Comments on: Craft Business Inventory, Commissions vs Ready Mades

By: cornelius

cornelius — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 11:56:32 +0000

Thanks for this great article. I'd just started my wirename craft business last year and I only do commission based craft orders, however recently on customer ordered a 500 wirename keychains ..I was speechless, and they want it in 2 weeks? I spent the past few days having 2-3 hours of sleep only. After reading your article, I agree that it's important for us crafters to prepare of ready made product and when people wants to buy in bulk, we can give them some discounts. Good articles. Keep it up. corneliuss last blog post..How to do a wire sculpted mouse?

By: Yazmin

Yazmin — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:21:37 +0000

Great article Lisa.

Personally, I’m at about an 80%/20% split, heavily on the ready made at http://www.aprettyrock.com. Commissions are what keep me afloat during the summer months (or at least it was very much so this summer.) However, when holidays come around, I sell a considerable amount of stock that I made during the year.

I was actually speaking to someone else about their product line and they tend to crank out items for wholesale. When something sells at a show, they pull out the same item from their backup stash. I like the idea a lot, but I identify more with the idea of making the same thing over and over and over and over….(yawn)…sorry, got carried away.

By: Myam

Myam — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 05:09:02 +0000

you are right in all regard, including the one about the tedious fabric-cutting.

By: Helen

Helen — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 21:06:33 +0000

Hi! Great post again. I’ve actually just sold my second commission item this evening. I’m pretty new to selling, through etsy at http://www.angharad.etsy.com and so far have had 8 sales, 2 of which were commissioned items. Will be interesting to see what proportion others have.