Calligraphy and jewellery making

wordsfan

I recently came up with the idea of making wedding invitations, place cards due to a friend getting engaged. I've done calligraphy before including my own invitations.

I'm also thinking of looking into jewellery making.

I'd love any advice or tips people can offer.

Also what's best way to come up with a price for handmade items ?

Thanks all

Ps the local community for buying and selling is this a good starting point?

FinanciallyUnsavvy

I'd take a look on sites like Etsy and Folksy, as for bespoke handmade items like this, they're going to be your best bets online. Also visit crafts fairs to scope out local competition, check their prices and see how your products will compare.

Good luck! I keep meaning to try my hand at jewellery making. Spent some money last year on supplies but have yet to really utilise them!

BritishBibliophile

Jewellery is a heavily saturated market, both online and craft fairs, and nowadays very difficult to break into.

You might find wedding invitations a bigger market, especially if you can afford to have a stall at a wedding fair. Will you be doing every single one by hand, or a design then scan it, touch up details in a program like Photoshop, and then print? If by hand then you need to work out how long each one will take you, plus a margin for any mistakes you make that mean the whole card will need to be redone etc etc

wordsfan

I'm gonna look at etsy and folksy. I'd heard of etsy but not folksy. The jewellery I've yet to look at properly, certainly will consider beading and similar as I might be looking to use these on invitations too. Would hand make invitations, place cards etc but orders of service would be computer printed inside on regular paper as it would just take ridiculously long to do otherwise.

There's a lot of people do jewellery I know but I'm thinking start small so no huge initial outlay.

Thanks both for the advice

Ebe_Scrooge

This is a lovely idea, unfortunately it's very difficult to make a living at it. This is true for any hand-made items.

At its simplest, work out how long it takes to make each item, and how much people would realistically be willing to pay for it. As previous posters have said, craft fairs are an excellent way to scope out the competition and the going rate.

A worked example : let's say wedding place-name cards. For a nice card, each one will take you, what, 5 minutes ( cutting the card, writing it, folding it ) ? So that's 12 an hour. What will people be prepared to pay ? I've no idea, but I would wager no more than £1 per card, probably a lot less. So you're earning £12 an hour.

Now subtract the cost of your materials. If I was paying £1 per card, I'd want some top quality card. Then your ink, pens, envelopes, whatever.

Now you've got to sell the things. So you've got to advertise. Whether that's a postcard in the local newsagent, gumtree, whatever. If your local community has a Facebook page that's always a good start. Again, craft fairs are a great place to sell, but you've got to travel there, pay an entrance fee, and account for your time.

It's difficult ( though not impossible ) to make a living from this kind of thing. My dad loves doing woodwork, making candlesticks, fruit bowls etc. on his lathe. Many years ago I suggested exactly this to him - get a stall at a craft market. But he said a fruit bowl, for instance, takes him about 3 hours to make ( he's a perfectionist about finishing, polishing, etc. !! ) He reckoned no-one would pay more than 20 quid for one, tops, so that's around £6.60 an hour, before you consider the cost of materials, stall fees, etc. etc. My mum has got the most beautiful hand-made items dotted around the house, but it's not going to pay the bills !

Sorry, I'm not meaning to sound negative. It's a lovely idea, and if you're wanting to do it for the love of doing it, then good on you. But if you're hoping to make money out of it, then just do the sums first. As I said, it's not impossible, but you do need to do a bit of research first.

Hope my waffling has helped somewhat !!

wordsfan

I'm not looking to make a living out of it, just a wee extra for luxuries.