The College Poster Sale Company has posted up somewhere else. The poster sale has moved down to the ground floor of the Reitz Union, and salesman Jeff Apostolou said he feels the move has hurt his sales.
“It’s definitely been a little bit slower down here,” the New York native said. “A lot of our business is impulse buying. They see the posters lying on the table, and they come over and buy it. We’re still doing OK down here, but we’re not doing quite as well as we would have at the Colonnade.”
The exhibit is a traveling poster sale exhibit based out of Yonkers, N.Y., that makes trips to various colleges around the country.
The company has been a regular to UF for about three decades — with the majority of sales taking place on what used to be the Reitz Union Colonnade.
The poster sale’s new area is tucked away in a spot with less foot traffic. Apostolou said he feels as if the change in location has decreased sales by about 20 percent.
“The poster sale is something that I look forward to every time it comes,” said 19-year-old accounting sophomore Nikki Masse. “I wasn’t even aware that the poster sale was here until the third day, and that’s unfortunate.”
Many students were totally unaware.
“I didn’t really know about the location change,” said 19-year-old psychology sophomore Melissa LaRosa. “I think people don’t walk by this (the new location) as much as they did the other location.”
The university approached Apostolou prior to construction beginning and offered him options for the next step for his business. One option was being fully outside, something that concerned Apostolou due to Gainesville’s weather.
Reitz Union Executive Director Eddie Daniels said the university kept the organizations in the Reitz Union in mind while going into the construction process.
With all of the student involvement on campus, Daniels said he thinks it is imperative that they have a space to be able to thrive in the future.
“We are the student union,” Daniels said. “If we’re not doing things that are appealing to students and that students enjoy being engaged in, then we’re not doing our job.”
A version of this story ran on page 4 on 9/3/2013 under the headline "Poster sale previously on Reitz Colonnade hung up on new location"
