10 things you need to think about before setting up a craft business in the UK

David and I set up Black Fox Metalcraft when the UK and much of the world was hiding in a deep recession following the 2008 financial crash. He was working in an office and I was working in pubs, but both dreamed of doing something creative and meaningful, above all enjoyable & not having to answer to our respective bosses anymore! 

When I googled to see if there was much advice available online around setting up a craft business in the UK, I found plenty of articles aimed at getting your business to go viral, to earn fame and make a fortune etc. This article is not aimed at those people, but young artists who want a lifestyle where they are able to earn an honest living from their craft, as we do. It's based purely on our own experience of being a young business in the UK, what we learned, what we did well at and things we definitely with hindsight could have done better! It’s basically a post that I wish I’d read when we were setting up back in 2012.

Disclaimer: You’ll definitely need to be self motivated enough to work weekends or evenings at some stage, the boring stuff like setting up business bank accounts, insurance and accountancy will take up a frustratingly large amount of time especially at first, but the pride you’ll feel knowing that your life is your own and that you’re doing something entirely for yourself is unquantifiable. Plus the fact that if you fancy a last minute weekend away with friends, you don’t need to ask anyone’s permission! If this sounds like the lifestyle you are looking for, read on…

1. Don’t give up the day job! Not yet anyway…

The day David handed his notice in at the bank was an exciting one, but with hindsight, perhaps getting another couple of months wages in would have been a better plan – I’d certainly advise anyone in our situation to keep their day job for as long as possible. Most businesses that fail do so in their first year or two – don’t expect to pay yourself a proper wage, or even anything straight away. * stats/ link on this? Anything you do make early on would be better put back into promoting your fledgling business. I don’t think we took anything for ourselves for the first year, and looking back this was definitely wise. It's always worth keeping money in the bank as there will be ups and downs that are out of your control.

2. Where will you work from?

Do you need to rent a business premises or can you get away with working from home / a garden shed to save money? As metalworkers, we felt that the sounds of angle grinders, hammers & chop saws, though delightful to us, may not be appropriate for a residential area so already we had the overheads of renting an industrial unit. We did manage to negotiate an initial rent free period and then a staged rent increase though, which really helped.

3.    Will you build your own website? 

Building a website may seem daunting but doing it yourself will save thousands, plus it’ll be exactly as you want it. I built our current website on Shopify, and while this platform has its limitations, I’m generally really happy with it. For the most part I found Shopify fairly user friendly, and managed to build something resembling usable over several months while my baby twins were napping each day. It could be worth employing someone knowledgeable on a consultancy basis for help with technical details if like me you struggle with that side of things.

4. Take amazing photos of your work.

You need to take incredible photos of your work. This is a skill we are still working on improving, but in an age where unscrupulous sites can use ai generated images to create perfect photos of whatever rubbish they think will make them money, you need to ensure your hard work stands out. I’d say this is one of the most important aspects of selling online – great photos sell work and therefore this is worth spending the time getting right. Experiment; see what makes your products look their absolute best!

5. Take the time to write honest, personal content.

As with the photos, these days AI can write your content and blog posts in seconds, which may seem like a great time saver, but it comes out incredibly generic, totally unpersonal and as google gets more sophisticated, this will become increasingly obvious to search engines and they will be better able to prioritise genuine originality. It is worth taking the time to write original content for your website – tell your own story! If your customers feel a greater connection with you personally they are more likely to remember you, recommend you and buy from you in future.

6. Quality Control

The internet is absolutely flooded with cheap, low quality goods purporting to be ‘hand made’ crafts. You’re unlikely to be able to compete on price with something that is mass produced abroad, so don’t try. Focus on producing quality, beautiful items that will last. British made goods are renowned worldwide for being well made, therefore there is a market for quality items that are genuinely produced here in the UK.

7. Don't undersell your work

When we set up Black Fox, we found it difficult to know how much to charge for our work, and as a result definitely undersold ourselves at times. You need to time how long it takes to create something & multiply it by your wage, not forgetting to factor in material costs including wastage, as well as basic overheads such as rent, electric bills and website hosting. There will always be someone who suggests, however helpfully, that you are charging too much for your wares, however they have rarely considered your overheads, the years it took to hone your skills, plus the fact that you actually need to eat, so please ignore them!

8. Can you get any free publicity?

Local newspapers are often interested in running stories about new businesses, especially if you give them an interesting angle to write about. For us, that was the simple fact of me being a welder/blacksmith and also female. 

9. Who are your customers and how will they find you?

Ok this is a big one, so I’ll break it down…

One mistake we did make was in not saving enough for advertising or promotion initially; by the time we had leased the business premises, got a great website, bought the welding kit etc,  we were out of cash and had to just sit there and hope people found us, so sales were as a result extremely slow to begin with!

•    Will you advertise in magazines, social media, or google ads? Which is going to bring you the most customers for their respective cost is a question I wish I had the answer to! There are so many variables that it really is a case of trial and error. Your best bet is in looking at magazines and seeing if there are any you imagine your typical customer might read; looking at the ads you see coming up on your own social media for inspiration.

•    Find lists of events to promote/sell your work. Visit them before hand & don't be afraid to ask the organisers questions - we booked onto a ‘craft fair’ once and found other traders selling hoovers & cleaning products, which we felt undermined the hours we had spent designing and creating our metalwork – we just didn’t fit in. We found our niche touring round county agriculture shows through the summer. These were loads of fun but exhausting, and we learned the hard way that we should have bought a good quality gazebo to begin with, as you can never rely on the British weather! The there are trade fairs – these can be great if you’re looking to sell in bulk to retailers. Whatever the event that you’re considering, you’ll need to think about the cost of your pitch vs the size of event vs whether the people attending are likely to be your customers.

•    Will you sell through online marketplaces or in shops locally? Factor in the commission these places expect to take when working out your prices, for example online marketplaces will typically take 20-30%, whereas it can be more like 50% in shops who have greater overheads to cover.

10. You need to be multi skilled

Unless you have a pretty big budget behind you, you’ll need to be an expert in everything from SEO to accountancy to photography, and that’s on top of the craft that you’re already working hard at. Don’t expect to master everything straight away, but you’ll find that if you diligently put the effort in early on, you’ll find most things clicking into place a few years down the line.

In conclusion, running a small craft business is not an easy life choice. It is however, a brilliant one in my opinion. My life is my own; if the sun is shining I can choose to have fun with the kids; David and I can go out for lunch or a bike ride if we feel like it… obviously we then find ourselves working late to make up for these little perks, but it’s definitely worth it. There are downsides, but the good far outweighs the challenges and we at Black Fox Metalcraft wouldn’t have it any other way.

If having read the above, you’re still interested in setting up your own craft business & the realities of the hard work has not put you off, why not get started right now and make a plan? Good Luck!