We are back from Top Drawer safe and sound. As any regular reader (err, well as regular as our posts are :)) would know, we have only been to one previous “retailer of home goods show” and that was the Harrogate Home and Gift Fair back in July last year, shortly before Lindsay Interiors launched. It wasn’t a particularly good experience and so it was not difficult to be rather unexcited about attending Top Drawer, only saving grace was the knowledge it would be more to do with design led products, and it’s slightly more local.
We were up bright and early on Sunday am to pack the children off to Grandma’s and so we arrived at Earls Court just before 10am. We managed to get an exorbitantly priced parking space within Earls Court itself and after a quick hop and a skip there we were, collecting our badges.
I was immediately struck by the amount of spaciousness and by a man with slicked back hair (later worked out I recognised him as he had been on one on those “turn our inherited mansion into a business” programmes……). Anyway, space was good, lots of room for us to see all the products. We saw a few current suppliers, a few that were new to us and some that I had stalked on the web but had not ordered from or contacted as yet.
It’s always good to see products in the flesh, you get to have a touchy feel so you can test the general quality and size – we all use dimensions etc within our web boutiques but how many customers actually understand/take note of those dimensions, I know I don’t, I’m constantly surprised at the size of some items when they arrive from the suppliers :).
One supplier I was looking forward to meeting in particular makes candles, to a very high quality I had been led to believe from not only their own website but from someone I know who regularly purchases their candles from a bricks and mortar that stocks them and who had suggested Lindsay Interiors stocks them as a good fit to the rest of our range. When I first looked them up on the web I was astounded by their pricing but now that I have seen them in the flesh (and smelt every one in a lingering fashion) I can see how damn huge and beautifully scented they are. I can concur on the subject of quality and value but, none of this aids me really, I still won’t be stocking them as I think any perspective customer would have the same misgivings as I originally had re value. I think candles unless purely for decorative purposes will always be the domain of the physical shop rather than the virtual.
Moving on, we found some interesting clocks and stunning light fixtures, some very tactile cushions and a rather amusing brand of teatowels and mugs. All in all, we have plenty of new products to spend our eagerly anticipated VAT refund on. We had some lovely chats with people, someone actually said they recognised our company name – I think they were just being polite – and no-one was rude, wooohooo, there was also no tat and no sign of a single meerkat. There was however a very eager sales lady who tried to catch us EVERY time we walked past to show us their magnetic light switch covers, apparently kids adore them.
At 1pm we found ourselves walking through the exit, only as we had seen everything at least twice. As we were not due to pick the children up til 6ish we decided to entertain ourselves in Chinatown for the rest of the afternoon, I won’t go into details here but we did have a very nice lunch.
Our consensus was that this show had a much “younger” feel to it, and was generaly a lot more pleasant that Harrogate. We’ve yet to try out one of the NEC shows but we will definitely attend Top Drawer next January….
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