Trade shows provide the ultimate opportunity for indie makers and smaller brands to cultivate real connections with customers. They’re also a manageable and (relatively) affordable way to showcase your wares in person, rather than investing in a full-scale brick-and-mortar location.
Simply having a vendor booth, however, isn’t enough. The design of the booth and how you display your products impact a passerby’s likelihood of engaging. It’s those people that are most likely to turn into paying customers.
This guide shares the best vendor booth ideas, alongside tips on setting up your booth for success.
What is a vendor booth?
A vendor booth is a small space, usually 10 feet by 10 feet in size, within a trade show. They provide space for brands to display their products and attract customers.
Vendor booths at trade shows, craft fairs, and makers’ markets offer the opportunity to network with fellow entrepreneurs in your area. You can also gain access to the festival’s audience, test your brand launch in a real-life venue, meet potential wholesale clients, and build a local following.
Trying a pop-up in-person selling experience can serve as the stepping stone to opening a physical location.
15 vendor booth ideas for 2024
- Create a booth banner
- Decorate walls or ceilings
- Add seating arrangements
- Welcome your guests
- Include social media opportunities
- Give out free samples
- Hand out food
- Hold a contest or competition
- Host product demonstrations
- Have a theme
- Maximize vertical space
- Experiment with lighting
- Collect email addresses
- Look for durable material you can repurpose
- Refresh your vendor booth display often
1. Create a booth banner
Trade show attendees often see a banner before they see the booth itself. Use your banner to make a strong first impression, which turns footfall into booth visitors.
“Something I have found that helps is having a retractable banner sign with my company’s name and key information about our products,” says Tiffani Sloan, owner of Treasure and Kin. “Then people come over and ask clarifying questions about our products.”
Get creative with your banner while sticking to these best practices:
- Showcase your retail branding and unique selling point front and center
- Use eye-catching designs, such as comics or contemporary art, to draw attention
- Experiment with a printed backdrop to stand out from white-washed walls
2. Decorate walls or ceilings
The walls and ceiling of your vendor booth space are great spaces to showcase your brand—especially if you’re in the creative trade.
“Walls are fantastic for telling your brand story,” says Esme Rogers-Evans, jewelry designer and founder of Duxford Studios. “Create well-designed picture boards or use your branding and product photography to build your visual story.”
“I also love hanging some intriguing tools on the walls, as I like to promote that I work with a completely handmade process—this can be a fantastic conversation starter.”
One word of warning: don’t go overboard. Many booths fill any available space, which results in a cluttered and confusing display. Utilize items to highlight a handful of focal points throughout the vendor booth, use simple signage, and leave blank spaces.
3. Add seating arrangements
Try to leave enough space to create seating arrangements for attendees. Just a few people can make your booth look busy and interesting, triggering herd mentality and encouraging more visitors.
This is especially useful if you’re selling to wholesale or B2B customers at the vendor event. Buyers often want more information before committing to large orders. Give them space to sit down inside your vendor booth and chat through their options with your sales team.
4. Welcome your guests
Without an inviting atmosphere, your aesthetic efforts will go to waste.
Step away from any distractions and welcome everyone who steps up to your vendor booth. This ensures browsers and potential shoppers know you’re available in case they have any questions.
“Our #1 rule at the booth is to always be engaging and make conversation with passersby. Take time to educate, have them try out the games, or simply make them crack a smile. People typically hate being sold to, so do your best to strike up a conversation and you’ll be surprised at how far it gets you,”says Chris Meade, co-founder of CROSSNET.
Use items as icebreakers that automatically encourage interaction, ask your visitors questions, talk about your process, and generally be open. If customers think they’re interrupting you, they’re less likely to ask about an item or purchase something, which is another missed opportunity.
Try to stand behind your vendor booth display, or at least near to it. Standing in front of it not only blocks it, but can be intimidating for people trying to approach your booth.
5. Include social media opportunities
If you want to encourage people to hang around and stay engaged on social media, try setting up a makeshift selfie station. Simply create a backdrop with a Bristol board or cardboard, or reserve a “blank space” on one of your vendor booth’s walls. You can also cut a frame out of cardboard to serve as a selfie prop.
Whether you use a wall or a frame, make sure your URL, hashtags, and social handles are clearly incorporated. It’s a fun way to encourage user-generated content that you can then post on owned social media channels.
Experiment with different trade show booth ideas that make the experience shareable. That could be a fun activity like:
- Virtual fitting rooms
- “Spin the wheel” competitions
- Photobooths with branded printouts
- Visual merchandising displays
- Motion-sensor games
6. Give out free samples
Distribute bag stuffers—small, curated free products relevant to your industry—as a creative way to get people to interact with your vendor booth.
A bag stuffer might include:
- Branded merchandise, such as t-shirts, mugs, or pens
- Free miniature versions of your products
- Supplementary items, such as sunscreen for beach-related products
“To keep our brand top of mind, it’s important to make sure they have something to take home. We gave away a mystery ticket with a QR code that can be scanned for a discount on a first purchase, and for more serious buyers, a signature jewelry box to keep on their vanity,” says Nora Sermez, founder of Sermez.
7. Hand out food
Looking for a smart hack that drives people toward your vendor booth? Take a leaf from Costco’s book and offer free food to visitors. It’s a great conversation starter your sales team can use to segue into product pitches.
Packaged products work best, since you’re unlikely to have access to cooking appliances. That could include:
- Chips
- Cookies
- Popcorn
- Candy or chocolate
Alternatively, hand out free product samples. Miniature versions of your product allow potential buyers to try before they buy, and are proven to boost sales by as much as 2,000%.
When distributing these samples, Spencer Lynn, northeast regional manager at KOS Naturals, advises, “Step out from behind your booth and get in front of it, hand out some samples in the aisles.”
“If it’s really slow, I’ll grab some of our single-serving sample sachets and walk the floor myself and hand them out as I go. Sometimes people will come to seek out our booth after that to find out more info.”
8. Hold a contest or competition
Promote an on-site contest or giveaway as part of your vendor booth. Ask shoppers to supply their email address or sign up for your newsletter for the chance to win something, which could be a gift card for your store, a gift basket filled with your products, or an impressive discount code to redeem on their next purchase.
Announce the contest winner at the end of the day, every hour, or even via email—another way to keep the conversation going with your customer post-event. Use Shopify POS to collect email addresses, send personalized carts, and upload notes about your customers for future communication.
Lucas Walker, CEO of Rolled Up, says, “If you can’t get a quick sale—by having credit card payments easy to do, or purchase orders easy to complete—have some next steps ready to go.
“It could be an email marketing flow for attendees who came by but did not purchase, or it could be setting up a more detailed meeting with buyers down the road,” Lucas says. “Most importantly, have everything ready to go ahead of time, including emails in your draft folder ready to send.”
9. Host product demonstrations
People love witnessing creativity in action. Instead of talking about the benefits of your product, use live demos to showcase your product in action or create a hands-on experience for attendees. Doing this gives context to your brand, lets you share your skills, connects you with potential buyers, and sets the stage to generate sales.
If you sell crafts, for instance, set up a live art demo to give potential customers a sneak peek into your creative process. Whether it’s sculpting, painting, or any other medium, visitors will witness your creative process in action, adding a layer of fascination and appreciation for your craft. Demos also add more value to the pieces visitors choose.
Strategically incorporate demo space into your booth’s original design or pick a booth with a small workstation for demos. Make sure there’s plenty of space for people to move about and mingle and that they can easily access the demo display.
If you can’t hold a live demo, give your booth visitors a virtual demo. Use an Android tablet or iPad kiosk, then find interactive elements, like Augmented Reality (AR) features, to give visitors a hands-on experience that’s almost as good as holding the real thing.
Be sure to get a little face time with visitors so they don’t just play with the demo, place an order, and leave without talking to someone.
10. Have a theme
Create a cool-looking booth by theming out the space and your team. You’ll grab attention, create buzz, and attract more traffic to your booth.
Luxury brand Dolce & Gabbana set up a traveling pop-up shop in the Hamptons in 2021. The Sicilian-theme cart was designed to immerse customer in the history of Sicily through images and historical symbols.
11. Maximize vertical space
Need some indoor vendor booth ideas? Try vertical displays. It’s a great way to maximize the area in your booth and intrigue visitors to find out more.
Booth visitors often look at everything on a table that's within easy reach as well as what's displayed on a wall, such as vendor booth signs, shelves, or easels.
To make a first impression, use different heights for wall displays and hanging banners or signs. These add visual elements to the ceiling and draw attention to your booth from a distance. You’ll free up floor space and make your booth appear more open and welcoming—without sacrificing brand visibility.
12. Experiment with lighting
A well-lit booth creates an attractive atmosphere that draws visitors, generates interest in your product, promotes sales, and boosts conversions.
Accent lighting makes your booth stand out in a dreary ambiance and creates a sense of liveliness and activity. Visitors can see the most important elements of your booth, like your branding, displayed products, or marketing messages, which helps them understand a bit about who you are. Warm lighting, for example, gives the impression of a friendly, down-to-earth brand personality.
Some common types of lighting you can use include hanging lights, front-lit signage, and back-lit lighting. Whatever you choose, ensure you use the right bulb based on what you want to illuminate. Flattering hues, for instance, are good for your booth staff and visitors, while spotlights are ideal for highlighting products or a part of your display, like your brand name or logo.
See how Relish incorporates different types of lighting in a vendor booth, giving it a homely kitchen feel:
“Lighting is one of the most expensive items in a booth set up, but it is absolutely necessary. Not only will it highlight the product, but it will catch buyers’ eyes. But be careful not to overwhelm them. Point the lights to the right places,” saysMarcia Hacker, owner and designer of Sauipe Swim.
13. Collect email addresses
A vendor booth offers a valuable opportunity for networking with visitors or potential customers and making personal connections within a short period. Collecting email addresses helps you stay in touch with them and builds up your lead list for follow-up marketing.
An easy way to collect emails from booth or craft fair visitors is through incentives. Give discounts on items visitors buy at your booth or branded freebies in exchange for their email addresses to entice them to talk to you.
Make the medium you’re using to capture email addresses easily accessible. Tuck paper forms under the clip of a clean clipboard with attached pens so people don’t have to make space on your table to write their email addresses.
Your paper form can be a simple printout with a column for names and email addresses or get creative with a branded form that has your logo or brand colors on it. Here’s an example:
Make your form as simple as possible, asking for basic contact information like name and email address, so visitors can easily sign up. For digital forms, have an iPad or Android tablet ready for visitors to fill out the forms. Alternatively, use QR codes with a call to action (CTA) like “sign up for a giveaway” on your flyers, posters, signup form, or even the booth walls to streamline the collection of email addresses.
After the event, send thank you emails to visitors who signed up for your mailing list to show you appreciate their interest in your product or brand.
In your email, remind them they signed up at the ‘X’ event. Include a link to an online form where they can confirm their subscription via email and a clear CTA of what you want them to do next, like “Visit our website” or “Get tickets to our next event.”
14. Look for durable material you can repurpose
There’s no need to design your vendor booth from scratch at each retail event. Save money on your vendor booth display by repurposing durable material. Get inspired by your product and brand, and see how it can help inform the materials you use for décor. F
Since every touchpoint of your vendor booth adds to the overall story of the booth space, flooring can help immerse your visitors further into your brand’s world. Plus, visitors might want to take “flat-lay” pictures of your products and shoefies (shoe selfies) to post on Instagram—and tag your brand.
15. Refresh your vendor booth display often
An inexpensive way to keep your vendor booth current is to regularly refresh the display. It’s especially handy if potential customers visit the booth more than once. A unique experience each time could be enough to draw them back and increase sales.
For each trade show event, experiment with:
- Different shapes and layouts
- Lighting effects
- Product displays
- Interactive experiences
- Booth decoration
How to design your trade show display
Once you’ve found innovative ways to set up your booth, master your preparation process so you can be sure the event goes off without a hitch.
1. Start a mood board
When researching vendor booth ideas, start a mood board. Type in "Craft Show Booths," "Craft Show Display Ideas," and "Market Booth Inspiration" on Pinterest, and each search will spawn hundreds of results. Follow these Pinterest boards before you're even confirmed to exhibit at a show so that the images gradually populate your Pinterest feed ahead of time.
Additionally, follow some of the top shows in your industry on Instagram, which usually post plenty of photos of impressive trade show booths in their feeds.
Gather all the saved images on your mood board to keep you inspired as you hatch your vendor booth design plans.
2. Create your vendor booth plan
Once you’re approved to attend the market or craft show you’re aiming for, contact the show’s organizers to get the floor plan and any rules or regulations regarding vendor booth setup.
Ask yourself what items you need to display and what the best way is to present your products. Sketch out a few possible layouts with a planogram and don’t forget to leave room for an area to process payments and for storage.
“The best way to prepare your booth if you can is to do a dry run at home before the show or market. That way, you’ll know how much time you’ll need to set everything up, and make sure you have the proper displays for your items,” explains Tiffani Sloan, owner of Treasure and Kin.
Booth regulations can be a creative challenge–how will you conceptualize the booth space within the constraints? You may only have a 10x10 space within which to tell your brand’s story, after all.
3. Assemble your team
Equipped with your vision and the show’s plan, consider how you’re going to build your booth. If you have a good handle of your moodboards and enough inspiration, you might be able to sketch out the blueprints yourself with the help of interior design apps.
If it’s overwhelming and you plan to attend more than one show, research companies that specialize in booth design and development.
There are three more things to keep in mind:
- Make your vendor booth easy to put up and take down.
- If you plan on attending multiple shows, you don’t want your booth to be too “out there” in terms of design and vendor booth display elements. Try to ensure that your vendor booth, while original, is still “one size fits most.”
- Consider the lighting of the show you’re attending. Where are the power outlets? Are there restrictions around lighting? And is power included in the vendor fee?
4. Choose colors and materials
Your goal when designing a vendor booth is to create a cohesive and on-brand look with the elements and colors you choose.
Use muted colors to help make your products stand out. There’s a reason photographers and top brands use white backdrops to shoot items—it really makes the products pop.
If you’re going with another color palette, try matching it to your brand color for your packaging or signage, and maybe even how you dress at the show. Uniformity and consistency make for stronger branding.
5. Stick to the budget
Success lies in being creative and repurposing items for different uses. For example, consider using books as risers or china saucers as holders for small items like jewelry or pins.
Other fun vendor booth display items include:
- Ladders
- Toolboxes
- Drawers
- Kids chairs
- Boxes or crates
- Racks
- Three-tier booth stands
Sometimes, the items you need are right in front of you—they might be gathering dust in your home or the home of a family member. Check your rooms and/or studio for things you can use, such as tables, containers, and props. Sometimes the more “rustic” and distressed, the better, depending on your brand.
Even consider bartering with other vendors before the show starts. See if they have any items you can trade or borrow for the show. Organizers may also have materials on hand to lend out or rent.
Attract potential customers to your vendor booth
The best vendor booth design ideas are simple yet effective. Make the most out of your vendor booth space with eye-catching promotional materials, free samples, and bold brand colors.
Remember, your vendor booth is a gateway to your brand and your online shop, so make every detail count. Whether you’re participating at a music festival, art fair, or a craft show, think outside the booth … and have fun building it.
Read more
- Craft Fairs and Art Shows 101: Sell Products In-Person
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- Deals on Wheels: Why More Retailers Are Taking to the Streets
- Will Rent Take Over As the New Retail CAC? 12 Experts Weigh In
- 8 Successful Examples of Pop-In Stores (And What You Can Learn From Them)
- Making the Leap to Retail: Why These Online Brands are Investing in In-Person Sales
- Ultimate Guide to Pop-Up Shop Marketing for 2002
Vendor booth FAQ
What sells best in a vendor booth?
- Handcrafted items
- Artwork
- Innovative gadgets
- Customized apparel
- Eco-friendly products
- Cosmetics/beauty products
How do you make a booth interesting?
- Choose the right booth location.
- Offer immersive or interactive experiences.
- Give away free food or samples.
- Use a photobooth.
- Host a contest or giveaway.
How do you make a good vendor booth?
- Design eye-catching marketing materials.
- Welcome passersby.
- Offer free product samples.
- Create opportunities for social media sharing.
- Demonstrate best selling products.
How do you stand out at a vendor fair?
- Apply bright colors to your booth’s design.
- Use a theme to create a cohesive display and weave a consistent message.
- Experiment with lighting to make your booth more unique and exciting.
- Incorporate live or virtual demos and unique interactive activities.
- Give away unique, high-quality, and useful promo items.