I have been sent a lovely copy of A HouseBeautiful Home Business: How to start a successful interiors, housewares or furniture business from home (House Beautiful Series)
I had been aware of this book for a while now as one of my lovely mummy friends from school Sonia is one of the case studies – “Yellow Book Interiors” and it is written by the publishing house behind my book “Crafting a Successful Small Business
6 Tips For Launching a Homemade Craft Business:
- Start with something you know (you can develop other skills behind the scenes). This way you can be confident and know the products are of suitable quality.
- Decide where you will sell, whether that is on or offline, craft fairs and/or websites etc …
- Research what others are making, where they sell, the price they sell at and how they are branded and marketed. Find out if you need any information on your products’ packaging. Do they need testing? Do you need any certification? Food or natural products will need ingredients listing, kitchens will need to be inspected by environmental health and toys will need to be CE tested for health and safety. Make sure you know all of this.
- Pricing is vital. You have to take everything into consideration factor in waste, shipping, equipment, advertising, utilities such as the internet, electricity, telephones, time and your hourly wage.
- Test the market. Get your products in front of others. Find out what they like, don’t like etc .. Talk to family members, bearing in mind they are normally well-meaning and may not provide the helpful criticism you need to test on strangers too – an actual market is a good starting point.
- Have fun! That’s why you started in the first place!
Have you started a home-based craft business? Or maybe you are thinking about it? Would you suggest any other tips?
Taken from page 20 of A HouseBeautiful Home Business.
Contains an affiliate link.
