How to Make a Living As a Craft Artist
Making a living through one's artwork is a common dream among artists and artisans, including craft makers. If you long to abandon the world of nine-to-five and make your beloved hobby into a self-sustaining career, it's important to understand the basic ways in which artisans are commonly able to connect with their potential buyers and make sales.
Instructions
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Find a niche. With so many artisans working hard to make a living with their crafts, those who have the best success tend to be those who offer something unique. Look at the crafts you make to try to decide which have the most individual flair and which show the best mastery. Showcase these items. Be willing to re-assess your niche as you go, especially if buyers are drawn to a particular type of piece, and be prepared for the fact that what people most want to buy might not be the items you most enjoy making.
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Become a booth vendor for local artisan fairs and events. This is easiest if you live in or near a major city, as this will afford you the most opportunities. While you can sometimes find craft fairs advertising for vendors in newspapers, community boards and local classified ads, the most reliable way to develop fair connections is through word-of-mouth, so keep an eye out for fairs already in progress and ask the vendors there about local opportunities; many fairs happen on a regular or annual basis.
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Look for retail sales markets. Local stores and cafes will often sell the work of crafters as a counter item, so ask around and look for shops that may already have a selection of homemade items (especially jewelry). Speak to the manager and bring samples of your work along to show. For the most opportunities, offer to sell either through consignment (items are displayed and the store gets a percentage of the sale) or wholesale (store purchases discounted items and keeps the full sale price).
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Sell your crafts online. Set up your own independent on-line shop (if you can't hire a web designer to build an e-commerce site, you can create one using tools on paypal.com), or sell through an established marketplace site. Auction giants like eBay tend to be a good choice for more expensive and unique items, such as one-of-a-kind artwork in a popular genre (such as polymer clay dolls) or costume pieces. For smaller pieces, try a craft-oriented sales site like etsy.com, artfire.com, or dawanda.com.
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Refine your efforts and be persistent. Ultimately, perseverance will make the difference between selling crafts as a hobby or supplemental income and actually making your living with it. Assess your artwork with a critical eye and always look to improve, but bear in mind that even a great product takes time to develop into a thriving business.
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Tips & Warnings
When selling on-line, having good photographs of your crafts is essential to their sales. Use a good quality camera and try to take pictures in natural light.
