I did my very first artist alley at AOD2015! I did a lot of research beforehand to help prepare, but one thing that I thought was missing from all the articles and blog posts I read was a step-by-step guide from the perspective of a beginner. So, I decided to put one together myself! I’m not entirely sure if this is the right way of preparing, but this is what I did and it worked for me.

If you’d like to know how I did it, read on!

Pick your first con. It’s good to start out with a target to aim towards while you prepare. Look for something local and small (attendence of a few thousand is a pretty good start) – this way, you don’t have to spend money on a hotel room, airfare, or large amounts of product inventory while you’re still experimenting with what works for you. Think about cons you’ve attended in the past, or ask friends if they have recommendations for cons that have artist alleys with good traffic. You might want to look around at local colleges to see if their anime clubs put on small cons/events. Or, look at AnimeCons.com for more ideas. Also consider whether the audience matches the type of stuff you want to sell (for example, you might want to skip a western-style comic con for your first AA if you only do anime-style art). Make sure the artist alley deadline for the con you pick hasn’t passed yet. Brainstorm products. Think about what you want to sell. What I did was start with items that are easy to produce and easy for customers to buy (buttons and bookmarks), plus commissions (which I can do without printing anything new). Can you put a new spin on buttons and bookmarks that no one else has? Are there different shapes you can take advantage of? Try to find a sweet spot between unique and cheap/easy to produce. Don’t worry about costs yet – just brainstorm specific ideas for what you want to make.

Submit your artist alley application. The exact process for this depends on the con, but just make sure to mark your calendar with the deadline date and try to do this sooner than later! AA applications are usually due several months before the actual con dates. This seems to usually involve submitting a portfolio of examples of art and products you might sell. It might be a good idea to plan ahead so you can submit mockups of the items you’re planning to make alongside any commission/print examples. Determine printing costs. Hopefully, by now, you’ve brainstormed a solid list of items you think would be awesome to sell. Now, you need to compare different printing companies, and if you look around at various artist alley resources there are links to recommended companies everywhere. I did my first bookmarks at gotprint and my first buttons at purebuttons (here’s a purebuttons discount code, if you want). When I started doing prints, my printing company of choice turned out to be CatPrint (use the referral link for you to get $10 off your first order!). Compare prices between companies, but also look at minimum order quantity. Remember, this is your first con, and you’re still experimenting with what will sell well and what will not. You don’t want to go with a button printing company that’s cheap but requires you to buy 100 buttons at a time! This is why I went with purebuttons – their minimum is 25 buttons, which was perfect for a first-time artist alley-er like me. I spent about $180 total on printing my first set of buttons and bookmarks. Decide your prices & how much stock to bring. There are lots of AA resources on this topic. I basically determined my prices by looking at recommendations from other artists. Some quick tips: Price based on whole numbers that are easy to make change for Include sales tax within your prices Provide deals to encourage people to spend a little more (for example, $3 per bookmark, but maybe $5 for TWO bookmarks!). The most important thing is to not undersell yourself, and to not undercut other artists, so price fairly! Variety over quantity! Only stock 5-10 copies of each print; and, when deciding on what products to sell, make sure you have something at all levels of pricing so people have options. Some can only afford the $1-2 trinkets, others want to spend $5-10, and then some are willing to drop $15-20 (from @deus-nocte). For me, untested prints follow the rule of 10. Only if you sell out at a con do you order more than 10 of a print. It has to prove itself. (from @linkakami)

Make a supply list. Products aside, you’re probably going to need to buy a bunch of supplies. What will you need on the day of the con? Check out my post on artist alley supplies for a fairly comprehensive starting point. Now, step back and look at your list. What do you already have, and what can you make cheaper? You probably own all the art supplies you’re planning to bring, so you can cross those off. Maybe you can print signs and banners at home, rather than going to Fedex to get things printed. Maybe you can borrow supplies from friends or family. Once you’ve determined what you need to buy, go do some research to see how much all of that will cost. I tried to limit myself to only spending $100 on new supplies (not including the con badge and table). Get a credit card reader (optional, but recommended). When creating your supply list, don’t forget about getting a Square or Paypal reader so that you can take credit cards as a form of payment through your smartphone or a tablet (from @deus-nocte). I don’t know much about Paypal reader, but Square ships free readers to people as long as you have time for it to arrive in the mail (and it even comes with a handy sticker showing that you take card which you can display), which is what I did! You have to pay a small fee per swipe, so make sure you are aware and OK with that. (Here’s a referral link to waive Square card processing fees for the first few months!) Create a savings plan (optional, but recommended). Spending money on all the stuff above is an investment – an expensive one, too. If you want (and if you have time before the con), do a bit a personal finance and set aside some money every month just for artist alley stuff! Create a “production schedule”. Hopefully you’ve started preparing for the con early, so you a few months before the actual con. Create a todo list for the art you need to make, and schedule when you need to order prints and supplies. I’d allow 3 - 4 weeks prior to the con to order prints. Also don’t forget to schedule things like creating a logo or banner, designing business cards, creating a commission order form, or creating examples of the commissions you’re planning to offer. Get a temporary seller’s permit. At least in California, you have to go to the CA Board of Equalization website and create an account so you can register your selling activity (so you can pay sales taxes later). If you’re from out of state, it might take a little longer to get your permit, as you’ll need to fax or email extra documents like your driver’s license – so do this sooner than later. Cons will also ask for your seller’s permit information, and might take you off the artist alley list if you don’t have it! Find a table partner. At some point, you’ll hear back from the con about whether or not you got in. If you did, great! Other artists who weren’t able to get in may be looking for a partner to join. If you didn’t get in, you will be one of these artists. Post on the con forums or the con’s Facebook page to find a partner! You can share the table cost, and having another artist’s work at your table will make your table more interesting (and make it look more full of stuff). Also, you can keep each other company! Many cons also allow you to bring a non-artist helper so you can also do that. However, just a warning – having more than 3 people behind the table gets pretty uncomfortable (I was tabling with two other artists at AOD and that got squishy). Order your products and buy your supplies. If you’re using printing companies, look for printing templates for download on their website and use those to make sure your products will come out right.

Practice setting up your table display. If you have a table partner, you’re going to want to figure out between yourselves how you want to arrange your table. In any case, you probably want to practice setting up your display beforehand. You will definitely discover better placements for products and signage while practicing. If you look at the photo at the top of this post, you’ll see that I actually printed off nice backings for my buttons and bookmarks because I found that my display looked really empty when I practiced setting it up the first time. Get change from the bank. A few days or so before the con, go to your local branch and ask for small bills ($1s and $5s) to make change with at the con (from @deus-nocte). For AOD, I brought $100, but I never got anywhere close to running out of change. You may want to bring more or less depending on the con’s size. Make sure you have a LOCKING cash box or some other method of keeping cash safe and close to you, and keep at eye on it at all times! Con theft is unfortunately a thing, so be vigilant. Day before the con - pack up your stuff! Not much to say here. Try not to squish anything. Day of the con - fulfill your dreams! Make sure you know about artist alley setup times before you head to the con, and arrange to meet with your table partner at a certain time, especially if you’re sharing display supplies! When selling, don’t be too eager – just say hi to those that wander to your table, let them know that you’re available to answer any questions, and have some small talk if you like! During slow times or setup/teardown time, introduce yourself to your artist neighbors or get to know your table partner, and offer to do art trades. That’s it! You’ve officially done your first artist alley! Have fun! :)

Other tips:

Some really great resources for artist alley advice: AAToast, How to Be a Con Artist, and the Artist Alley Network International

Keep track of expenses! Keep a spreadsheet where you record all your printing and supplies expenses. Don’t forget things like parking, badges, and table fees for the con. Manually write down all your sales in a sales book/notebook or use Square Register, and enter them in your expenses spreadsheet later. This way, you’ll be able to keep track of how closely you were able to get to breaking even. There’s also another reason you want to keep track of expenses…



Remember your temporary seller’s permit? Sometime after the con, you need to pay the required amount of sales tax to the state! Exactly how much and the method for doing this depends on the state, but refer to the state of the convention’s Board of Equalization website for more info on how to do that. Basically, some percentage of your sales will need to be paid as taxes.



Keep track of stock! I also started a spreadsheet where I record how much of each product I have left after the end of the con. It’s a good way to record which products were most popular and to give you some heads up as to when you’ll need to reorder products.

If you were like me, you probably had a great time and cannot wait to do another AA! Make a list of local cons, their dates, and their artist alley application deadlines. Follow the cons on Facebook and/or Twitter to make sure you don’t miss announcements about AA tables opening.



to do another AA! Make a list of local cons, their dates, and their artist alley application deadlines. to make sure you don’t miss announcements about AA tables opening. Want more tips? Check out my artist alley tag for more (hopefully) helpful posts!

Did I miss anything? Send me a message and I’ll be happy to update this guide!

Last edited 1/8/2017.