Motorcycle Rallies

I’ve been up to Sturgis 4 times in my life. I’ve skipped the past two years but I do have some friends who still go up there vending during bike week. The event actually started on August 4th but they have been there weeks in advance setting up all around town.

One of my friends was kind enough to send me a few pictures and I couldn’t believe that it actually snowed beginning of August at Sturgis! This is the 2nd year in a row Sturgis has been seeing some serious weather. Enjoy the pictures from Sturgis Bike Week.

You can get these Patches for only $4.99 No Shipping Charges as well. And No Minimums

August 9th through 15th are the official dates of Sturgis Bike Week this year. But nevermind the official dates, this event is a month long with vendors already setup waiting to cash out. My first visit to Sturgis was back in 2005. I had just finished my masters in Aviation Management. In fact I got married 2 days before leaving for Sturgis. No it wasn’t a honeymoon unfortunately, it was purely my first experience vending at a motorcycle rally. My first impressions were I would get to see Mount Rushmore, the Badlands. And so I did during my ride in. The next few weeks were being stuck in a tent from 7 in the morning till past midnight for a mere hundred bucks a day. But it was a great experience, I never knew I could work 18 hours a day for 10 days straight not including setup and breakdown. I thought I would get at least $3000 out of the torture and was pretty shocked to see a $1700 paycheck. I guess it worked out to about five bucks and hour I suppose. Way below minimum wage, but what are you going to do. Just learnt one of the biggest lessons in my life. Never work for someone else. Overall I had to experience it though. I kept on coming to Sturgis for the next three years to follow. This time working for someone else not selling shirts but patches. As a matter of fact in 2006 I was Seattle bound ready to pick up an engineering position with Boeing. I got a call from an old friend who begged me to fill in for someone who had gone MIA. Why not! So it began my first time selling patches. I must say my friend was nicer about the hours and the overall pay.

Boeing job went to bust before it began when I was turned down from the doors of their corporate office for not having received my green card at that moment. So it was Destination Daytona again after having moved all the way from southeast to northwest. I’m kind of glad it happened though. I continued doing shows at different Biker events here and there with Sturgis being the toughest and most memorable of them all.

Bikers surely see Sturgis as a pilgrimage ground. Each year almost a million bikers pass through Sturgis (so I’m told, but yeah it does get busy.) I must have done 4 Sturgis’ altogether. And here is a story I would like to share.

Sturgis is a small town north of Rapid City. The towns only income must be from the Rally that takes place early August each year. Mostly all the locals leave for a vacation renting out their homes to Bikers. But that is what’s fun about it. A small place, little law, open roads, great scenery. Most of which has changed now. Year after year I had seen an exponential growth in the number of Police Officers. And they are not there to help you, they are there to cut you tickets. I have personally seen the police handcuff Bikers, Take them to the nearest ATM in handcuffs, make them pull out there bail money. Take them to their insufficient capacity jail, have them pay the bail and send them on their way. I wish I had a camera to take a picture of this. Robbed by the police. So please go ahead support Sturgis so they can get more police. Support Sturgis so they can hide a cop on every corner. Or say the heck with it, just buy unofficial merchandize, who cares, does official matter? If it says Sturgis than it’s Sturgis. I say I do not want Sturgis becoming another city like Myrtle Beach. Let it be the unique small scenic place in the Black Hills where Bikers can go to enjoy themselves and not have to worry about going a mile over the speed limit or enjoying a joint or two within the nature. I’ve got Sturgis patches for $5, they all ship free. You can get them dating all the way back to 1980s. Sorry it doesn’t say Bike Week or Black Hills Rally on it as they are registered trademarks. Buy the Sturgis 2010 Patch or Past Year Sturgis patches by clicking on them.

It has now been about two weeks since I attended the treasure coast bike fest as a vendor. I was meaning to write about it earlier but I’ve been very busy keeping up with orders. I thought I should take a 20 minute break and talk about the small weekend event at Fort Pierce, Florida.

On thursday we decided to call up the promoters and ask for a vending spot. They could get us in on a 10×20 for which we ended up paying $300 plus tax. So Friday morning we packed my minivan and headed down on a 2 hour ride down south to Fort Pierce. I guess one of the perks of living in Florida, on our way down we saw the shuttle launch into space from I-95. I thought that was pretty neat, I didn’t know there was going to be a launch on that day, just happened to catch the trailing white smoke rising through the blue skies. I did try to snap a photo but the trees got in the way every time I tried.

After a few hours of driving we came by the location which was right before the bridge that took you on the A1A side of the town. The setup area was nicely shaded with trees which was a big plus as it kept things cool over the weekend. The only problem was the dust from the ground which lacked grass.

I had a small display of saying patches and the rest of our tent had past event shirts and ladies tops. It took us about 2 hours to setup our tent and put up our merchandise ready to sell on Saturday morning. The promoter didn’t want the money right away before we even began to setup so I thought that was pretty nice of him to give us a day to make some money to pay the rent.

Overall we did make some money, took some pictures and met new people over the weekend. I cannot say it was a blast for sales. The turn out was not huge. I mean they were people there, but noone willing to spend more than $20. They had a concert area setup for Bikers to lay and chill on the grass while listening to live music. And I did hear some good music overall. Unfortunately the beer was terrible, yes for the first time I got myself a beer while vending from one of the Budweiser wagons. I thought I was drinking yellow water. Definitely not what beer should taste like that’s for sure.

Overall our expenses were pretty small as we only had to drive 2 hours and everything we had fit in my small minivan. We did not make crazy money, but we didn’t loose any either. I enjoyed the weekend talking to bikers about new ideas on patches, met some interesting people like Mike who had quite the showcase of scroll saw art of wooden creations. When you go to do little shows where the rent isn’t as ridiculous as some show like Daytona Bike Week, so you tend to see mom and pops with their original creations. I think this adds more value to the show as you get to see something different rather than t-shirts at every stop.