Lucy and Finn and Duggy had got up early and driven into town in Duggy’s ancient green Peugeot. They had three boxes of printed ‘Busy’ T-shirts, and Lucy was determined they were going to get a good place to set up their stall in the bustling Temple Bar market. Early birds get the worm, and she’d had to cajole the boys with a hot cooked breakfast of pancakes and bacon served at 6 a.m. to get up and get moving.
‘We don’t want to be at the back end of the market,’ she warned.
‘We’ll probably be first, cos we’re so early,’ yawned Duggy, pulling a fleece hoody on over his ‘Busy Bonking’ T-shirt … trust him.
The market was already buzzing when they got there, with Duggy dropping them off with their boxes, fold-up table, stools and the display board for their posters – and then going off to find a car park.
OK, so they didn’t get a premium location, as they were already taken by experienced marketeers, but they set up their T-shirt stall beside a guy selling great-looking leather boots and someone selling doggy-print cushions, and there was a Mexican hot food stall just across from them.
‘Mexican food stalls are always busy.’ Lucy grinned, satisfied with their location.
Finn and herself laid out a load of the T-shirts, and pinned up a display of the four designs they had got printed. They had also done sample graphics for a few more, and people could order these if they wanted.
‘Looking good!’ yelled Duggy, appearing back with three hot cups of coffee for them.
They each took a turn to wander quickly round the market and see how much competition there was for their product.
‘Saw a girl with pretty fairy T-shirts near the entrance,’ sighed Finn, ‘and did you see the two guys at the back selling Guns N’ Roses and Metallica ones?’
‘Different market to us,’ Lucy said confidently.
Duggy slipped off and came back.
‘That stall with the jeans has a few T-shirts for sale, too. There’s a cool kind of Japanese print one and a Kung Fu one and one with James Dean on it.’
Lucy went off and checked them all out, and prayed another T-shirt stall wouldn’t set up today.
The first hour was quiet, and they all tried to stay upbeat, and talk as if they were having great fun and a lack of customers didn’t really matter. Suddenly people began to arrive at the Mexican stall to get a breakfast wrap, looking around while they waited for them to cook.
‘Take off your jacket,’ she bossed Finn as she pulled off her own grey sweatshirt and Duggy dumped his, too.
Within a few minutes they had sold four black ‘Busy Stargazing’ T-shirts and one ‘Busy in Bed’ one. Two guys with guitars came and bought ‘Busy Busking’ ones, and they couldn’t believe it when they sold a dozen ‘Busy Queuing’ ones in only a few minutes. All morning it continued, with quite a crowd collecting around the stall and reading what they’d written about how being on the dole had inspired the T-shirts. Some people suggested more ideas, which Finn diligently wrote down.
Duggy had to split around lunchtime, as he was doing a bit of editing in Filmbase for a friend of his.
‘Give me a shout when you need me to pick up your stuff,’ he offered.
By three o’clock the market had started to wind down, and Finn and Lucy realized that they had sold over fifty ‘Busy Stargazing’ T-shirts and had eight orders for them. Twenty people had bought ‘Busy Queuing’ and there were only three left, and they’d cleared out all of their ‘Busy in Bed’ ones. ‘Busy Busking’ had sold well, too.
Lucy couldn’t believe it, but they had sold over a hundred T-shirts! Finn was incredulous – and glad that Lucy had insisted on keeping the prices low.
‘Everyone’s broke at the moment, and so twelve euros for a T-shirt that is original and different is a fair price. If we can keep getting them made up and printed for five euros it’s a good mark-up for us once we’ve paid for our stall and our overheads.’
‘I just can’t believe it.’ Finn laughed. ‘A hundred people walking around Dublin in something I designed … it’s kind of cool.’
‘You’re kind of cool.’ Lucy grinned, and kissed him.
That night they ordered in a celebration takeaway from the Balti House and drank some beers. It had been some day, and they were pretty knackered.
‘We’ve booked the stall for next week,’ announced Finn.
‘Great!’ approved Duggy, helping himself to some naan bread. ‘You know, I was thinking maybe we should put the T-shirts up on the internet and sell some that way … well, try it out, anyway. Set up a “Busy …” website.’
‘That would cost a fortune,’ worried Lucy. ‘But we could definitely do Facebook and Twitter!’
‘Yeah, great, but my friends and I are always setting up web stuff and sites like that for the film projects we work on, but this would be different as you would be selling, and people would have to pay online, and you’d send them T-shirts … I’m not sure how that works.’
‘I’ll ask my dad,’ Lucy offered. ‘He works in a bank, he’d probably know about that kind of thing.’
‘Well, here’s to Busy,’ toasted Finn, wrapping Lucy in his arms.
‘Here’s to a business that might actually get us all off the dole!’ Duggy and Lucy laughed in unison.