If you make her shape products
and you want to sell them online
and have a successful business doing that stay on to watch this video where I'll show
you how to start your own handmade crochet product business.
Hi, my name is Mei and I help makers artists
and designers make a living from selling their handmade products online first.
Let's talk about why your crochet business is a great idea.
It's not expensive to start a crochet business.
You just need some yarn and hook to get started.
Right that's much less expensive than say starting a laser cutting business,
which requires a $50,000 machine crochet items also have broad appeal people in cold.
Climates neat hats crocheted items are very common traditional gift for babies.
And there's the whole Avenue of crocheted artwork
and on the whole you'll be pricing your items at a comfortable price
point that is you're not trying to sell a $2000 ring,
right you're looking at items in the double digits,
which means that your items are likely to be accessible to a large audience having said that
there are a number of challenges that you do need to look out
for there are a lot of hobbies.
And crocheters out there who are creating items
and selling them for little more than the cost of the yarn because they aren't building a business.
They're happy to just have fun and have their materials covered.
So they're not making enough profit to make a living off
of but if you're running a business not only do you need to be paid
for your labor and profit but you're competing with all of these hobbyists.
It is a crowded Marketplace and it can be a challenge,
but don't worry. I'll talk about this issue more When I show you how to add your special sauce.
Okay crochet is also time-consuming compare it to other production
methods because you're creating each item stitch by Stitch.
There is going to be a limit on how many items you can make per week.
Right? It's going to be crucial that you select and design products that maximize your earnings.
Also some customers perceive crochets old-fashioned or not,
very valuable and this is partially
because Was it is a very common
hobby but that just makes it super important that your branding is on point.
Finally. You'll want to think about the care of the final product.
You may be happy hand washing a wool sweater.
But the average customer isn't so choose your materials with the average customer in mind.
Let's talk about the products that you're going to stock in your shop.
This may sound completely obvious,
but I'm going to say it anyway because I see a lot of business owners go wrong here.
You need to offer products that people actually want because of your items aren't in demand.
They aren't going to sell this probably means you won't be
successful selling the easiest thing to make
and it may not even be the first few ideas you come up with but how do you know what people want?
I'll have a secret that I'll share with you in just a minute.
But first let me finish up talking about what you should offer in your shop.
Once you have a few product ideas you want to think About
what they share in common so that your shop has a cohesive message.
What you don't want is a shop that's confusing with random stuff inside.
This is what I call a garage sale shop.
No judgment here. I used to be a garage sale shot myself.
You definitely also don't want to just sell stuff you crochet know.
This isn't a good enough theme in a competitive Marketplace like we're in now,
especially if you're trying to run a serious business,
So find a niche and develop it make sure that
what you're offering is something people actually want to buy.
Okay. So, how do we find out?
What's popular and what's selling? This is where Etsy comes in.
It's a great place to do research on what sells well,
of course, you never copy what other shops are doing,
but Etsy is an easy place to do your research because so much of the information is public.
You can see how many sales our shop has how long they've been in business
and how many times An item is sold.
So ideally you'd stay away from a niche that's completely
flooded with low-cost competitors like sugar
and cream dish cloths.
You'd also want to really think hard before you offer something.
Absolutely. No one else is doing like adult-sized custom crochet costumes,
like maybe you're the first person to have the idea and you'd be a total success,
but more likely it's a sign that the idea wouldn't really work.
I'm not saying don't go for it. But think about it.
Remember you need to sell items that are in demand.
My guess is there aren't enough people willing to pay you for the time.
It takes for you to crochet that custom adult-sized costume.
All right, so you've narrowed down your product ideas two items that you can make
and that you're pretty sure people want to buy now.
Let's keep pushing a little bit further.
To be successful you need to make sure your product stand out.
I think of it as adding my own special sauce your special sauce is
what makes your products unique and different from everything else that's out there.
It could be a little thing like adding leather tags to finish off your pieces,
or maybe it's about the quality of the yarn you use maybe it's the designs you
use or maybe you design your own pieces,
you know, whatever it is. You want someone to be able to see your products
and say that So and so's your special sauce is the thing you become known for for example,
when my friend Stacey truck ran her crochet pattern company fresh stitches her designs
for so distinctive that her customers could pick them out right away.
She told me one time she did a design
for a publisher which didn't put her name on the pattern design
and her customers actually wrote to her saying that the publisher
stole her pattern her designs were that distinctive?
Just from the style. That's the look in definition a special sauce can give you your
special sauce could also be a combination of two different niches
or niches.
For example, I make scented food jewelry.
I don't just make any kind of jewelry. I make jewelry that look like food.
I'm essentially combining the food Niche and the jewelry knees into one or take for example,
Twinkie Chan who combines both crochet and food together to make her food?
Roche products. Okay. So I hope you're inspired by now.
Just keep in mind that building a business takes a lot of time.
So don't expect all of this to happen overnight.
Okay now for your shop to be successful you need to be able to earn enough money,
right? So let's talk about pricing.
I think the biggest challenge with selling finished crochet products is
finding the balance between your product design its price point
and people's desire for what you make If you make something
no one really wants to buy then it doesn't
matter if you spent a hundred hours making the item the reality.
Is that how much time you spend making something isn't really
going to make someone like your product more
or less,
even though I know as humans were trained to think from a young age that if we spend
more time on something we deserve a better result.
Unfortunately, that's not really true in business.
This doesn't make it impossible to have a successful crochet business,
but you just have to be extra careful with how you design your products.
Not only do you have to be extra cognizant of keeping the production process
as Labour efficient as possible,
which probably means creating crochet products that are fast to make
but you also have to be thinking
about whether or not people value the item you're making for example the perceived value.
You of a key chain is far lower than that of a scarf.
So even though it's probably faster
and easier to make a small item like a crocheted keychain accessory
people probably aren't willing to pay much money
for a keychain.
You have to problem solve
for multiple factors here and make what I call Smart design decisions from the get-go.
This is super important to know about
and is the difference between a five-figure business and a six-figure business now,
let's talk about your materials. Has and supply chain.
I see a lot of crochet businesses buying their supplies retail.
That is they go to the craft store and they buy their yarn at the same price.
Everyone else is pays This is a very hard way to run a profitable business.
When you purchase an item from a retail store.
They take about half of the cost of the product
so they can pay their expensive overhead to keep their brick and mortar business going.
So the prices you're paying are a lot more than necessary.
That's why if you're running a business instead of having a hobby.
You'll want to think about your supply chain. If you're purchasing significant quantities of yarn,
you should be able to purchase it wholesale
or at least at a Out from retail try to go
as straight to the source
as possible with your other materials poly fill tags and Notions can all be purchased in bulk.
So take the time to find your sources
and you'll save big money in the long run a few of my recommendations are knit picks for yarn.
It's not wholesale pricing
but they are the manufacturer so their prices are on discount all the time.
They don't have minimum orders
and they often run the sales to Brown sheet is also
for yarn Brown sheep is an American Mill in the Three yarn Market,
they have low minimum orders
for a production makers and at an accessible price point for the luxury yarn Market.
They will also allow you to say American-made
and point to the yarn origin
as the selling point for your own products bat Mart sells large
quantities of polyfill if you're a stuffed animal maker
and also check out Shiny Happy World,
you can get 50 pair of packages of craft eyes at bulk pricing if you're outside the
US or need a more specific.
All contact supplier you like to see if they offer wholesale
pricing to business owners depending on the company.
They might want just a text ID number some paperwork
and as little as a 300 dollar minimum order that may sound like a
lot but if you plan your products the right way like selecting from a limited color palette,
then you'll be saving a lot of money. Once you've got all of that figure it out.
You'll want to create a library of marketing materials.
That's going to help you make sales first.
You want some great. Product photos it's good to have both product photos on a plain background
as well as lifestyle photos,
which are your items in real life situations like blankets on a bed a hat on a baby
or a stuffed animal in a pair of hands.
These photos are great for social media and they'll also help you out with customer service,
you know, because customers miss a lot of information in your product descriptions.
And if you don't show your product in a real life situation,
you will inevitably get someone who I thought your product was going to be a different size.
Next you want a logo an easy
and affordable way to make one is head over to a site like creative Market or Fiber.
You can get either a template to use for yourself or have someone else make you a simple one.
There's surprisingly custom looking
and usually modern and on Trend but they're probably made using a premade template.
You can also use these sites to create any packaging or print materials like business cards.
A template goes a long way you don't have to do.
Everything from scratch you will of course also need to get
your products up online somewhere you have
options like building up your own site on an e-commerce site Builder like Shopify
or to sell on Marketplace sites like Etsy and Amazon.
I recommend focusing most of your time on your own site.
And when you have the time set up on Etsy and Amazon later,
I have a whole other video that talks about the pros
and cons of these different options
so you can go check that out if you want a more in-depth explanation now
once your Is open it's time to promote it if I were to start a
business all over again from scratch today
and I had very limited funds.
I would do media outreach media outreach is reaching out to magazine
editors YouTubers social media influencers bloggers,
and anyone else who has a large following
and the goal is to get them to talk about or feature your products.
This is a chance to get your work in front of hundreds of thousands of
people if you want to get that kind of visibility,
See the other options you have our to pay money
for paid advertising like with Facebook ads
or to slowly build your own following one follower at a time.
Can you imagine how long it would take you to build a following to a decent
size where you would make a meaningful income from
and if you didn't know it would take you years.
So media outreach is a great shortcut loads of successful online businesses have a track record of
being featured in some were prominent this The only thing I would attribute to being able to make a
full time living with my jewelry business tiny hands
and my coaching business creative Hive if you want to learn more on how to do media outreach.
I have a whole other video on how to do that here building a
crochet business is not the easiest thing to do
but it is totally possible as long as you're considering all of these things.