Bristol Pop-Up Shop: Where it all began.
It's time to get festive in Bristol
Christmas 2020 is in full swing and we’re gearing up to open the Winter Pop-Up Shop in The Galleries, Bristol for the third year running. It’s safe to say it’s been a bit of a rocky year with uncertainty and challenges being thrown at us all, but we’re delighted to be back for another year and with a slightly different look too.
We’ve had a bit of a rebrand as we’ve worked hard behind the scenes on our various projects this year so we thought now would be the perfect opportunity to introduce ourselves and reflect back to how it all started.
What is The Bristol Pop-Up Shop?
The Bristol Pop-Up Shop is a collective brought to you by 10 members of the Bristol Etsy Team. Our mission is to connect and support Bristol’s small creative business community whilst simultaneously offering Bristol shoppers a special shopping experience that truly makes a difference.
Each year since our launch in 2018, we’ve hosted our physical Pop-Up Shop, The Winter Pop-Up Shop in The Galleries Shopping Centre in Bristol where we bring together a show-stopping selection of high quality products all locally designed and made from over 80 of Bristol’s small creative businesses.
2020 has also seen the launch of a new project; our online Bristol Pop-Up Shop. With the uncertainty of in-person shopping this Christmas, we decided to bring all our favourite Bristol creatives online so you can shop meaningfully even from the comfort of home. The online store officially went live on Saturday 14th November featuring work from over 100 southwest based businesses. If you’re looking for a one stop Christmas gift shop this year, the Bristol Pop-Up shop is packed with unique handmade gifts, quirky stocking fillers and easy secret santa solutions so you can tick off your gift list and support small businesses all in one fell swoop.
How did the Bristol Pop-Up Shop begin?
As I’ve mentioned previously, the Bristol Pop-Up Shop is a collective of 10 members of the Bristol Etsy Team, and it’s there where our roots lie.
I, personally, started as part of the Bristol Etsy leadership Team. As part of the Bristol Etsy Team, we regularly put on events and organised monthly meet-ups designed to grow the city’s creative community. We provided a space for makers, artists and sellers to connect with one another, to learn and support one another in their creative endeavours.
Through our selling events, such as the successful Etsy Made Local Christmas Market, we bought together many talented Bristol based designers and creatives to offer exciting shopping opportunities where each and every purchase matters. After having firmly established Etsy Made Local as a go to destination for Christmas shopping, we needed another challenge and started to think about the possibilities of running a Pop-Up Shop...
Enter Stage Left the Bristol Girl Bosses
The Bristol Girl Bosses; a collective of 8 designer/makers within the Bristol Etsy Team, was founded in 2017. Similarly, their group was based upon seeking community and support. Being a ‘one girl band’ brings about a lot of challenges so having a group of like minded women to talk to, to seek advice from and to bounce ideas around with was extremely important to them, thus their collective was formed
Back in March 2018, the Bristol Girl Bosses ran the exhibition ‘Muse’ at local makers' shop Blaze. Each Girl Boss produced a piece of artwork inspired by their interpretation of women and femininity which were exclusive to the event. Their International Women’s Day launch night was an incredible success with a great turn out which continued for their month long run. The community spirit and success of the event created a high that they were eager to retain and thus ideas began to form.
Geared up by their success, the Bristol Girl Bosses and we (Bristol Etsy Team) arranged a very informal pizza based meeting in Pinkman's, and slice by slice the foundations for our Pop-Up Shop started to be put in place. The wheels started turning and we approached the Galleries with our pitch to open The Bristol Etsy Team X Bristol Girl Bosses Winter Pop-Up Shop.
The rest, as they say, is history
We had a fantastic opening year with success that exceeded even our greatest of expectations and we were delighted to follow that up for a second year. Now, in 2020, we’re back under the name of The Bristol Pop-Up Shop and ready for a Christmas unlike any before.
Now more than ever, as a nation we are realising the power of our small creative businesses and, more importantly, we are championing and supporting them more than ever. 2020 is the year many of the population are taking the pledge to shop a bit more thoughtfully and buy gifts with meaning. We at the Bristol Pop-Up Shop are delighted to play an active role in that.
Come visit the Winter Pop-Up Shop
The doors for the Winter Pop-Up Shop are open to the public 3rd-24th December, Monday-Saturday:10:00-18:00 and Sunday 11:00-17:00.
All the team working shifts in the Winter Pop-Up Shop are the makers, designers and artists who have their products stocked in there. This means you can meet the makers and speak with the experts themselves!
And if IRL shopping isn't for you, you can still find 95% of the Winter Pop-Up Shop stockists online plus a load more online here at the Bristol Pop-Up Shop. Sit back, have a browse and get that Christmas gift list ticked off.