Spent 2 hours at a local gallery opening last weekend and it changed how I organize my portfolio

I was at the River Arts Gallery in Burlington for their monthly showcase and noticed every artist had a printed QR code next to their biggest piece. It linked to a simple PDF portfolio, not some fancy website. Tried it on my own work for a small show at a coffee shop downtown and got way more follow up emails than usual. Has anyone else found simple stuff like QR codes works better than the polished online galleries?

2 comments

2 Comments

mark_thomas7d ago

Did the PDF portfolio have thumbnails of your work, or was it just a list of each piece with a price and a short description? I ask because I tried something similar at a craft fair last fall and used a QR code that linked straight to a simple page with one photo per piece, no extra fluff. The people who scanned it seemed to actually look at the work instead of just glancing at my table and moving on. But I wonder if the key is keeping the file so basic that it loads fast on a phone without any lag or scrolling. What format did you use for yours?

lunakim6d ago

my friend jen tried exactly this at a pop-up market last month and she taped a qr code on her price list that linked to a single google doc with her work. she said people actually stopped to scan it instead of just taking her card and walking away. it was wild how many orders she got from that one simple trick compared to her usual instagram link.