Anyone else notice a dip of about 20% less revenue this year than last unilaterally?

[Sam & Oliver]

I talk with dozens of vendors at shows.  From antiques, to food, to woodcrafting, to sauces, to services.
 
Everyone has mentioned this year not a lot of people are opening their wallet.
 
Checked my metrics for year to date in 2017 and I can confirm, it's just about 20% less than 2016 at this point (still have about 14 big shows to go, out of 60 this year... I'm so tired haha)
 
I do notice there is a reluctance to use the credit card.  I normally did about 25% of all show sales in credit cards, about 74% cash and 1% checks.  This year it's about 93% cash, 7% credit and I had one customer stroke a check at the booth table.
 
Anyone else noticing a dip this year?

 

[salsalady]

I haven't been participating in events or markets this year, but I've noticed our local farmers market has been about 75% full of vendors.  There's open stalls in the farmers only section, which is unheard of for the middle/end of august.  I mentioned it to a long time pottery vendor, asked him what was up.  He indicated both vendor attendance and customer attendance was down about 20% from a few years ago at ourn local market and a couple other markets he attends.  
 
Which is interesting to me because our local building industry is booming!  like we haven't seen in 10 years! 
 

 

[AJ Drew]

Different market, but still a show.  Our local ren. fair is getting plenty of folk threw the gate, more than previous years.  But yes, our credit card use is way down.  Over all we are doing better than previous years, but our selection and inventory is way up.  Other merchants are looking grumpy and complaining.

My guess is that in general credit card bills are catching up with people, so they are reluctant to use them.

 

[BrotherJosh]

Event/ farm market sales along the NJ coastline are slightly down for me this year compared to last year.  I've noticed more credit card usage but thats not surprising given the clientele in my region (rich people who own or rent expensive beach houses).  
 
I'm not too alarmed though; I have many friends and family with small restaurants/ shops in vacation spots along the east coast and they also have lower revenues this summer too.  I'm attributing the lower sales to smaller crowds here in NJ.