My vegan bake sale was a complete success! I could not have asked for a better first bake sale experience.
Last week, I pretty much spent most of my free time 'practice baking' - trying each recipe at least once, if not numerous times, to perfect it and make it bake-sale-worthy. I was eating ("testing") muffins non-stop, and trying to give failed ones away to my coworkers whenever I could. By the day of the bake sale, I was sick of eating muffins, but it was allll worth it. If I say so myself, each muffin was pretty dayam good. I'm especially proud of my Pumpkin Spice muffins that I heavily revised from the recipe on PPK. The original recipe tasted fine, but it kept sinking in the middle for me. So I added more flour and reduced the liquid content, which made them rise beautifully~
I started baking the night before and was still baking the morning of. I didn't make that many muffins, but I made five different types, so it took a while... My wee convection oven was working overtime, that's for sure. While it was fun making so many different muffins, I think next time I will stick to two or three different ones, to make my life a bit easier.
Anyway, the venue of the flea market was pretty good. The organizers had set up tents and each group got a mat and fold-out table to sell their stuff. My friends and I were sandwiched in between some lovely folk; a French family on one side, and then a fab British/Korean couple on the other. We put all our used stuff and my art on the mat on the ground, and put the muffins on the table, along with my 'Vegan Muffins' signage that I painted.
I will use the sign again for my next bake sale, but I will probably explain what 'vegan' is in Korean or something, since I don't think Koreans understood. I will just have to add something like "No eggs! No Butter! No milk!" like 'Sticky Fingers' does.
The lineup, in no particular order:
Pumpkin Spice muffins
Mocha muffins
Zucchini muffins
Lemon Poppyseed muffins
Chocolate muffins
I thought there would be a lot of foreigners at the flea market, so I tried to go with muffins that are hard to find here in Korea, like pumpkin spice and lemon poppyseed. I wanted to provide people with a little taste of 'back home', but there weren't that many foreigners, considering it was meant to be a "Foreigner's Flea Market"! I was honestly worried that nothing would sell because Koreans might not be interested in buying muffins from a stranger, or even 'get' the flavors, like zucchini, or lemon poppyseed, but they amazing all sold out! Three customers actually came again for seconds! Yay for spreading the vegan love.
Anyway, aside from the fact that I sold every single muffin, the most surprising thing about the whole flea market experience was that people actually bought my artwork!!! I wasn't expecting any art to sell, but I took them anyway, just to have them on display... But people were actually interested in the art! I sold 4 larger canvas works, and then a few smaller paper pieces! I was selling the pieces for less than I would usually ask for, since it was a flea market, but still~~ If I hadn't sold them, they would've just collected dust in the corner of my room. I made a happy profit off of my art alone. I have to say, this experience was just completely encouraging in that it inspired me to keep going with this art/illustration thing. It made me think that 'Hm, maybe, just maybe, I could survive off of my art?' hehehe... Ofcourse, I have a long ways to go til I can live off of my art alone, but I have a newfound motivation. Several customers also told me that I should sell my stuff at the Hongdae Free Market on weekends, so I think that just might be my next venue!
What a great new experience! I'm soooo thankful to my dear friends, who helped make this a sweet success. They did so much, from signing up for a booth, helping me carry the muffins and paintings from my apartment, to charming the customers into buying my work, and supporting me with their patronage. A special thanks to each one of you- you know who you are!
For those of you who didn't make it, fret not. I will absolutely do something like this again, so stay tuned for the Vegan Bake Sale #2!