A Place to Sell Projects

[walnutjerry]

Also remember you are now selling nation wide not just to the paperboy and the neighbors. Buyers will pick up the premium.

Mike-------check out ebay for handcrafted items. That is world wide as far as the market goes. Last time I listed any handcrafted items I did not get a bid to reach the minimum level. You will be competing with mass produced imports-----impossible to do.

I also had a web site for about 3 years----------I sold a box of checkers to a guy in London and a chair to a lady in Charlotte. Not much as far as sales go, huh? Being on line is like being a minnow in the ocean.

Most of my sales success has been doing craft shows and that can be a gruesome avenue. The overhead for doing craft shows is usually a lot more than 20% of the sales. At show sales is not the end of it-------you will get orders from people that came to the show and were able to put their hands on the work. They can not do that on line.

The online gallery is good in theory but I believe difficult to make profitable. I am sure there are exceptions to this. There is no easy way to market handcrafted items. If everyone had the advantage of belong to the Southern Highlands Guild and its reputation it would be a plus. Hey-it took them decades to get where they are today.

From my experience, everyone is ready to jump on a ready-made-market bandwagon. Very few are willing to roll up their sleves and help make it happen. Come up with a plan--------or a planning group and see what develops.

Jerry

 

[DavidF]

I think Jerry has made some good points, for those that want to make a living off their work, then on-line is probably not going to do it on its own. As has been said, there is nothing like picking up a piece and looking at it "in the flesh" This means making "spec" pieces and putting them in a gallery and that can be an expensive effort in time and materials. For those of us looking to sell the odd piece, maybe the "word of mouth" marketing plan is still the best. Start with friends and neighbours and go from there.

 

[SteveColes]

From my experience, everyone is ready to jump on a ready-made-market bandwagon. Very few are willing to roll up their selves and help make it happen. Come up with a plan--------or a planning group and see what develops.

Jerry

The man speaks the truth:icon_thum I suggest that Rob's and Steve D's model. They created a usergroup on this site. Asked people to join the group. From that and the discussions they had amongst themselves, they formed a new woodworking in western NC.

Well, you can do the same. All it takes is someone to decide to really start it. All you have to do fill out a Make a request in the help desk menu, asking for a usergroup, tell us its name, who will be the groupleader(s)and probably ask for a private forum. Then you can you use that forum to discuss organizing and getting going.

The group leader(s) then make an announcement of the purpose of the group and ask members who are interested to join. I will then turn over the website with the domain name of your choice from the list in a previous post as soon as you name a webmaster and a web designer.

When you are ready I will enable a system to allow you to collect dues online. Once the site is up and running, I'll bet you'll have more people wanting to join.

You guys have not seemed to noticed that a professional web designer as already offered his services free.

Gosh, Talk about herding butterflies and cats:roll: :rolf:

 

[Jonz]

Request for usergroup sent.

Thanks Papa Smurf.

 

[walnutjerry]

A group got together and did this in Stokes County. It is called the Dan River Art Market. It is non profit org and very small funding from the Arts Council.

Great Idea for NC Wood Workers to do the same. Maybe I can get some info if interested in how they did it here.

Mike--------At one time I belonged to the Winston Salem Guild. We had the same thoughts on having our own store. A golden opportunity opened up for us. There was an empty house in historic Bethabra (the brewers house), it was offered to us free including maintenance of the grounds. They just wanted something useful done with it. We had to supply the display furnishings and inventory and keep regular shop hours.

I drove 100 miles round trip and worked in the store one day a month. As large as the guild was at the time, we still could not get enough volunteers to keep the store going!!!!:eusa_booh

Hope it goes better for you and the group you have put together.

Jerry

 

[DavidF]

Some explanation of the cause of failure would help.

Was it lack of participation or low sales volume?

Low traffic count in the store?

Too seasonal?

I have been to several events there and sales seemed to be brisk, but the events are only 2-3 per year. Don't know what traffic is like during the rest of times.

If we can get this together it won't mean that you put all your goods in the store. It is just one more avenue for sales. You have a product, you make a picture or a few, you upload the pics and a description/price, if it sells you are paid, if not or if you sell it somewhere else you mark it SOLD. You have to keep your gallery current and ship promptly, but there is not much else you will be required to do.

For custom works you would present photos of prior works and a description of your process/expectations and maybe a "meet the artist" blurb.

I don't see where there would be any down side.

This sounds like I had in mind. By "store" I assume you mean an "on-line" "store"

 

[DavidF]

Yes, I am still discussing an online store. Won't you join the discussion group?

Hi Mike, Yes I will -Jonz PM'd me this morning and I responded to him. It's an interesting venture.

 

[jglord]

I wonder if doing a physical store for a short period of time would be work for folks who have items to sell?

My thinking is to have a place for folks to sell their wares for a relatively short time - for example, for a few weeks before Christmas. The shop might be staffed but volunteers but would require staffing by all who wished to sell items.

One option for a location would be a short term lease in a local shopping center. For example, in the shopping center where woodcraft is located, people lease space for a month or two. There is currently a group opening a Halloween store that will close November 1. I don't have any idea what a short term rental costs, but I would imagine shopping center managers would view it as a win - win.

Anyway, just a thought to address concerns about potential buyers needing to see and tough before buying balanced with concerns of staffing, etc.

 

[dozer]

I would definetly be interested in this sound like a great idea that just needs some details worked out.

 

[walnutjerry]

Yes, I am still discussing an online store. Won't you join the discussion group?

Mike----How do we join the discussion group? Is it by invitation only?

I am not opposed to the ideas mentioned for marketing and I do not have all the answers. I think I know some of the things to avoid.

In answer to one of the other posts concerning cause of failure of the store------------I think lack of volunteers to man the shop was the biggest factor. The bulk of the work fell on just 2 or 3 people and the guild did not want to pay someone to be "in charge".

I do not think anyone can predict sales volume, in a shop, at a craft show or online. So what do you compare to?

The location of the "store" we had was not a heavily traveled path. If there was a special event at Bethabra then the traffic increased.

Advertising??????????????? very expensive so there was not a lot of money in the budget for regular advertising. Mostly flyers and word of mouth.

Finally-----------a lot of avenues are needed to "make a living" selling handcrafted items. Any exposure is good to let people know you are there. Just don't expect to get covered up with orders because of an online presence.

Jerry

 

[DaveO]

Jerry, go to your user settings in the left hand menu. then to the bottom of the list to group membership, and there you can make a request to join the group. Jonz, the usergroup leader, will approve you, and then you can participate in the planning discussions.
Dave

 

[walnutjerry]

I wonder if doing a physical store for a short period of time would be work for folks who have items to sell?

My thinking is to have a place for folks to sell their wares for a relatively short time -

John----------Have you considered talking with the owners of an established gallery to see what the chances are they would work with the group to have a designated area for NCwoodworkers products? I am sure it would involve a commission though.

Some of the places, if not all, that rent floor space also charge a commission on top of the space rent. (There are at least two such places in Rowan county). And................they want a minimum 6 mo. contract.

Jerry

 

[walnutjerry]

Jerry,

We need your experience. The best way to be successful is to avoid failure.
Thanks Mike------I am not computer savy but real good giving opinions:rolf:




I see this as one more avenue for members to sell through. It will not be a sole means of support for any one member, but hopefully it could collectively support the forums. And this will be good if it can be done cost effectively, in reality you cant continue to spend more marketing than your net profit.

For some that are new to selling crafts it will mean a lot, to the well established it may mean few if any new contacts. But as you say any exposure is good.

Everybody has to start somewhere and the online store may be the most cost effective way to do it--I do not know enough about "computer marketing" to get a handle on costs.

Jerry

 

[Woodfish]

I'm late to this game, but you might want to look at "Womancraft Fine Handcrafted Gifts, Inc." in Chapel Hill as a model. This is a group of about 30-40 mostly women who have this store where they sell their handcrafted
items. They've been in business a long time. Their items are mostly in the less than $100 range. They have a web site, but I forget the name. I've been selling my end-grain cutting boards there since February with good results.

 

[jaustin]

I'm late to this game, but you might want to look at "Womancraft Fine Handcrafted Gifts, Inc." in Chapel Hill as a model. This is a group of about 30-40 mostly women who have this store where they sell their handcrafted
items. They've been in business a long time. Their items are mostly in the less than $100 range. They have a web site, but I forget the name. I've been selling my end-grain cutting boards there since February with good results.

http://www.womancraftgifts.com/

 

[brent innc]

Has anyone even considered talking with the Dept. of Travel and Tourism? They may be able to offer some insight and possible avenues to explore to bring this to an actual business?:icon_thum After all, talk is the cheapest thing we have this day and time, and it doesn't hurt to ask.

 

[Littlejon]

Guys, I am joining this discussion late and I am not about to read every post in the thread, but if all you are looking at doing is setting up an online shop to sell members' items, with a percentage going to NCWW for naming rights or whatever, why reinvent the wheel? Use an established online community such as eBay for the "store" part of it. NCWW won't ahve to create a storefront and you can set up the store there however you want it. Members put their items up for sale, set the price and don't have to use the "auction" type of selling unless they want. Since a NCWW person would have to monitor sales, etc., the members would have to agree to a certain percentage of the sale to go there or set a base fee for all members to pay over a perdiod of time for operating costs. If you have it quarterly, members would have the option to go out in case they had slow times of the year, times when they need to get away from the shop (RIGHT!!) or in case their goods aren't selling like they thought. If you limit the number of members allowed in a given time period, you know the set fee will always be the sa,e for every member and if one goes out, you can add another without changing the fees.

I know a few people who have set up operations like this with other ventures. I could ask them if they would offer expertise on doing it this way. They used eBay for their "store" and this guy lives in NC while his partner is in Arizona, I think, so geographical locations aren't an issue.

Just a thought. If I am off base as to what you want to do with this, let me know and I will go back to the shop and quit bothering you folks! :-D

 

[DaveO]

Jon, that is very good thinking. We have established a forum with the sole purpose of discussing and establishing some sort of NCww'er sales system. It would be great if you could participate in that discussion (might breathe some new life into it:icon_thum) Go to your user cp and in group memberships you can add the .COM group and one of the usergroup leaders will set it up.
I would be very interested in hearing more about how the E-bay "store front" could work for this application, as that would save a lot in setting up a web-site.
Dave

 

[Greybeard]

Hi all,
One thing I haven't seen anyone bring up is advertising for the new site. There are untold number of websites out there on the web and over 3.6 million under the search criteria of "handcrafted wood items for sale".

One thing we must be ready to do is to advertise to the point that everytime you you type in a search in Google, Yahoo, MSN, ALTAVISTA, and the rest of the top 10 search engines, your site comes up in the top 10-20 sites brought up. People don't want to go thru page after page of returns.

This kind of advertising can be expensive, but it will give you great returns. After the site is up and running, and the sales are coming in, the money will also be coming in to support continued advertising, and so on.
This is just another outlay that will have to be made BEFORE while the site is starting up!

Another thing that we need to think about is are we going to take sales from this site or act as a referral site to the owner of the item up for sale.

If we are going to sell it right from the site, how is payment to be made and in whose name? I will let you guys debate that one! It opens a number of large cans of worms.

Just a few thoughts I thought I would throw out there.

 

[Littlejon]

Dave - I have requested to be added. Now what do I do? I don't know what I can add to the discussion, but I think you have some options out there that could be a better choice for you right now. Glad to offer my opinions!

Jon