It is fun spending some time on creative projects that you love. But what if you could make money while at it? There are many crafts to make and sell and there’s a growing market for them, after all, just like any other profession, creativity deserves a pay too.
The resistance movement against the sea of sameness continues to gain traction. People are increasingly looking for unique things to set them apart. Knowing an item has a unique story behind it brings a twist to the user’s experience.
The coronavirus crisis has brought out certain aspects of creativity in people and a few niches within the crafts industry are doing exceptionally well.
As the need for crafts increases, their market also grows and there are several online platforms specifically created for this. And can easily turn crafts creators into online shop owners. It’s also important to note that crafts are in myriads of categories and there’s a market for each and every one of them.
But before getting into the types of crafts to make and sell, here are some important things you need to know.
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How to Sell Crafts
Just like any other business, the business of crafts requires some selling skills, irrespective of where you choose to sell them. Whether online, at the crafts fairs, or even at your local shop, you need to be visible. And there are a few more steps you need to take to have a sustainable crafts business.
Pick One Craft and Do It Well
When starting out, you may be filled with inspiration, and you may feel that if you have more craft products you’ll have more customers. Hence, the opposite is also true. You don’t need to have a myriad of products to sell well. You need one range of products to thrive better.
Focusing on one range will be easier when it comes to marketing to a specified target group. It will also show your customers that you know your craft and that you’re not just a Jack/Jane of all trades.
Being specific will also help you better sharpen your skills because it’ll mean you’re doing the same thing often. And next time you’ll be able to make it better than before.
Build a Strong Identity
This is all about branding. Your brand will be your identity, if you’re going to spend your time creating beautiful crafts to make and sell, then you might as well spend enough time branding your business. It is about understanding who you are and in the simplest way letting people know why what you create is special.
Your brand should go beyond your logo and color theme and be able to tell your story and your values. Use a name and images that show your style. And all this is easier when you pick a specific niche as stated above.
Get Your Pricing Right
How to price crafts and things you make to sell is a major concern especially when you’re starting. Finding that sweet balance between a good selling price that works and earns you a profit is crucial. This calls for some research on your part. Find out how much similar products are going for, incorporate all your costs, and include profits in order to get it right from the start.
Other things to factor in include materials and packaging. Also, consider if they’re seasonal products. You may want to consider if you can sell them wholesale or purely in retail.
Will you consider running promotions on your crafts? Then you have to avoid very slim margins and allow some wiggle room in order to be able to offer discounts (and still make profits).
Another factor to have in mind is where you want your crafts to be positioned in the market. Are you a luxury brand or are you a regular brand? All these factors will guide you on the best way to price your products.
Marketing Tips to Help You Sell Your Crafts
Target Customer Research
Before you get deep into crafts to make and sell, know who your ideal customer is. Are they males or females? What age are you targeting? Old or young? Are they urban or rural or suburban? Where are they likely to shop? On a physical store or on an online store?
If you get all these answers then you’ll be able to filter your marketing strategies in order to reach the exact customers that you need.
Peek at Your Competing Products
Understanding your niche is crucial. It can give you hints on how your competition sells its products. You’ll learn more about the media they use most for their marketing efforts. This will show you where your customers are likely to be found. Plus, it’ll give you a hint about the market price.
All this information will help you build a better and more informed marketing strategy.
Great Photos Are a Must
Great photos for crafts to make and sell are really the first impression that you cannot afford to get wrong. Think about your target customers and what their interests are. What color themes will bring out the element you want to show? Your photos need to help your customers visualize themselves using the product.
Would it be useful to incorporate the tools of work in order to emphasize the handmade nature of your products? Or would you rather photograph it in the space that it might be used in?
All these are options that you can consider based on the nature of your product as well as your ideal target audience.
Market Your Crafts
After creating beautiful crafts, you need to get them out there in front of your potential customers if you want to sell. There are a number of options you can pick from. You have social media, for instance. Here you can pick Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter, it’ll depend on where your target audience spends most of their time.
When using social media, be social. Interact and engage your followers or anyone that will reach out. The beauty of promoting your crafts on social media is that you can do it for free if you don’t intend to spend a dime on marketing. Make use of hashtags to connect to a larger audience.
Another method you may use to advertise or put the word out is through pamphlets, this is especially if you want to focus your sales only on your local areas. Whatever you do, you need to market your crafts in order to sell.
Use Catchy Titles and Clear Descriptions
How are you going to describe your crafted products to customers?
Write clear titles and easy-to-read descriptions with keywords that people might use when searching for your kind of product. Give as much detail as possible but ensure not to get too wordy. This is very important if you intend to sell online either through social media or through platforms such as Etsy or Amazon.
It’s all about making your brand easy to find.
Packaging Plus Posting
The packaging is the first real physical contact of your customers with your products. It’s the first real physical impression.
Therefore, you should never underestimate the power of great packaging. You can use your packaging to say more about yourself. For instance, you can convey that you care about nature when you use eco-friendly – recyclable packaging.
Your values can also be communicated through packaging branding. This includes your logo, the images you use, your selling statement, etc.
So, even though posting and packaging can mean extra costs for you, it can make a huge difference if you ensure to give your customers a good experience. This involves timely delivery and delivering your products in the best possible conditions. As such, you should include these costs in your pricing to avoid going at a loss.
Once you include all the packaging and postage in the product pricing, you can then deliver your products to your customers for free. Meaning they will have a motive in plus to purchase. However, if including shipment costs is not a good idea for your products, ensure great packaging and efficient posting.
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Where Can I Sell My Crafts Online?
So, with all this important information out of the way, what are some easy crafts to make and sell?
Most Profitable Crafts to Sell. What Are Some Good Crafts to Make and Sell?
Tip – You can easily get tutorials for all of these crafts on YouTube or Google.
Home Décor Crafts
Cinnamon Stick Candles
For this, you’ll need unscented candles, cinnamon sticks, sisal twine, and hot glue. You can add ribbon and lace for extra aesthetics.
Use any color of candle depending on your choice or occasion. For instance, you can use a red candle for Valentine’s or a purple candle for a birthday. You can pick any color of ribbon to make a beautiful bow tie. Just remember to blend the colors to create an attractive thing.
Rustic Wood Magnets
For this, you will need a ruler, acrylic paint, small paintbrushes, a magnet roll, wood stain, hot glue, and a hot glue gun. Measure your wood into desired sizes e.g. 3-5 inches long and then smoothen the edges.
Stain them and use stencils or paint on them to give them a pretty look. Once the paint is dry, glue the magnet back on the wooden piece and enjoy your rustic wooden magnets. They would look good on any fridge.
Flying Cups
These flying cups and saucers give such a beautiful optical illusion. You’ll need a coffee cup and saucer, fake flowers, a couple of cable wires, hot glue, scissors, and wire cutters.
Bend the wires in such a way that it touches the inner wall of the cup. Using enough glue, stick it inside the cup, then when it dries, bend the wire and glue it on the saucer while ensuring the cup is stable.
Then glue the fake flowers to make a beautiful composition, starting from the bottom of the cup downwards. These would make any space beautiful.
Tobacco Basket
Tobacco baskets have a rich history that dates back to the 1800s. Back then people created them to keep tobacco off the floor. But human beings being so dynamic, these baskets found their way into homes as part of décor.
These items to make and sell are great and versatile and can be used in open shelving, fireplace mantels can be placed against a neutral background, or even as a centerpiece.
Their open-weave nature allows them to be anything you can imagine in your home and make for great crafts to make for sale.
Christmas Stocking
The above would make for easy Christmas crafts to make and sell. They’re easy and fun to create, even though they may be seasonal. Such items can easily be hung on walls, windows, Christmas trees, or almost anywhere. Get creative and craft unique socks and see how they sell during Christmas.
Paper Covered Pots
What are good crafts to make and sell if they don’t include paper-covered pots? These are favorites of many and would definitely make for a quick sale thanks to the ability to play around with colors that would suit both outdoor and indoor spaces.
You can try it out with the waste stash of papers around your house. Another option is to use tissue paper for this and still get great results of a beautiful décor piece.
Transfer Images on Cushions or Pillows
This is another example of many easy things you can make to sell that can be offered as a gift or be used for home décor. The variety of images you can use can go with the different seasons, from Christmas, Easter, birthdays, wedding anniversaries, and so on.
Pillows can be customized if your customer wants specific images of his own, e.g. family images. You just need to really master your art and the orders will bring themselves to you.
Hoop Wreath
A hoop wreath is a modern glam idea that anyone can use for home décor. When done well, hoop wreaths can be used inside the home to spice up boring walls and give life to dull hallways. Besides home décor, hoop wreaths are great for weddings and parties as well.
Get creative with the easily available supplies and create cool hoops.
Mason Jar Candles
These are some of the fastest-moving crafts to make and sell on Etsy, Amazon, and Pinterest. They’re easy and cheap to make and they’re loved by many people simply because mason jars never go wrong. You can spice your candles by scenting them with different flavors, using different colors, etc. The ideas never end.
DIY Lace Bowl
Lace doily bowls are delicate but beautiful bowls meant to hold tiny light items such as keys, earrings, rings trinkets, and things like candy. They’re pretty easy stuff to make and sell easily too. All you need is a doily, something to act as a mold such as a balloon, and a fabric stiffener. Since they’re cheap to create, they’re also cheap to sell and so they move fast. You can add glitters or splash them with paint for that extra vibe.
Wall Art Crafts
The paintings are great. But there are other cultural crafts out there that can be used as wall arts and are easy to craft. You can create cultural art wall décor that’s unique and distinct in taste. People are using dry twigs and leaves for art. Just spray paint them with gold, silver, rustic, or any color that would trend, and voila! You have a wall art no one can replicate.
Best Things to Make and Sell. Functional Crafts
Erase Menu Board
These are cute boards that can be hung around your house, and they’re super functional, especially for those people that are not very organized. Menu boards can be used for menu planning, to-do lists, cute messages, or simply things to remember. They’re also easy to craft and the required supplies are quite easy to get.
Tote Bag
What are good crafts to make and sell? Well, anything that can double as functional and as a home décor accessory is a great craft to make and sell.
Tote bags are cheap and excellent for shopping, especially in cities or countries that banned the use of plastic bags. The materials needed to create them are easily available and it’s one of the easiest crafts to make and sell even for first-timers.
Besides, they are super easy to ship since they can fit even in an envelope. So, go ahead and try these tote bags.
Etched Wooden Chopping Boards
If you’re considering creative wooden Christmas crafts to make and sell, then this is one perfect idea. You can etch beautiful messages that can outlast the Christmas season or customize them for other occasions such as weddings or anniversaries. This is a top seller on most online crafts platforms. Besides this, it’s easy to make and the materials are not out of reach.
Kitchen Utensil Wooden Box
Still on unique wooden crafts to make and sell, here is another brilliant idea. This farmhouse-style idea brings that retro feel to any kitchen and is a favorite just like the wooden chopping board. They can be ideal as gifts for any occasion. The bamboo tree is popular for this craft because of its natural shine and requires minimal work. Try it.
Mason Jar Soap Dispenser
This is easy to craft and gives a fresh aesthetic to a kitchen or bathroom. It’s cheap to make and since it’s a mason jar, then it’s an automatic hit when it comes to selling. Besides its functionality, it’s also a decorative accessory and can be crafted to fit in any space as the colors can be altered to suit the user.
Tic-Tac-Toe Board Game
You can create a travel game bag that would make for an excellent gift for kids. The tic-tac-toe game bag has a game board on the outside and it can carry the game pieces while traveling. It’s easy to make, would be easy to ship, and would also offer great margins.
Fringed Fleece Blanket
You can embellish so many things with yarn and it would look great, you can use a yard of micro-fiber fleece with a nice color of yarn fringe to give you that unique no-sew soft blanket. The secret is in attractive color combinations, and you can turn any fleece blanket into a fine throw with just added fringe. This is another easy craft and takes such little time to make.
Baby Caps
Baby caps are beautiful just like the persons they’re made for. Use warm beautiful colors. You may choose to use recycled material, as it would boost incredibly your profit margins. If this is not possible, you can get cheap but good-quality supplies and try these crafts to make and sell.
Travel Jewelry Fabric Case
There’s always a holiday around the corner. Thus, it’s always a perfect time to craft something that would be ideal for a holiday such as a cushy travel jewelry case. It’s a necessity that helps in organized packing for ladies that are keen on keeping their items in organized manner. Such fabric cases are ideal for overnight camping or even long trips.
Aprons
These are great crafts to make and sell for men, women, and even children. You can craft beautiful all-season aprons for barbeques, or you can give them a twist and make them convertible harvest and produce aprons. This dual-purpose will be a great selling point that will leave your potential buyers with no choice but to want to buy it.
Adjustable aprons mean they are crafted in such a way that they can be worn by someone six feet tall or be readjusted to fit a five-foot person. This apron will draw both indoor and outdoor chefs as well as garden harvesters.
Pet Toys
There are an estimated 80 million dogs within America alone, and an estimated $60 billion is spent on the pet industry every year. People love their pets and do not mind spending money to keep them happy and healthy.
Such spending is a good indicator for you, it shows a ready market for creative crafts, especially the eco-friendly types that are not necessarily mass-produced by companies. Consequently, you can recycle material within your reach and craft clever pet toys that you can sell online or even within your local area. A Google search will give you endless ideas on pet toys that you can create from recycled eco-friendly material.
Handmade Soap
Today, most people are keen on the safety of the products they’re using. They want to incorporate organic products into their lives. You can tap into this need by creating organic-based soap. Create your soap from scratch. It requires minimal capital to start, you can get many ideas on how to create it and remember to give it a good scent and great branding that clearly states it’s organic.
This soap would be perfect for a gift idea.
Customized Dinner Napkins
Customized napkins are a good idea for crafts to make and sell. You can use easily available and low-cost materials in a creative way using color and patterns to craft unique dinner napkins that would match with hand towels to encourage the buyer to make the purchase. These table accents may require basic sewing skills, but once you make them, they will make for a good sale.
Coasters
Coasters are quick crafts to sell locally or online. They’re popular because there’s no limit to the kind of material you can use to craft them. You can use wood, broken colored pencils, glass, fabrics, or even plastic.
To make things better, you can customize them to fit special seasons or occasions such as anniversaries or corporate events. Coasters can also be customized for corporate purposes as a means of promoting an organization’s agenda. Just let your imagination do the work.
Cat Tent
These cute crafts to make and sell are unique and sell quite fast. The materials you’ll need to use are easily available at a low cost and don’t require special skills to craft. You can customize them for different seasons, e.g. Christmas-themed.
You can also create them in various colors in order to blend with a variety of spaces. And for that final nudge to make the customer buy, you can offer further customization of different sizes and bespoke pet names.
Baby Blankets
Every parent wants something new and unique for his newborn. How about crafting monthly milestone cute blankets for sale? The internet is full of many ideas you can incorporate to make yours even more unique. Go ahead and craft them, they’re ideal for baby shower gifts as well as newborn gift ideas.
Hanging Shelf
Are there ever enough shelves anywhere? Shelves are super versatile; they can be hung in the kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom in the hallway, literally anywhere. All you need for this piece of art is a piece of popular wood, a drill, and strong twine. You can paint it in various colors to give your customers a choice.
Circle mirror
Here is another functional craft to make and sell because why not? Mirrors are always a welcome addition. They are chic and easy to craft. You just need a round mirror, a rope, a piece of wood, and yarn. You can paint them golden, silver, or even rustic, the choice will be yours, and what you’ll see selling most.
Nesting Desk Organizer
This is one of the most useful crafts to make because who doesn’t need a neat workstation? It’s ideal for keeping small items such as paper clips, makeup, hairbrushes, and so on in order. You can create them with a wooden tray or recycled material such as stiff cardboard.
Endless possibilities open in front of your creativity you can paint them, cover them in fabric, spray them, or use nail polish. You’re spoilt for choice on the kind of texture and look you can give them to fit into different spaces.
No Sew Quilt
What are good crafts to make and sell if you don’t want to sew? Here is a craft you can make without a sewing machine. All you need are beautiful fabrics and your creativity. You can make beautiful baby quilts or multipurpose quilts using various fabric textures and colors in order to offer more than one type.
These easy handmade crafts are great for gifting babies as well as anyone who would want to spoil a loved one with a unique quilt.
Homemade Dog Biscuits
Remember the dog statistics above? They are still a motivator to keep tapping into this market with different crafts to make and sell, and this time you can bake homemade dog biscuits. In the same way people are concerned about their health, they care for the health of their pets too. You can use organic ingredients to make healthy dog food and this would boost your sales.
You can sell it in your local area shops and online.
Time Out Stool
With soda bottles, pieces of wood, and nails (and a few other options to pick from) you can easily create this functional, cute, and playful time-out stool that would be of great help to many parents out there. Adorned with an hourglass feature, it can also encourage timed disciplinary conversations adding to the functionality of the stool. This is one of the best ideas for crafts to make and sell, no doubt.
Seatbelt Pillow
This is another winner in the gallery of the best crafts to make and sell. Safety and comfort are what every parent desires for his children. When in the car, kids can easily get strained necks and shoulders due to discomfort caused by the seat belt. But you can offer the solution to this and make money.
These seatbelt pillows measure around 4’’ wide and 25’’ in length, you can stuff them with fiber and shredded foam, and you can then cover them in fleece fabric to keep them warm and soft even for the younger kids. You then can use Velcro tabs to tie them around the seat belt in order to avoid interfering with the functionality of the seat belt.
Crafts like these solving such problems sell very well, especially when marketed properly.
Pacifier Clips
These are excellent crafts to make and sell because they’re not only easy to make but also very useful to the users. Parents can get tired of having to look for where the pacifier fell, and with this clip, that won’t be a problem anymore. Thus, besides being super easy and cheap to craft, they sell quickly.
Cushy Tablet Cover with Zipper
Expensive electronic gadgets are popular with people nowadays. Some of them require one to spend extra cash to buy expensive cases to keep them safe. You can leverage this by crafting pretty, unique, and functional covers for gadgets such as tablets or the Kindle book reader and selling them cheaper than the manufactured options and making money.
You can use different fabrics with different colors; add some straps in some covers to give the user the option of hanging them around the neck or shoulder. It’s about your creativity. But the market sure is there.
Top Selling Crafts. Fashion & Self Care
Milk Bath
Baths have gone beyond bubbles only, there are oils and teas but the newest addition to this blend is the milk bath. It contains powdered milk, mineral salts, baking soda, and essential oils mainly. For something extra, you can throw in some dried flowers.
A milk bath is growing in popularity, but you need to remember that it requires waterproof packing, plus your branding needs to be spot on to be able to draw your customers’ attention and effectively give confidence about the content of your products. You need to indicate all the ingredients in your labeling. Keep it stylish, some of these products are purchased for gifting purposes and this means they need to have the necessary appeal.
Reversible Headband
These are great crafts to make and sell because they’re easy to craft, the materials needed are even easier to find and they can be sewn or not. The tutorials on how to make them are more than numerous.
Headbands are great for any time. You can create double-sided headbands with one side a holiday print while the other side something more calm and universal. This allows you to test with animal prints, polka-dotted fabrics, the use of shiny fabrics, and so on.
Eyeglass/ Sun Glass Case
This falls in the category of the simplest crafts to make and sell. They’re cute, really low cost, and easy to sell. If you have leftover fabrics or even clothes that you no longer wear but are made with beautiful fabrics, you can easily use them to craft these sunglass cases.
You can use fun printed colors or plain colors that you can embroider or add shiny stick-on faux diamonds and so on. It’s all about making them unique and irresistible.
Infinity Scarf
This is another fun craft to create, you can crotchet it or knit it or use fabrics to create one. You can use a single color, two, or even more, the possibilities are endless. Try this stylish accessory and make money from it.
Leather Bow Belt
This is an adjustable bow that can be used with nearly any belt. You just need to have a variety of sizes to fit more categories of belts. Leather is a popular option. But if you can’t get good affordable leather, you can use different fabrics to make pretty bows for belts.
Necklace Display Stand
This is a sought-after item, especially by people that sell necklaces. You can create them with these people as your target market. But if necklaces are the crafts you make and sell, then you’ll not need to buy a stand you can simply create yours and save up on costs. Also, these come in handy when selling scarves and you don’t want to use models, just hang them and sell them.
Bath Salts
With such busy lives, people are intentional about doing some good self-care. And bath salts are a key ingredient in most people’s self-care routine. Therefore homemade bath salts are such a hit in crafts to make and sell.
The reason homemade salts are preferred is that most people prefer the all-natural ingredients that most makers use. The Himalayan sea salt and different flavors such as grapefruit, lavender, or any other flavor variants are almost all you need for these crafts. The purpose of flavors is to give your customers a choice to pick from.
Bath salts are soothing and look good sitting in your bathroom. If you package them beautifully, they’ll easily sell as gifts, and you need this to boost your sales.
Sugar Body Scrubs
This is another easy craft that can earn you easy money. Just like natural bath salts, these sugar scrubs are all-natural and eco-friendly. How does sugar scrub work? Glycolic acid appears naturally in sugar and is an excellent skin cleanser as it does a great job of dissolving dead skin cells. At the same time, it’s gentle on the skin.
Sugar body scrubs are easy crafts to make and sell, all you need besides the granulated sugar is an oil base such as sweet almond oil, jojoba oil, avocado oil, and so on. You can create different variants using different oils since they all perform different functions on the skin.
Ruffled Scarves
Crafting with ribbon yarn or ruffle is easy and fun and you get quick results. You just need to identify the best ribbon yarn for scarves, and you’ll be on the way to earning money with these crafts to make and sell.
Ruffle scarves are also fun to wear, as they add a warm and soft aesthetic to the wearer. They’re an evergreen kind of trend, meaning they’re always trendy. Check out various tutorials on YouTube and pick the ones that you can start with, and you’ll only get better as you go. You can use various color combinations and patterns to make yours super unique.
Digital Crafts
What are some easy crafts to make and sell without too much hassle? Digital printable crafts to make and sell are quite many and are an excellent way to earn some dough without too much work. And one reason they’re great is that you create them once, but they can earn you money for months or years as you put your feet up.
You can craft digital products on just about any topic. However, there are some categories that are better than others especially if you’re doing this to make some money. Here are some of the most popular and year-round suggestions:
Profitable Crafts. Printable Crafts for Kids
Coloring Pages
These are great for all ages, you can create them according to age, for instance, smaller kids would enjoy coloring fruits or pets, older kids would enjoy coloring their favorite cartoon characters, and so on.
Flash Cards
These are excellent things to make to sell because they’re a fun way to get kids to learn new stuff. You can create numbers of cards, shape cards, alphabet cards, sight words, and alike.
Chore and Reward Chart
What better way to motivate kids to be responsible than through a weekly chore and reward chart? You can create this to help parents teach their kids routine and accountability.
Holiday Worksheets
These crafts to make and sell are meant to help kids remember what they’ve learned and can be extremely useful, especially during the summer holiday. It would be a useful tool to bridge that long gap. You can include counting, reading practice, or any relevant school content that would be useful for kids.
Wedding Printable Crafts
Bachelor/Bachelorette Party Games
You can create some really fun games that would be applicable to either a bachelor’s party or the bachelorette party. The more fun the better the potential for sales.
Labels for Wedding Favors
You can design some stickers or tags that can be used on candles, wine bottles, or any other wedding accessories. After all, weddings can be expensive and most people will look for ways to cut costs without compromising the wedding. These crafts to make and sell would save them on wedding favors.
Table Numbers
Wedding planners would like this a lot, it helps with guests’ seating arrangements. When done elegantly and with extra details such as thoughtful quotes, these table numbers would add fun to the celebration and money for you.
Planners
Household Planner
This can be helpful around the home to help everyone with their time management, to-do list e.g. chores for everyone, and so on.
Meal Planners
Everyone could use a meal planner to ease the hectic life that most people live daily. This printable meal planner can help people organize themselves better by planning ahead and it helps in creating shopping lists. So, go ahead and create a unique meal planner.
Finance Planner
Finance planners are another perfect digital craft to make and sell as they help people put all their financial data in a single place. You can include bill payment calendars, monthly budgets, savings logs, spending trackers, and so on.
Final Thoughts
You may have crafted something before or maybe feeding an inner desire to do something new that you have definitely never tried before. Wherever you are on this journey, the above list of crafts to make and sell is ideal for anyone, anywhere.
Some can be started immediately while others need a little low-cost investment in terms of supplies needed. The possibilities are endless, get inspired and try something today. Just remember to use all the tips for marketing your crafts and you’ll be on another inspirational journey.
