Why creating a collection is crucial for your creative business

Creating a collection is one of the most important decisions you can make as a creative. It will really help to make your business more sustainable, both financially and emotionally! It’s often the moment that your ‘hobby’ mindset will turn into a creative business mindset.

Why is creating a collection so crucial?

Many creatives love creating!

And creating some more … and some more … and some more! (Am I right? Yes, I am talking to you!)

I often see (mostly new, but not exclusively so) creatives who spend most of their time designing and creating more products. Often more than 80% of their time is spent on creating work. And then they wonder why they aren’t selling enough?

Of course, creating new products is what you love doing! Very often that’s why you started your creative business. It’s what you know how to do.

It’s very rare that a craft or design graduate learns basic business skills, so it’s not really a surprise that they focus on making to get their business off the ground.

what many new creatives do instead of creating a collection …

• New creatives will mostly create products that they love themselves without any basic market research around pricing or if anybody is actually interested or might like to buy their products.
• They post product images on their website or Etsy shop when they are finished, not properly launching them, creating a buzz or doing any marketing, and at a time that suits them, rather than when their clients are most likely to buy.
• They often keep adding more and more products as they go, creating an ever-growing collection of products. Even, or sometimes especially (!), if they don’t sell much they keep adding more and more … creating an enormous monster of a collection.

This is very, very common practice. But of course very unsustainable in the long term.

Creating a small, but a well-thought-out collection of 5 – 8 products that work well together is one of the most important actions you can take if you want to be a successful designer maker or creative business owner.

Why creating a collection is crucial for your creative business

I already gave you some hints earlier on. It will help you and your business in many different aspects of your creative business:

1. Get strategic & stop juggling too much

Of course … it is very tempting to create something immediately when an idea pops into your head!

But if you do even a little bit of research into what your dream clients really want and need, when they are most likely to buy and how much they want to pay (even vaguely) then you can save yourself a lot of time, money and stress creating unwanted products.

Being more strategic and taking a bit of time to plan can help your business in many ways:

1. If you plan ahead you will quickly see when the best times are in the year to do your research and development, when to create new products, and when to launch them. Most of my creative product clients sell the majority of their products in the 12 weeks before Christmas. So if you take that as a starting point then you can work backwards to identify when you need to launch, photograph, create and design your products. Instead of being overwhelmed and juggle making, marketing and calling suppliers at any one time, you can group your activities together more efficiently and effectively during specific periods of the year.
2. If you take the time to research your dream clients, their needs and wants, then you can develop creative solutions with more interesting product ideas that your clients will be interested in. Instead of producing just another printed cushion with a fox or a towel with an owl (ouch!), you start creating products or services that fit your clients’ lives and lifestyles … design richly embroidered bolster cushions for a lavish bedroom, or design a large and sturdy floor cushion for a family living room in trendy colours.
3. Instead of having to think about ‘what comes next’, you will know what your clients are looking for. And once they have bought from you, your clients will often come back again and again. And that’s what you need to build a successful creative business.
4. If you need to outsource production then it will often work out cheaper if you get a larger order together in one go rather than ordering many times a year. Most manufacturers won’t accept small orders anyway.
5. Work with the flow of the market to sell more and much easier. Launching new collections properly during key buying periods (such as September for Christmas) will add more buzz and excitement (not least for yourself!) and can attract much more (buyers’ and press) attention than adding new items throughout the year.

So creating a collection is crucial for your own sanity and to make your life as a creative business owner much easier and efficient.

Creating a collection also helps with selling yourself when going out into the world.

2. Create a clear story & launch a confident brand

A small but focused collection revolving around a singular concept or theme will express your style and story in a much more confident and attractive way.

• A focused group of creative products will express your talents better and attract buyers. Having loads of different products or styles will often confuse potential buyers, and that will cost you a lot of time, money and energy.
• A well-curated collection of items will create a more attractive display – in a shop, but also online or at a selling event. It’s easier to brand a collection and to tell your story and express your values through related colours, materials, and visual themes.
• It’s also easier to ‘up sell’ within a collection and to get customers interested in the more expensive pieces or to sell two products at once (think about a necklace and earrings that are bought together or two different sized bowls). Also if your clients like one product in your collection, they might come back for more later on, or they might put your products on their wish list for their next birthday or Christmas.

Creating collections creates collectors and fans of your work.

Not surprising then that most shops and galleries love collections!

Retailers are far more inclined to purchase products or an entire collection than one-offs because they can display them together more effectively in their crowded retail space. One-off items very often ‘disappear’ in a crowded retail environment.

It is rare for a larger retailer to purchase one-offs, as they don’t want too many very small suppliers for administrative reasons.

summing up why creating a collection is crucial for your creative business to succeed:

• Internally it will help you to make the most of your limited time, money and energy. It’s about working with the market flow and launching your creative products at the right time so that you are more likely to sell.
• Externally it will help you to create a more confident brand, tell your product story, get noticed and get more repeat orders.

Did you find this blog post on why creating a collection is so important useful for you? Did it give you broader ideas?

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