldn’t make $T14 change for my $T20 note. With or without a float, merchants might be told that they can make change in $cdn, to reinforce the view to consumers that T$ are valued at par with $cdn.

Agora

Agora accepted my T$. I made several lunch trips here.

The Food Chain

In a startup location such as this, the immediate (first week) problem seems to be starting the circulation. Eateries, such as Pascal’s and Agora are easy sinks for T$. It is hard to see Pascal making many trips to panache to get his pictures framed using T$, but easy to see staff from panache making several trips to Pascal’s for coffee.
I would support a 100% reimbursement guarantee for eateries as ‘everybody has to eat’, and they provide a sure receptacle for T$. Of course in an area like SLM, some eateries can pass their T$ on to stall holders.
One might locate at most two prime T$ sinks in any location to serve as receptors of T$, and cut a special deal with them.

New merchants

I dropped a flyer at Vesuvio’s because, of course, the manager was busy. We might go back and harvest the manager this week.
I spoke with Wandee, manager of Young Thailand. (I had eaten there last week). She seemed quite receptive, and agreed to meet with us next week.
“Clive” of Global Aware Kensington market quite threw me off my feet by accepting T$ unsolicited. I tracked him down and reimbursed him. He suggested that Kensington Market is ripe for T$, with many aware merchants. Sunday morning he bought his $20 back ad promised to grab his coffees from Pascal’s.
Clive referred me to Petra of “Ten Thousand Villages”. I gave her flyers (Junction & SLM) and my business card and asked her to contact me. www.tenthousandvillages.ca has stores across Canada. My friend Linda Polsson is part of a chain of volunteers who receives, sells a crate of goods once a year in Prince Rupert BC.

Thoughts

We might have contracted with, say, Pascal to purchase an urn of coffee at our stall, giving away free coffee (Pascal isn’t out of pocket because we paid for it) to encourage people to stop by and chat. My limited experience with fests is that people stroll and browse, but won’t stop unless there is something tangible.
I will have laminated a strip of T$ that we can place on the table. I stuck some notes with adhesive tape and of course lost them (tearing) when removing them.
Several consumers baulked at the “Jennifer” notes; these are confusing to consumers, and we ought to rethink them. It is hard enough getting consumers to stop and talk, harder still to have them accept and use “funny money”. The task becomes nigh impossible when they are confronted with a third kind of note. Worse yet; The Jennifer notes are different colours from T$ - the $T10 is blue whereas the $J10 is brown.

Photos

I took photographs of every storefront between Keele & Quebec. We can use that with the BIA list to hand-deliver a brochure to each Dundas Street merchant over the next two weeks.

Monday, September 10, 2007

I returned to the Junction at lunchtime. The BIA was closed, so anyone wanting to purchase T$ was out of luck. I bought back $T160 from Agora and $T100 from Pascal’s. Interetsing. I sent out $225, but those two eateries had retained $T260, and I know that at least one of them made change, so they took in a lot more than I gave out.
Panache appeared closed, so I could not get my picture re-framed.