Author: christine

From oversized Jenga style games to handmade Scrabble lawn games, and wooden tic tac toe boards to lawn Yardzee games, there’s plenty of outdoor games that you can create and sell with your Silhouette or Cricut. And, the best time to promote them? Right now: The beginning of summer! Today, let’s take a look at three different ways you can make money selling handmade yard games.

3 Ways to Profit from Handmade Yard Games

1. Sell directly to customers. Just a second to state the obvious here: Make and sell to customers through local buy and sell groups, Etsy, your own website, or word of mouth.
2. Rent them out. Renting out giant yard games is another way to profit from them this summer. Many people won’t have a use for them outside of a special event like a wedding or a family reunion. Also, they might not have the space to store them. Head to this post for the ins and outs of renting products. (And trust me, it’s something I could consider myself an expert in!)
3. Sell to event rental businesses. Wholesaling is a great way to make money off of handmade yard games this summer. And who better to sell them to than your local event rental businesses? In this case, you’d sell your yard games directly to the event rental business. Unless they are extremely busy, they’d probably only need 3 to 5 units total. They’d then rent out the units to their customers throughout the year. Need more information on wholesaling? Head to this post.

Yard Game DIY Tutorials

Looking for a few tutorials to get started making your own yard games with your Silhouette or Cricut? There’s no need for me to write any, since there are plenty of good ones already online.

• DIY Yardzee
• DIY Outdoor Dominoes
• DIY Backyard Four in a Row
• DIY Giant Dice
• DIY Oversized Tic Tac Toe

If you decide that making and selling the games isn’t for you, you could also make and sell the digital plans to other crafters.

Tell me in the comments, what is your favorite tutorial for making giant outdoor games with your Silhouette or Cricut?

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Making and selling customized and personalized products in your craft business is a great way to make money.

However, there are just some products that it makes more sense to outsource. For example, if a customer came to you with an order for 5,000 tee shirts, you’d likely find a way to outsource it. For the amount of time that it would take a single person to do the order wouldn’t make it worth it for the maker or for the customer.

Similarly, can koozie orders usually aren’t worth making them yourself. Let’s look at reasons to outsource can koozie orders.

If there’s one thing that crafters love… it is discounted prices. I have had a number of Cutting for Business readers ask how to set up their own blanks buy in groups – so today I’m tackling the topic.

First, what is a blanks buy in (also called a co-op) group? It’s a group of crafters that bands together to purchase large quantities of blank goods or craft supplies directly from a manufacturer. By placing an order together, buyers can negotiate lower prices. Essentially, the owner of the group becomes the ‘middle man’.

How to Start Your Own Craft Blanks Buy In Group

1. First, figure out how you will make money. There’s two different ways to make money: 1) Upcharging members for the blanks they purchase. For example, if you are purchasing tote bags from a manufacturer for $3 each, you could charge members $5 per bag. 2) Charging members a buy in fee. This fee is on each order placed and is generally $1 to $3. Beware: If you upcharge too much, members will know and will likely not use or recommend your group. Similarly, if your buy in fees are too much, members will shop elsewhere.
2. Decide whether or not you have the time and space to host a buy ins. You’ll need space to store the bulk order while you divide it up and space to store packaging materials. You’ll need the time to create and send out invoices and package each buyer’s order then ship it to them.
3. Locate products that you feel would be good sellers. Do some research and make a list.
4. Register your business. If you want to buy directly from manufacturers, you’ll need to have a registered business. Manufacturers generally won’t sell direct to the public. If you are looking for manufacturers overseas, Alibaba is a good place to start. Learn more about Alibaba in this blog post.
5. Form relationships with manufacturers. This is usually as easy as sending a message through a marketplace, an email, or calling them. After you locate manufacturers that you’d like to work with, ask for them to send a sample product for you to review. The manufacturer may send it free of charge or they may ask you to pay for it.
6. If you plan to order products from overseas (like China), get familiar with the customs duties involved with importing goods to the United States.
7. Now, it’s time to start your group. Most buy in groups use Facebook Groups to communicate with members, but you could also use a website. When creating your group, be sure to include information about the group, group rules, and how members can reach out for help.

Hosting Your First Buy In

1. After you’ve received samples and negotiated a price with the manufacturer, you will want to photograph the products in the buy in or get permission from the manufacturer to use their photos.
2. Then, create a spreadsheet that members can edit to place their order. Once you’ve got it ready, upload it to your group. Be sure to tell members about any minimum order quantity, colors available, and the buy in closing date.
3. Once the buy in has closed, send members an invoice for their order. Your invoice can either cover their product order and shipping from you to them, or you can invoice shipping costs once the products arrive.
4. After all members have paid, place the order with the manufacturer.
5. Be sure to keep members up to date with the expected arrival date of the products and the expected shipping date from you to them. Always share delays with all members.
6. Once the products arrive, divide them and ship them to each member.

Buy in groups can be profitable, but they aren’t a ‘get rich quick’ scheme. If you are truly interested in starting your own buy in group, I’d recommend you first join some existing groups to see what works and what doesn’t work.

Also, there are a number of  ‘Beware of buy in groups’ and ‘Bad buy in groups’ Facebook Groups. If you create a buy in group, I would become a member of these groups as well to monitor your group’s reputation.

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Need to slow down orders in your craft business? Whether you are thinking towards summer or you stumble across this article later during the Christmas rush; there’s times in your craft business when it may be too busy to keep up. And that’s ok. If you are a one person shop owner, it is likely that you’ve got a lot on your plate.

No matter whether you just need a break or you’ve had something come up, let’s take a look at five ways to slow down orders in your craft business.

5 Ways to Slow Down Orders in Your Craft Business

1. Raise your prices. This is pretty much a nod to Economics 101 – it’s simple supply and demand. When the demand is high, you raise the prices. When the demand is low, you lower the prices. Put simply, if you are too busy with orders, raise your prices. This will cause some customers to wait until the price is lower before they order. And, you’ll be making more for doing the same amount of work. If you raise your prices and the orders don’t slow down, raise them again. (Psst! The pricing in your craft business should be changing regularly anyway.)
2. Lengthen your turnaround time. If you are having a hard time keeping up with the orders flowing in, lengthen the amount of time before the orders will ship. This not only gives you more time to work on the orders, but it will deter some customers from placing an order (especially those last minute types).
3. Stop doing custom work. While this won’t work in all situations, if you sell a mix of ready to ship and custom designed products, stop accepting new custom work. It’s no secret that custom work takes longer to complete than ready to ship products. If you are behind, stop taking on custom requests. And, custom work might not even be the best for your shop.
4. Remove your products from some marketplaces. If you sell products in multiple places (some on Facebook, some on Etsy, others through your website, and so on), sell out products in the smaller venues and only take orders from your most profitable marketplace. This ultimately gives your products less visibility and will slow down the amount of orders you have.
5. Place your shop on vacation mode/sell out your products. Debates fly on the internet about the adverse effects of placing your shop on vacation mode – whether it is on Etsy, Amazon, or somewhere else. Putting your shop on vacation mode is quick and easy to do and will definitely stop orders. Let me offer you a quick alternative: If you are able to keep up with the messages in your shop and you don’t have thousands of products, consider selling out your products instead of placing your shop on vacation mode. This will also stop orders from coming in.

These are all temporary solutions to slow down your orders. Don’t forget that once you’re able to handle the flow of orders again, reverse whatever steps you took to slow down orders.

And remember, if you are researching on how to slow down orders in your craft business – you must be doing something right!