I am selling knitting & croched items. How should I price my items?

Question

I am selling things such as scarves, purses, bags, bookmarks, pencil cases, etc........ Does anyone have any tips and/or suggestions????? Thanks

Answer 1

What age market are you planning to sell to? That will make a big difference. If you are a young person, selling to friends, etc,. then realize that you are not going to be able to price your items high enough to cover your time and cost. Teens just are not interested in spending $$$$ on handcrafted items.

Generally, knitted items are sold either in craft fair environments, or specialty stores that will carry very trendy purses, scarves, etc. You have to charge enough to cover the cost of your materials and then calculate some value of your time.

And, the items you make need to be unique. If they look like something that could be bought at Walmart for $5.00, why would anyone want to be it from you for more?

I knit, and have often had co-workers ooh and ahh over my vests, scarves, socks. But when they ask me to make them something, after I let them know what the yarn cost ALONE would be, they quickly say forget it. People who do not knit have no idea what nice yarn costs.

Answer 2

Study your competition. Check out ebay (completed listings) and etsy and see what other people are getting for the same types of things. If you are planning on selling locally at craft shows go visit some and see what the going price is for similar items. You should at least double the cost of materials.

Most of being successful in crafting is marketing. I sell handspun yarn on my website and in yarn shops around the country. My stuff is really, really expensive. But I make speciality, designer yarn and very few people make anything like it. Therefore I can charge a very high price for my stuff. If I were spinning regular, worsted weight two ply yarn, no matter how beautiful it would be I wouldn't be able to make any money doing it. The only way I can make money is to have a very unique product.

If you want to just make enough money to buy more supplies, then double your cost of supplies is a good rule of thumb. If you want to make a living doing this, you will need to do a lot of research and find a niche that is untapped.

There are tons of people spending money on handmade items right now. You just need to go find them.

Good luck!!!

Answer 3

I know the love that goes into a hand knitted item, I could never put a price or should i say a reasonable price because of the time and effort involved. I love to give items i've knitted as gifts but no sane person would pay what I think there are worth. Good Luck, let me know how this works for you. mary alice/Georgia

Answer 4

Well, at least you should make up for the materials used.
otherwise, counting how much time you spent and materials used at the federal wage standard can get pretty pricey. for example, I knitted a hat recently, it used approx 2U.s. dollars worth of worsted weight acrylic and was about two days worth of work, so 18 hours. standard wage in the u.s is about five dollars. so, by this reasoning, I should part with this hat for about 95 usd. The most I'd make anyone pay for it is 20, probably more if it was made of wool or some other natural/nicer fiber.

so really , to price, you should ask yourself, or other people, what they would be willing to pay for it.

(knitted items do not go out of style, after all everyone either, wears socks, t-shirts, or has a favorite sweater)(all knitted items)(although I wouldn't want to knit myself a t-shirt or a sweater by hand, I am knitting myself a pair of socks)

oh, just thought of something, do you know it violates copyright to sell knitted items of other peoples patterns? I think you can knit them on comission, though. And I'm not really sure about either of these. but just know to check on this before trying it or to ask the designer.

Answer 5

How To Price Crochet Items

Answer 6

i think that the longer it took you to make the product or the harder it was, the more expensive it should be. also, add up all the costs of materials and such, the price should be more than that so that you can make a profit. hope you sell a lot!

Answer 7

Figure what you paid for materials then a reasonable price for your labor. Let's face it, from one crocheter/knitter to another, we will never get the price we want. And to the person that says our art is outdated, that may be the case in their opinion but I see our craft crossing over into high fashion. Sounds like a hater is on the loose! :) Keep on doing your thang and much success on your work.

Answer 8

A good rule of thumb is 3 times the cost of materials, plus actual cost for packing materielas and postage. Then, if the item is very unusual or hard to make, double it again.

Unfortunately if it is something that is easy to make, you will be lucky to recover the cost of the yarn.

Answer 9

Knitted and crocheted items are VERY in style.

Here's a website that people can sell and buy handmade stuff from, you can look there and get some ideas, or even sell your stuff too!!!

http://www.etsy.com/

Happy knitting and crocheting!!!

Answer 10

I think you should multiply the price of suplies times 1/2 of the number of hours it took.