PoshFest Review: Is PoshFest Worth Attending?
A few weeks ago I attended my first PoshFest held in Phoenix, AZ. If you’re not familiar with PoshFest, it’s an annual 2-day convention hosted by Poshmark in different cities around the US. Its purpose is to bring Poshmark community members together for networking, education, and fun!
I want to share with you a complete review of PoshFest 2019 so you can see what it’s like and determine if it’s worth attending yourself next year.
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Why attend PoshFest?
Most PoshFest attendees go for the same reasons you would go to other conferences:
Learn tips to sell more on Poshmark – tips on sourcing, pricing, taking better pictures, marketing, building a brand, etc.
Meet new Poshers and reconnect with old friends
Surround yourself with people who understand what you’re doing and support you
Meet and get to know the Poshmark team
Take a vacation!
Source inventory in a new location
I’d attended a few blogging conferences in the past and had such great experiences that I wanted to attend one for Poshmark devotees. My goals were to learn tips that would help my business and to connect with other Poshers in real life.
While my family is supportive of what I do, they don’t understand some of the things I tell them about selling online. It’s rare to be around people who like to talk about reselling 24/7!
What was on the agenda at PoshFest 2019?
The conference presentations focused on much more than Poshmark as just a place to sell clothes.
My impression is that there were three major themes:
1) Fundamentals of selling on Poshmark
2) Growing to full-time status
3) Social media growth of individual Poshers
These were the main stage presentations:
Balancing Act: Tales of Part-Time Poshers
See & Be Seen: The Road to Becoming a Master Marketer
State of the Posh Union with Founder & CEO Manish Chandra
Posh Stories – stories from Poshers about how Poshmark has changed their lives
Numbers Speak Louder Than Words – data on selling from Poshmark’s data analytics team
Posh Markets: The Retail Revolution is Now
Innovation Through Curiosity & Creativity – fireside chat with Co-founder and Senior VP Tracy Sun about scaling Poshmark
Hackathon Reveal – new app features revealed
True Life: I’m a Full-Time Posher
Farewell from the Founders
There were also smaller breakout sessions, workshops, and demos that went on simultaneously.
You had to pick and choose which ones you wanted to attend, although some were repeated multiple times. (I bolded the ones I attended.)
Content Strategies: How to Break into the Booming World of YouTube
Building Your Personal Brand
Act Like a Boss: Beyond Business Basics
Taking the Leap: Going Full-Time & Thriving
Boost Your Business with ‘My Sales Report’
Hackathon Feature 411 – more detailed information about the new features
Face to Face with the Poshmark Executive Team
Posh 101: Best Practices When Starting Your Business on Poshmark
Connect with Consumers: A Guide to Posh Markets
Taking Your Relationship Beyond the App
Inventory Processes for the Pros
Live Thrifting: Sourcing Strategically
Self-care, Self-worth, & Self-Made
Content Strategies: How to Build Your Brand Throat Storytelling on Instagram
Master of Negotiation
Covershots: How to Dress Your Listings Up for Success
Beyond that, these smaller events were going on:
Spot the Fake Challenge – guess which luxury items are authentic and counterfeit
Product Research Sessions - test the new “Just Picked for You” feature
Closet consultations
The Posh Studio – share your personal stories about Poshmark on camera
App Me Anything – help with using the app
Meditation Sessions
What were the pros and cons of PoshFest?
Let’s start with the pros because there were many.
Pros
1 | You’re the first to know the newest Poshmark features
The Hackathon Reveal is where Poshmark introduces its upcoming features. This year didn’t disappoint either. Poshmark is adding
private listing fields – space in listings visible only to sellers like SKU, cost price, and notes
inventory report – just like my sales report but for listed inventory that’s up for sale not yet sold.
Posh Stories – like IG Stories for Poshmark instead. You can tag others and tag listings.
I know that you can find out about the features later, but it’s exciting to hear about it directly from the developers first. You hear about the features as the developers designed them and intended them to be used. You get to see a demonstration of how to use them too.
2 | Get to know other Poshmark sellers and the Poshmark team
It’s easy to say that networking doesn’t matter or that you can meet other Posh sellers in your own city, but you can make connections that grow your business by leaps and bounds while at PoshFest.
If you want to be a top Posh seller, a Poshmark influencer, or at the forefront of Poshmark advancements, then being at PoshFest lets others see and know who you are.
One of my roommates had been to all but one prior PoshFest and knew many seasoned sellers there. She introduced me to many other top sellers and even Poshmark employees.
I met a woman who runs the clothing portion of a liquidation company. She invited me to visit the company warehouse if I’m ever in her area. I met some other sellers who showed PoshLove by featuring me in their IG stories and pictures.
I could see more friendships and partnerships coming out of meeting other Poshers – celebrating Poshmark highs and lows together, collaborating on giveaways and Posh N Sips, and getting feedback on business ideas.
As I mentioned above, I don’t know many serious Poshers in real life. The most exciting thing for me was meeting many other Poshers from all walks of life finding success on the platform in their own way.
3 | Attend Posh N Sips!
You can count on other Poshers to host Posh N Sips each night during the conference and then the morning after.
There were Thursday night pre-conference parties, Friday night parties, Poshmark’s Saturday night party, and Sunday brunches.
Since this was my first time attending PoshFest, I didn’t know they were going on until about a week before the conference. I hopped onto the PoshFest Facebook group and bought tickets for $20 each for the two I attended from other people who couldn’t attend anymore.
I thought $20 was reasonable as they came with goodie bags for the first 50-100 attendees, a drink ticket, food, giveaways, and lots of socializing. A bonus was that Manish and several Poshmark employees attended the Posh N Sips as well.
4 | Thrift shop with others
Many Poshers took to the thrift stores and discount stores in Phoenix, where I’ve heard that low-cost inventory is plentiful. My roommates arrived early on Thursday, connected with some other women via social media, and went thrift shopping with them before the conference even started.
I’ve heard that the discount store Last Chance is one of the best places to find inventory for your PM closet. A lot of Poshers rave about the one in Phoenix. Unfortunately, I planned a tight schedule for myself around the conference so I didn’t get to check it out for myself.
If you attend PoshFest in the future, take a look at the thrift stores in the area before you plan your travel and add in some extra time to shop in the city.
5 | Focus on growing your business beyond the basics
I was happy to see that several of the sessions covered more advanced topics for building a business such as branding and marketing. I attended the Act Like a Boss: Beyond Business Basics and Building Your Personal Brand breakout sessions, which had some great information:
Write down your standard operating procedures. Make a manual of how to run your business so that you can easily teach someone when you start hiring help. You can also analyze where you can improve in time management or expenses this way.
Set aside a percentage of your profits for taxes. If you’re selling to make money, then you have to pay taxes. Prepare for that by setting aside money regularly so you’re not surprised at tax time.
Your brand is about your customer, not you.
Cons
1 | You might not learn a lot at PoshFest
The main critique I heard about past PoshFests is that it’s great for socializing and fun, but you don’t learn much, at least not enough to justify the cost of attending.
It’s possible that you might leave without having learned much more about selling on Poshmark. If you’re a new seller, every panel and breakout session might be educational. If you’re a seasoned seller though, you probably know most of what was covered in the sessions.
Sure you may learn a new thing or two, but enough to say that it fundamentally changed the way you do your business? Probably not for most experienced sellers.
The other point I should make here is that how much you get out of PoshFest also depends on how much you put into it.
If you spend your time actively networking, picking people’s brains, utilizing the conference content to improve your closet, using the content to grow your social media, and so forth, then you may find that it does pay off.
For me, I was excited to have the overall experience of attending PoshFest. I didn’t plan or expect that it would directly translate into increased sales, although I would be happy if it does.
I met some wonderful people, had some lucky breaks, learned some things here and there, and had a fun time. That was enough for me to find PoshFest worth it.
2 | Varying quality of information
The breakout sessions were hit or miss in my opinion.
Because they were short at about 30-40 minutes each with multiple panelists speaking, they couldn’t be that in-depth in their content in their current panel form. There were some good tidbits of information, but also lots of superficial information.
For example, my friend and I attended breakout sessions about selling full-time at different time slots. I felt a lot of the information was common sense or easy to learn from an online search:
Create a daily schedule to keep yourself organized and on track
Determine what amount of profit you want to reinvest into obtaining more inventory
Set financial goals (a must if you rely on selling for a living!)
During the session she attended, she said that an attendee asked for advice about saving for retirement funds and obtaining health insurance once self-employed.
She said the panelists said that those were good ideas but didn’t or couldn’t provide more information than that. My friend actually educated a panelist about her options for retirement funding after the session was over!
It’s not the panelist’s fault for not knowing things like retirement options for the self-employed. I didn’t know these things either when I started working.
It’s expected that panelists are knowledgeable about some things and not others. But that presentation is not as helpful as it could be for the attendees.
I would’ve loved to see breakout sessions in the form of presentations led by “experts”.
Each session would be packed with lots of information, concrete takeaways, and actionable steps that attendees can implement the minute they leave each session.
It could be led by a Poshmark employee or even a seller like you and me, but their goal is to teach as much as possible given the short time allotted. After the presentation would be the perfect time to bring out multiple panelists for additional comments and a Q&A session.
I felt that the best breakout sessions were the ones led by Poshmark employees because they are the experts of Poshmark.
They provided demonstrations of features such as how to use your My Sales Report and how to use the new Hackathon features.
As a frugal living blogger who promotes spending on the things that matter most to you and getting value from them, I want everyone to feel that a trip to PoshFest is 100% worth their time and money.
For me, that happens when both the socializing and educational aspects of a conference are top-notch.
Final Thoughts
PoshFest is an experience that can’t be replicated by selling alone at home, attending a local Posh N Sip, or even an online conference.
There’s nothing like being in a convention center with over a thousand other sellers who have the same excitement for selling and the same motivation as you do. Attending PoshFest was a highlight in my Poshmark selling journey and a highlight for the year.
But know that attending PoshFest is not necessary to your Poshmark success.
Many people are successful on Poshmark without ever having attended a PoshFest. I’d recommend it only if it’s in the budget and something you really want to do.
I plan on attending PoshFest next year. Now I’m just waiting to find out where it is. It’ll be even better if I see you there!
Did you attend PoshFest this year? If so, what are your thoughts on it? What were some of the most valuable things you learned or did while there?
