Brecho Variedades

It's that time of year again. 2009 is nearly over and 2010 will be beginning. It's time to take stock of the old year and set goals for the new.

I don't believe in New Years resolutions, they're broken so often it's become a routine joke for late night comics. Personally I think the reason they don't work is because they tend to be vague, lose weight or be more cheerful. They aren't concrete and are hard to hold on to. Instead I think you should set specific goals with a timeframe for completing them.

So take a little time to think back on what you've done with your business this year. What worked? What failed? What would you do differently?

Taking those things into consideration, what goals do you have? One of my goals is to put out an art book this year of my work. It's a really big project so I'm breaking it down into small jobs. First is to decide on the layout, what publishing I'll go with, what photos I'll need, and some other research, I want that done by the end of January.

Oops! This was supposed to be Wednesday's post but I accidentally published it early when I wanted to schedule it. There will be a short post on Wednesday instead.

How much are you really making from your work? Sometimes we don't honestly exaluate our costs by leaving off some of the costs.

A common pricing system that I see is Materials + Time = Wholesale x2 = Retail but I think this formula is flawed because it doesn't take into account other costs such as shipping materials, other costs, and fees.

I use a formula of Materials + Time + 15% = Base Wholesale x2 = Base Retail however because of shipping and fees from etsy and paypal it becomes more complicated after this. I add the total cost of shipping which is postage and shipping materials. Base Retail + Shipping Costs = Total Cost This number is what I WANT to receive after fees.

Note: I actually have a sliding scale for wholesale depending on order size but 200% is what I use for calculating the retail price.

Now Etsy and Paypal do fees different, Etsy doesn't charge fees on shipping while Paypal does but for simplicity I'm just going to assume they both charge on the total amount.

Etsy fees: $0.20 + 3.5%
Paypal fees: $0.30 + 2.9%

If you are interested in the math here it is (skip to the bottom if you're not)

Total Cost = C
Total price I need to charge = P
C+[$0.30+(2.9%P)]+[$0.20+(3.5%P)]=P
C+[$0.30+(.029P)]+[$0.20+(.035P)]=P
C+$0.50+.064P=P
C+$0.50=P-.064P
C+$0.50=.936P
(C+$0.50)/0.936=P

So if the amount I need to make is $28 I need to charge ($28+$0.50)/.936=30.45
Total Price - Shipping Costs = Online Retail

I've put this information into a spreadsheet on Google Docs with an imaginary item entered into it. You can download it in Excel or Open Office format and edit it with your own numbers.

Monday I spoke at a local school for a bunch of art students and a lot of business stuff came up about selling online. There are a lot of great creative kids out there who would like to sell the things they make. Personally I think it can be a very valuable learning experience for a kid to start up their own little business. So if you have a creative child who wants to try to sell their work, give them a shot at it but realize it is going to be work for you as well as them.

Legally children under 18 can't enter into legal contracts so as the parent you are ultimately responsible for any online accounts, bank accounts and so forth. This means that you're going to have to do a good bit of work, the younger they are the more work you'll have to help them with. Research with them local rules for businesses, help them with the books, you'll have to accompany them to the bank to set up an account for them (most states don't allow kids under 18 to have a bank account on their own), and teach them how to manage their money.

Most selling venues online require a credit card to set it up (and paypal prefers you have one on file). Since I don't think most kids should have access to a real credit card instead of using your own consider using a prepaid card or setting up a checking account with your child that has a debit card with a credit card logo.

On the subject of money I think you should put rules down at first about how their money must be spent or saved. A portion should be for personal spending, a portion goes back into the business, a portion to savings, and a portion to charity (let them pick whch ones, it'll mean more to them). What the proportions should be will constantly change depending on their age and how much the business is making. For a younger child (say 9-10 years old) an even 1/4 split between them would be simplest to handle but as they get older they may want more money to go into growing the business or going to college savings. Discuss it with them every few months. As your child gets closer to 18 you need to back off and let them make more of the decisions to prepare them for when they'll be on their own.

Links:
Etsy Guidelines for Sellers
Forbes article on Raising an Entrepreneur
These Kids Mean Business Documentary (aired on PBS)
Kids and Money Books on Amazon

I will be posting a Weekly Inspiration later but I came across this story and I think it's really important.

Fans rally to rescue soured sweets maker in Oklahoma City

To summarize: Fat Daddy Sweets was reported to local health inspectors for not following regulations on using a licensed kitchen. She's now rallying Twitter and her fans to help her raise the money to get all the paperwork in order and into a licensed kitchen. I really feel for her and hope everything works out so she can get things back up and running soon.

This isn't a difficult situation for a handmade company to get into, so many of us start in our home selling to friends and family. However once we move out of that realm into starting a real business there are laws and regulations that we must follow. It is your responsibility to research all your local and state rules that govern the products you sell, from license requirements for food to sales taxes.

Every selling venue online has a place for you to input your shop policies in some way. So what sort of thing should you include? This is a little questionaire to give you a starting point in writing your policies. However it is only a list of questions, you'll need to format your answers into your policies yourself.

Introduction:
What is your shop name?
What do you sell?
What is a brief description of what you do?

Payment:
What forms of payment do you take? Paypal, Google Checkout, Check, Money Order, etc?
What is the timeframe must you be paid in before you cancel a sale?
Do you require payment in full before shipping? (hint: this should probably be yes for your own safety)
Do you live in a state that charges sales tax? If so what is that sales tax rate that you have to charge to orders in your state? (If you aren't sure, look it up you don't want your state's revenue service mad at you)

Shipping:
How quickly do you ship? Next business day? Only certain days of the week?
What shipping service do you use? USPS, Fed Ex, UPS?
What type of shipping do you use, is it priority mail or ground shipping? Does this vary depending on product?
Do you offer international shipping? Which countries?
How do you handle international shipping? (Make sure to state that recipients are responsible for any custom fees or taxes in their country)

Refunds and Returns?
Do you take returns at all?
Are there limitations to returns? Do you accept all returns or only items broken in shipping?
Do you give a refund for returns or replacement only?

Everything Else:
Do you offer gift wrapping? Is it free or for an additional fee?
Are there age limitations for your products? Why?

If you sell edible items:
Does your state require a licenced kitchen? Do you have one?
Do your products contain any common allergens such as peanuts, milk, etc.

If you sell Bath and Body:
Do they contain any common allergens?

Other specialty areas may have their own concerns, so make sure you address them.

I'm always covering things to do on this blog, I rarely cover things you shouldn't do. I have to give lots of credit to everyone on Twitter who helped me compile this list. Most of these are obvious and hopefully none of my wonderful readers do these but there are some people who still do.

1: Lousy photo. Blurry, dark, yellow tinged, bad background, etc. these photos don't give customers a good impression aboNothing telut your products.
2: Ignore emails. Nothing tells customers you don't care than not acknowledging their emails.
3: Lacking descriptions. How is a customer supposed to know they won't have an allergic reaction to your soap without ingredients or that a shirt will fit without the size?
4: Shipping is more than the cost of the item or extremely high. Find a cheaper shipping option or adjust your prices to balance them out.
5: Poor spelling and grammar. One or two mistakes, especially if very common ones like it's and its, isnt going to be a big problem. Howevar if ur listing make no cents, you has a problm.
6: Don't offer Paypal. Yes, I know it's owned by eBay and therefore evil in many eyes but it is the biggest player in taking payments online so you need to offer it.
7: Smoke around your products or let your pets around fabric/fiber goods. Nothing will cause someone to never buy from you again more than an allergic reaction or icky smell. If you want repeat customers smoke outside and banish the pets from your workspace.
8: Underpricing yourself. This is very common and I know it sounds counterintuitive but it's true. Prices that are too low imply cheap construction and materials. If your products are high quality you shoudl be pricing them accordingly.
9: Outrageous prices. Okay, so in the are of handmade products underpricing is a far more common problem but you can overprice your work as well. $300 is perfectly reasonable for an original painting (depending on size & skill maybe too low) but not for a print no matter how high quality is it.
10: Don't fill out your profile and location. Would you want to buy from someone who's anonymous?
11: Threaten your customers. Don't fill your policies with threats and don'ts, keep things positive but firm. For example "Items are shipped as soon as payment clears" is much better than "If your check bounces you don't get your item".
12: Unclear policies. If you only ship on Mondays, Wednesday, and Fridays you needs to state this. Be simple and straightforward.
13: Don't organize your shop. 100 items with no sections/categories is hard to navigate when looking for something specific.
14: Make a bad quality product. Strange, unusual, creepy, even ugly (chinese crested dogs?) all sell great if you can find your market, but bad doesn't sell.

I had a post ready for today but I just read something so important that I'm postponing the regular post until tomorrow.

Sheril Kirshenbaum of the Intersection blog has started a campaign called Silence is the Enemy to bring attention to rape around the world. Along with several other bloggers, she's raising money for Doctors Without Borders to help them treat these women and children. Please go read the post and subscribe to her blog, she'll be writing more about the subject all month along with discussion of what we can do to help. There's also a facebook group you can join as well.

I've never been a victim of a sexual assault but I don't fool myself by believing it could never happen to me, I've known too many women that's it's happened to. I can't imagine what these victims, many of them children under 12 years old, must go through and I want to do what I can to help.

Last week I finally sat down and started working on a logo for Noadi's Art. This led me to do a lot of searching online for tutorials and software. Here's some of the good ones.

Software:
I love open source software, partly because it's free and also because most of it is cross platform and can run on many operating systems.

I really recommend using a vector software to create the logo because it makes scaling the logo up or down very easy and without loss of quality.

Inkscape - Vector image software. Not quite as powerful as Adobe Illustrator but still very good and with all the most common tools.
The GIMP - Powerful image editing tool comparable to Photoshop

Tutorials:
Step-by-Step Logo - I don't know about you but I love to see examples of how other designers work—they reveal better (or worse) ways of doing things and allow me to gauge whether my methods are mainstream or totally whacked-out.
Logo Design Process Tutorial - One of the main aspects of the branding process includes logo development.
Graphic Design 101 - Lots of resources covering graphic design
The Basics of Graphic Design - This tutorial examines the process of graphic design for printed publications, presentations, and web sites.

Font Resources:
Many logos include text so you need a good font. There are loads of good free or inexpensive fonts available online, here are a few good sources.
Blambot Comic Fonts and Lettering - These are some very fun fonts which are good if you want something inspired by comics, pulp covers, or science fiction/horror films.
dafont.com - Large collection of free fonts of varying quality
40+ Free Fonts for Professional Design

I could use some help from my readers. My area of experience is in selling jewelry and sculpture, so I would love to be able to feature articles about selling other products.

Type of topics I'm looking for:

• Hiring and working with a model (or how to convince friends to model) for clothing photography.
• Getting started selling candy or other foods online.
• Sources for sewn in clothing tags or how to make your own.
• Wholesaling your products.

Those are only a few examples. So if you have some knowledge to share please drop me an email with a short description of what you want to write about. Guest writers will get a short intro paragraph about them and a link to their shop.

This article is being written as I do what I'm writing about. I'm tired of scrambling to gather all my shipping stuff when I get an order. It was all more or less in one place just as a big messy stack of stuff with no organization. So here we go.

I'm only working with what I currently have and it has to fit in a corner of the room.

Before
I'm a bit embarrassed to put this picture but we need a before.


Storage
So since I'm committed to doing this with what I already have I need to consider the storage I have available.

• 1 wide plastic set of drawers 24 inches wide 36 inches tall
• 1 narrow plastic set of drawers 12 inches wide and 36 inches tall
• plastic shoe boxes
• Various cardboard boxes
• Various other storage containers
  

What I Did
I'll spare you the horrendous photos of how messy my living room got during this process. Suffice to say you can't organize anything without first tearing everything apart to sort through it.

1. First of all I need a flat surface to construct the packages on and keep my scale. The top of the wide plastic drawers works great. The shipping area is directly across from my computer so I can just wheel the chair over when I need to pack things.
   
2. On the top of the drawers are my postal scale, box with gift bags, receipt book, calculator, packing tape, scotch tape, scissors, box cutter, business cards, box of brochures and promo packs. Also some packing paper that didn't fit anywhere else.
   
3. Small flattened boxes went in the bottom drawer. Larger flattened boxes tucked between drawers and wall.
4. Tissue paper saved from orders, gifts, etc. in a cardboard box. Box then went into the top drawer.
5. Bubble wrap in the top drawer.
6. Envelopes, extra packing tape, small box of saved packing peanuts, and other miscellaneous small items in the middle drawer.
7. Assembled boxes arranged in a neat stack. Larger boxes stored in downstairs closet until needed.
8. Less frequently used items stored in the smaller set of drawers that has been moved to where the larger one used to be. In it are gift boxes, ribbon, wrapping paper, etc.
9. Next to the small drawers are some more boxes.
10. Hung my t-square on the wall, I use it for cutting down over sized boxes.
11. Packed up the art paper, mat board, and other stuff that didn't belong in boxes and they're stored downstairs as well. Organizing my paper is for another day.
12. Threw out a lot of trash and broken boxes. The stool with my pasta machine went back where it belonged next to my art desk.
    

After
Here's the result of my efforts. It's not pretty but it's neat and functional. I hope it inspires you to consider how your shipping and studio is organized.

Some Links on Organization

• Home Office: Organization and Productivity
• Life Organizers: Home Office
  
• Office Organizing Tips

I just joined the Sellers Assisting Sellers Etsy Team. This is a great resource for Etsy sellers, members are all willing to help out other sellers during SAS Critique chats in the Virtual Labs or directly answer questions via convo. Check out the blog which is packed full of good information.

Remember my post on earring cards? Well I took the template file I had and designed a bunch of new ones that you can customize on Zazzle along with adding some ideas for using them on this Squidoo lens: Get Customized Earring Cards on Zazzle.

Generally I write about positive things you can do for your business but today I want to talk about things to avoid doing. There are always people out there willing to scam you (just look at the spam in your email account) and a recession really brings them out of the woodwork because people are desperate. To be honest here I am involved in the skeptical movement (though not as actively as I would like to be) so this is a subject I have a lot of personal interest in.

There's a lot of sketchy information and advice out there on business. You need to look at things with a skeptical viewpoint before jumping in. What does this mean? What it means is that just because someone says they are an expert you shouldn't automatically believe everything they say, you need to critically evaluate ideas before you put them into practice and if they don't work for you after a reasonable amount of time stop doing it. That goes for this blog as well, I'm simply sharing my thoughts on running a business and what has worked for me. Not every piece of advice I give out will work for everyone.

Some Basic Skeptical Tools

Skepticism isn't about being closed minded or rejecting things out of hand. It's a tool for finding the truth and to help protect yourself (and in this case your business) from being deceived. It involves thinking critically about claims you are presented with, requiring evidence, and spotting common arguments that obscur the truth. A good primer on skepticism in this great video by Brian Dunning called Here Be Dragons



Skeptical Links

• Carl Sagan's Baloney Detection Kit
• Skeptic Magazine
• Federal Trade Commission (okay, this one isn't technically about skepticism but they do have news on scams and what to avoid)
• James Randi Educational Foundation
• Skeptic Blog
  

Some Advice to Be Skeptical Of

This is by no means a comprehensive list, just a few example of how unscrupulous people will try to play on your hopes to get money from you. A comprehensive list could (and does) make up many books.

Easy Money: Remember the old saying "if it sounds to good to be true it probably is"? Get thousands of sales in 30 days guaranteed without really trying! Just pay me X amount of money to get the secret! I don't think so, the only one possibly making all those sales is the person trying to sell you their plan. Running a business is work, anyone saying otherwise is either deluding themselves or trying to scam you.

Home Business Offers: It's tempting when you already have a business from home to add an extra source of income. There are some legitimate ways to make money working from home such as article writing, putting affiliate product links on a site or blog where you get a commission if someone clicks it and then buys something, and some others. However there are a mountain of scams, some big red flags are if they charge you money to get started or worse won't give you the full information on the offer until you fork over money. More information from the Federal Trade Commissions here and here.

Grant Money: The government really does give away a good bit of money in the form of grants and you may be eligible to apply for some. However you don't need to buy any book, software, subscription, etc. to find out where to get grants. The US government very kindly offers a website where you can get all the information for free at Grants.gov

In the words of Douglas Adams "Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the drug store, but that's just peanuts to space." The same could be said for life and knowledge. We don't know everything, our brains just aren't big enough and we don't live long enough to find out all there is.

Okay that's enough philosophy for today, what I'm getting at is that sometimes we need help. It can be frustrating to have friend or family say "I think you should do this" or "Maybe you could try that" about your business when the ideas aren't very helpful. However rejecting all help and advice because you think you know best is a dangerous thing to do.

There's nothing wrong with admitting you need some help. Of course you should find someone to help you who is more knowledgeable than you about your problem, a good place to look is your local Small Business Administration or Chamber of Commerce. Talk with other business people and bounce ideas off each other, not all of them will be good ideas but it often helps to have someone take a look at things with fresh eyes.

If something isn't working try to figure out why, if you can't you should ask someone else to take a look. Several times on forums I've seen fairly new online sellers complaining about not making sales, when told they need to work to bring in buyers and given suggestions on how to do so they get offended that someone would dare tell them how to run their business. These people are setting themselves up for failure. If you are going to succeed in your business you need to learn all you can.

Now this article is going to seem a little funny compared to my next article. Not all business advice is good advice, you need to evaluate all ideas critically and that's what I'll be writing about.

Some good links

• Small Business Administration
• Business.gov
• State by State Business Resources

This will be the shortest installment of this series. I'm going to take about staging your photos.

Most selling venues give you between 5 and 10 image slots so take advantage of them by taking a number of photos of each item. My generaly rule is the first image should grab attention, at least one should show the entire piece clearly, one closeup of important details, and one photo of your packaging.

The photos showing the whole piece, closeups, and packaging are the simplest, arrange your piece so the details you want seen are clearly visible and take the photos. These photos are to show the technical details of your work and give your customers the best idea of what they'll be recieving.

The one that is trickiest is the impact photo. This is the photo where you really want to use a nice prop or model if you have one, try different angles until you find an interesting one, maybe show only a portion of the piece but make sure it's a recognizable portion, you want to entice people to click to see everything not make them confused at what they're seeing. It's hard to give advice about doign this because it's really a creative choice how to stage your photos.

Some useful links:

• A Picture is Worth A Thousand Dollars
• Shop Makeover Series: Are Your Photos Frontpage Worthy?
• Shop Makeover Series: Feature Friendly Photos

Part IV will cover editing your photos.

Read the Rest of the Series
Part I - Basics
Part II - Backdrops and Props