Every author dreams of the day they do their first signing or public appearance. But it’s also really scary. Especially with all the horror stories lately about conventions that did everything from not living up to expectations to outright fraud. 

If you’re new here, hi, I’m Katya. An indie author who may not be a best seller (yet) but I’m pretty good at explaining things. I write blog articles to try to make the indie struggle easier for other authors. As always, there is nothing for sale in this article, but you will find affiliate links and referrals.

On October 4th, I had my first signing at the Oviedo Mall’s Page and Pen event. This wasn’t a big event. It didn’t sell tickets. It wasn’t romance-focused. But it felt like a great place to get my wheels (feet?) wet. A starter event, if you will. It wasn’t a traditional author event, but I’m not exactly your traditional indie author. Very few things I do are the “right” way. I barter and trade services, my cover artist is an animator, and I do all my own typography. 

I’ve eyed a couple of events in the Central Florida area in the last year, but what keeps turning me off is the huge table fees. I have only three titles out at the moment. My following isn’t huge. I didn’t think I could reasonably make back the $300 table fee, plus all the other costs it would take to get ready for the event. Your first event is your most expensive since you’re buying all your supplies for the first time. 

Page and Pen only had a $50 charge for an 8’ x 8’ space. They didn’t provide tables, wifi, or electricity. But for a one-day, six-hour event, I figured we could manage. And I was right! 

I took ten sets of Sea Side Cove and five additional copies of Hurricane Ryan. I’m happy to say I came home with only one full set and four books. That was better than I had even dreamed. I was fully prepared to come home with the only set I sold being to my assistant. (She’s one of my best friends and ARC readers, but she never picked up paperbacks after I transitioned to illustrated covers.)  

I’ve seen on social media that you should bring enough stock for 10% of the attendees. Except there weren’t tickets, so I had to make my best guess. I couldn’t afford to have a ton of stock leftover, but I also didn’t want to show up looking like I didn’t expect to make sales. 

We actually sold our first set before the event officially opened, and I nearly cried. I did have a few other friends come out to show their support (and if you’re reading this, I LOVE EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU), but I also sold five sets to complete strangers. 

While I’m pretty much an expert at working events, thank you MegaCon, I’ve never had a table at one. I spent a few months screenshotting every setup I saw on social media so I could get ideas. I’m big on not reinventing the wheel. Setups are also going to vary between size of the event and venue. A pop-up at a bookstore is very different from a setup at a convention center. 

• A standing banner 

• A banner on the front of the table 

• Some sort of giveaway 

• Book displays 

Most events provide a table with a black tablecloth from what I’ve seen. And then authors put a vertical banner/table runner over the front to display their name because custom tablecloths are ridiculously expensive.  

Disclaimer: I really don’t like how that looks, and found a workaround through a friend. Which is why, for purposes of this article, I’m not telling you where I obtained my materials. I’m not going to dangle something in front of you that I can’t guarantee you can have. 

These can be purchased from places like Vistaprint, Canva, Office Depot, and dozens of places online. Vistaprint was where I was going to order from originally. I used them for my wedding invitations back in 2019. Based on my research, you want one that is at least five or six feet tall because there’s a good chance your table might block part of it, and you want the retractable kind to take up the least amount of space possible. Expect to pay $100 to $200 depending on size and quality.  

Keep in mind there is a good chance the bottom of it might get blocked by your table, so try to keep your most important information in the upper half/third. I wanted to keep it simple, so I put my logo, my website, and my Instagram handle all near the top. Then, at the bottom was the amazing art of Ryan that Danika Lynn Rose did for me. 

Vistaprint gives cashback through Rakuten. (Referral link.)

Custom tablecloths are insanely expensive. Like, we’re talking $400 on average. So what most people do is they get a vinyl banner that is designed to be hung with string and drape it over the table instead. Weirdly enough, the cheapest place I found for this was Walgreens with a 50% off code. You can even do same-day pickup so you don’t have to pay shipping! They also frequently also do cashback through Rakuten. (Referral link).

Bookmarks and stickers are common. I’ve seen both custom stickers and generic bulk packs of themed stickers. I planned to do golden retriever stickers myself, but I wound up going a completely different route. My mother had a bunch of flower seeds left over from a real estate event. I put new labels with my QR code on them that I printed myself, and BAM! Giveaways that cost me almost nothing. Thanks Mom! 

The one thing I don’t like about stickers is that if they’re not custom, there’s nothing with your name on them. There’s nothing that ties them back to you after they walk away. I planned to get a stamp of my logo for the back of the stickers to at least try to advertise something. 

I did have Buffy stickers that were free if you bought a book. In the future, there will be more Buffy stickers that are themed to each series. 

I also did a sign-up for my newsletter online that entered you to win a free copy of my audiobook. I love doing audiobook giveaways because I don’t have to ship anything. This only resulted in about eight sign-ups though, so mileage may vary. 

I got these acrylic book displays off Amazon (affiliate link). I put the display copy on top of the stack of books. It was really fun to watch the stack get smaller as the day went on. 

Me being me, I took it a step further. I used my Cricut, my laminator, and some lollipop sticks to make physical trope maps for each book. Transporting them without damaging them was a little bit of a nightmare, but it was doable.  

You need a way to transport these items. Now, if you’re going to a big convention and shipping pallets of books in advance, that’s going to be very different from if you’re taking a few boxes to a mall. I have no advice on that at this time, but I promise I’ll write another article when I do! I fit everything in one large rolling suitcase. I packed the books into two different boxes to protect them. Mr. Summers pushed my wheelchair, and I pushed the suitcase. My assistant brought the table, but we made my husband go get it out of the car. 

I had read from some authors on Threads that they started doing better at events when they brought their art to sell. Now, I don’t have art. The only thing I can draw is a polar bear in a snowstorm. I went looking for something else to sell, and I landed on friendship bracelets. I bought some supplies, had a bunch of friends over for a day of day drinking, movies, and making bracelets. 

Now, to be completely honest, I thought I would sell a ton of bracelets and no books. I actually gave away more bracelets than I sold, because if you bought a Sea Side Cove set, you got a free bracelet. So it wasn’t my best idea, but we did have a lot of fun making them.  

I also had glasses chains made by a friend of mine that I was selling for her. We only sold one of those, but the woman who bought it was really excited about them.  

All of this was a lot of costs up front, but I’m also crafty and had a lot of things on hand already. Not everyone has a home printer, a Cricut, a paper cutter, and a laminator. Or the graphic design skills to make your own banners. Or friends who let you use the art they drew of your dog as a giveaway. I also picked up frames at Dollar Tree to display signs, and a display for the bracelets on Amazon (affiliate link). My table was really full. It might have been too full in retrospect. I don’t feel bad about what I spent, because I learned a lot, and everything will be able to be reused or sold or given away in the future. Maybe I’ll just trade the bracelets from now on. 

Now there’s one other thing you need that I haven’t talked about yet: a way to take payment. You can do cash only, but you will lose sales because of it. The beautiful thing about a world of tap to pay is you can take payment right on your cell phone. I bought a card reader for $10 from Square, but I never used it. Every card I took I was able to tap, except one that wouldn’t go through, so I entered it manually. It was easy enough. 

I chose Square (Referral Link) because it was one I was already familiar with. They charge a 2.9% +$00.15 fee per transaction. That will cut into your profits, but not by too much. I spent $7.61 in fees for the day. 

Stripe is another one. I do have it set up because Beventi, which is a site for preorders, uses it. If you search credit card processing for events, you’ll come up with a ton of options. I can’t recommend any of them because I’ve only used Square, and while I don’t know that it’s the “best” one out there, for the moment, it is working for my purposes. 

Don’t forget you’re going to need to charge sales tax! That can vary by state and even county. 

In the interest of full disclosure, I spent $520.12 on my first event. That includes the displays, the table fee, the book inventory, the stickers, labels, bracelets, what I paid out to the friend who I sold stuff for, etc. I made $431.99, including what I took in cash. So, I was about $100 from breaking even. Was I secretly hoping I’d break even or turn a profit? I mean, yeah. But I’m thrilled I got this close. For my next event, which I’ve already booked, all I’ll have to pay is the table fee and for additional inventory. Maybe some new giveaways. 

This is also why I intentionally picked a smaller, non-traditional book event for my first one. I never could have done this if I had to pay a $300 fee. I also didn’t have to worry about an assistant’s badge or any of that. Because I cannot do large convention centers on my own. It’s too much wheeling, and it’s exhausting. That’s why when I work MegaCon, my Mom works it too. So, not having an assistant isn’t an option for me. 

Also, on the disability note. I pre-signed all my books in advance and brought the same pens with me so I could personalize them. Your girl gets the shakes when she’s been rolling a lot, and I wanted your signatures to be legible. I still have nightmares about how bad the signature I signed for Kate Moseman was. Only two people actually wanted them personalized. I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing. Food for thought if you’re worried you might have a hard time signing a lot at once. 

They’ve already announced a Page and Pen event for 2026. I haven’t decided if I’m signing up for it just yet. However, I have signed up for their Summer Lovin’ Book Festival. It’s romance-focused, and I think a little more what I’m looking for in my next event.