As I mentioned the other day, I got Opinions about what I did experience of the convention. In my case, I was kind of a failure in regards to the socializing part of the con and primarily trolled through the vendor’s hall and shopped ‘til I dropped before me and my friend went off to goof off at Target and our hotel room (the one place I didn’t feel like a walking sweat puddle).
So yeah, I didn’t go to any of the panels because I was busy shopping and, frankly, none of them grabbed my interest. It was a lot of stuff for newbies to dolls or crafting, neither of which was applicable to me. xD There was a general meet-up scheduled, but by the time 6PM came around, I was at capacity for being around people and was completely drained due to walking around so much + the heat.
That said, I did have some thoughts about the vendor’s hall and the big swap. I will attempt to keep my usual blunt mean-ness to a minimal since I know a lot of people enjoy Resin Rose and had a good time this year. That said, if you don’t like to hear critical shit about things you like, what’s below the cut ain’t for you.
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Registration
Registration/badge pick-up was a chaotic mess, to be frank. For one, what a choice to have check-in to the right of a vendor table at the entrance. Badge pick up and con merch should be front and center and the first thing you see when you walk in. Also, for the love of god, get those poor people a laptop or tablet + keyboard with a spreadsheet or something for checking names instead of those physical paper lists. Opening for general admittance is chaotic enough without adding extra steps that hold up the line and cause walkways to be blocked/clogged at the LONE ENTRANCE/EXIT*.
There also didn’t seem to be anybody checking for badges at the door or anything so it feels like there’s not a point to making 2-day and 1-day pre-registered pass holders to wait until Saturday to pick theirs up. Anybody with the audacity could just peruse the hall and buy shit without a pass. Considering how chaotic just purchasing from some vendors could be, checking if someone is wearing their pass would be the last thing on their mind lmao. Coloring coding passes would likely help close up that particular hole if you’re genuinely worried about not getting paid for someone to check the Vendor’s Hall out.
Back to the lists—they couldn’t even find my name (I was supposed to have had a helper badge through my friend Rae since she was vending at RR) and I had to pay for my badge. On top of that, I didn’t receive an envelope that I guess had raffle or scavenger hunt information in it? Didn’t even realize I was supposed to get that until my friend asked me about it ten minutes later. Not even mad about paying (planned to pre-register before Rae said she’d take care of it), but the chaotic mess was a really rough beginning to my visit. Mayhaps just have everything in an envelope and organized by badge-type.
*Yes, there really was just the one place to come and go to this room because the door to the pool area of the hotel was blocked off by vendor tables (how is that not a fire hazard lmao). Also…Monarch Hotel, why the fuck would you give a room this big a single door entrance? That fucker needed double doors and you know it.
Vendor’s Hall
The general layout seems pretty run of the mill for conventions from what I’ve seen online, but there just wasn’t good space between tables. People were wearing big backpacks to display their dolls in, plus got swag bags they’re carrying, and then stopping to check out what’s for sale. Shit clogs up quick, especially when there’s a popular vendor. Saw one poor woman with a walker nearly take out the wheel thing the raffle tickets were in because something hanging on her walker handle caught onto the wheel’s door, and that was at the entrance area of the hall. If two people in wheelchairs can’t comfortably pass each other, there isn’t enough room.
The outer ring of tables were basically a dead zone, even with the chaos of the hall opening to 2 and 1-day pass holders. Most everyone buying stuff were concentrated in the middle and alleyway type tables because that’s where the well-known sellers were. It’s already a hard time being a vendor that may not have a huge and viral social media presence where they can hype people up for a convention appearance, but it’s all the worse when you’re out in the boonies. Plus I feel like the eyes just don’t get drawn towards the outer corners of these kind of set ups—there were several tables I completely glazed over the first time because they got huddled away into some dark corner.
Speaking of the outer ring, in one corner, they were right there with the air vents and were keeping nice and cool, and in the exact opposite corner diagonal from them, the people were fucking slow roasting next to the windows. I didn’t see any sort of box fans or anything set up for them to help keep them cool, just papers and handheld fans they either got from the freebie table or brought along themselves (or purchased from someone else). That really isn’t acceptable and I feel it’s on the convention and hotel staff for not looking out for them. That’s such an easy way to give someone heat exhaustion or heat stroke. The gift shop I work at temporarily got moved to what was essentially a shoe box with no real heating or cooling and we had one of the hottest summers at the time and just one hour during peak heat in that hot box was fucking horrid. I would have refused to come to work if my boss and her assistant hadn’t gotten me a box fan to keep my work area cool. It wasn’t exactly a secret that Portland was getting hot weather; there should have been contingencies in place to keep people safe and comfortable.
Generally, there just shouldn’t have been vendors set up by the windows, particularly ones that’d get a lot of sunlight. Instead, you should just cluster the contest tables (preferably with backdrops that could block the sunlight so the dolls don’t get potentially damaged), raffle jars, freebie tables, and sitting areas for that space. Basically stuff that isn’t going to draw consistent crowds (people generally drop by the once and then off to shop).
For the raffle stuff, that all should have just been photographed and put on like…a big poster board or a QR code to a dedicated web page to show the prizes and just have the prizes themselves stored away somewhere safe until they’re actually getting handed out (think that was primarily at the closing ceremony?). Then you got several tables freed up for vendors.
Overall though, enjoyed shopping and seeing all the stuff. Just felt very awkward to attempt to stop and chat with other people about their wares or dolls in general and whatnot. Managed to spend 3+ hours in there on Saturday, so my hermit and socially awkward ass managed to survive well enough. Only left because my stomach demanded food. xD
Got to see Rae, take a picture of my dolls with Shrimp, and spent over $500. 8/10
The Swap
So bad it was embarrassing.
The space between tables was hellishly tight, there was absolutely no direction in traffic flow, which just made things worse. There was also one person I remember with two luggage bags ON THE FLOOR IN FRONT OF THEIR TABLE alongside all the shit they had actually on the table. I don’t know who the fuck told them THAT was okay, but they clearly don’t know what a fucking tripping hazard is.
There really should have been HALF the amount of tables in that room than there was. If you’re gonna have that many people with swap tables in a room that small, then you need to make it an all day event and cycle people through. I managed to put up with one walk around the room to see if there were any dolls that were on my wishlist, bought a pair of boots, and then got the fuck out of there.
Couldn’t get out fast enough, 0/10.
Other Thunkin’
Didn’t go to the closing ceremony since by the time me and my friend got back to the hotel from our day trip to the Clackamas Town Center, we were hungry and exhausted and there just wasn’t enough time to have the nice dinner we planned and then go to the ceremony, so we just did our dinner, made a trip to a convenience store + Target and went back to our room. Heard it was crowded and warm tho, so I’m not too broken up about enjoying a steak and drinks instead. xD
Overall, I don’t regret going, but it was definitely uhh…underwhelming, I suppose? Maybe if I wasn’t sweating my tits off because the hotel’s air circulation sucks and I was actively talkative on the likes of Instagram and the RR channel on the BJD Discord server, it’d have been easier to meet up with people I’m actually acquainted with to chit chat and all that shit. It was really nice to get to see Rae in person for the few minutes we got, but she was busy keeping an eye on her table and I was busy shopping and oogling stuff, so we didn’t get to hang as much as I would have liked.
I’m not likely to go to another doll convention anytime soon since just the flight down south is expensive on top of saving my money all year to make sure I had plenty to splurge on what I wanted and still have some in case of any emergencies. Put off a lot of doll plans this year for Resin Rose, and while that was fine this time around since I had my attention on other hobbies, I can’t do that on a yearly basis haha (and if I’m gonna be leaving my small ass town, I’m GONNA be buying shit).
#think the peak convention for me would actually just be a BJD market with a connected room for just general meeting up
#and chitchatting
#plus food you could order lmaoi could spend all day doing that
#in fact that’s all i did at clackamas town center on sunday XD
#a BJD mall wouldn’t that be amazing?also AC. so much AC.
#my fat alaskan ass cannot deal with y’alls heat good god
