Owning a craft business is a constantly evolving business where you are constantly trying to increase awareness of your handmade items. Many craft businesses start small just selling to friends and family before they grow a wider customer base. I thought I would take this opportunity to share with you how my business has grown to date from where it started many years ago.
My First Sale: The start of my craft business
My very first sale occurred when a friend came over for a play date with our children. I had recently made a picture for my Sister’s Wedding gift which was on the side in the living room. My friend saw this item and asked if I could make one for her. The rest they say is history!
Shortly after that first sale I set my Facebook page up for my craft business. I just started by having a single place where all my handmade items could be seen in one place. To begin with it was just a page where I could post pictures of what I had made and see which items if any people had an interest in purchasing. I began by inviting my friends to like my Facebook page. As a result friends and family of friends saw my items and people began to contact me to make them items.
Following on from creating my Facebook page I started to share some of the items that I make on local Facebook selling groups. A few sales were generated from this initial bout of advertising.
Craft Business Recommendations
At this point the majority of my sales came as a result of recommendations. Many of my customers became repeat buyers and would recommend me to anyone that was looking for handmade items. This is also the point that I decided to really try and undertake my crafting as a business.
Fairs
I decided at this point to attend some craft fairs to try and gain some feedback from the wider public on my items and what sort of items they were interested in. Over the course of around two years I attended a wide range of events from £5 Women’s Institute Events right up to a Castle Christmas Market weekend and the Big Craft Event at the local showground.
Over time I came to the conclusion that I damaged more stock transporting it than I actually sold on the day. At the same time, I could spend time at a craft event sharing posts on social media and online which would result in more sales than at the fair. I came to the conclusion that fairs were an expensive outlet that didn’t, for me, see a justifiable return.
Please see my blog post on finding craft fairs by following this link https://claireyatfairycrafters.com/find-craft-fairs/
Retail outlet
I approached a number of retail outlets that offered shelf rental. Although sales were reasonably good in these outlets, the outlets did not exist for very long. In fact the last craft shop that I stocked in was going to close down so I took the decision to take over the craft shop to protect my sales that I was getting from that outlet.
As a crafter it is important that you are fully aware of what stock is selling. Make sure that you get reports on what items have sold so that you can ensure your stock levels remain at an optimum level. It is also important that you get an idea of how the shop operates. Go in and get a feel for the shop and staff that work there to see if you think it is a shop that generate trade.
Online
I decided to try and look further afield at what online outlets I could utilise. This would hopefully increase my customer base and enable me to reach a wider range of customers who may not necessarily be local to me. Online works well for a number of crafters however it is important to properly think about the viability of posting your items and the associated costs with doing so.
EBay
I managed to sell a few items on Ebay however I found that customers were more likely to try and haggle on the price of your items. At the same time I had bad experiences of customers who were untruthful when making claims through the dispute centre. For handmade business there was no after sales support available. Often I would end up being out of pocket refunding orders that were correctly fulfilled.
Etsy
Etsy is definitely my favourite outlet for online sale. I receive an equal amount of sales from Facebook and Etsy at the moment. I find that the experience through Etsy is very easy to manage. There has been a lot of discussion recently about the fees on Etsy. I have found an online fee calculator which I use when pricing my items. This ensures that I get the right amount of profit for my handmade items. As long as I am making back what I want to receive I have no issue with the fees.
Folksy
I have recently ventured onto Folksy, it has a similar pricing plan to Etsy. However Folksy is for UK based crafters therefore you are not competing against crafters all over the world. As I have started on Folksy during the quieter months in the year; I am not sure how success this will end up being as a selling outlet for my items. As with all retail outlets it is important to really give time to a potential outlet. Quiet periods after Christmas for example will not give you a true representation of how successful sales will be.
Craft Business Website
I have set up my own website that I am currently learning how to improve. It is my mission this year to make a sale through my website. Setting up a website doesn’t need to be that expensive. However to make it worthwhile there is a lot of work that goes into it. To help your craft business grow you will need to work on visibility for your site. Also how to really ensure that the SEO (search engine optimisation) on your site is helping to make you visible.
The one thing that I should point out at this point is do not just copy a listing from one place to another. If your listings have the same title and description etc across several selling platforms they will compete against each other. This will result in lower views for all of them. It is important (although a lot of work) to ensure that your items appear differently on each platform; to give them the greatest chance of being seen.
Here is my blog post on getting started with your craft business
https://claireyatfairycrafters.com/facebook-the-first-step-to-getting-your-craft-business-started/
If you already have a craft business and you are looking for a bit of direction on what to do to try and build your customers I found the following challenge very helpful
https://www.creativehiveco.com/asaleadaychallenge/
In Conclusion
In conclusion selling online has been my biggest outlet for my handmade items. Therefore this is where I tend to concentrate most of my attention on promoting. Each business will find that different outlets work best for them. The key is finding where your best outlet is. Then narrowing down the items that are best sellers in those arenas. I found that different products sold better in different outlets. Some items sell well in my physical retail shop. Completely different items sell well online through my online selling outlets.
Have a read of my blog post all about the lessons I learnt whilst growing my Craft business https://claireyatfairycrafters.com/craft-business-lessons-learnt/
