Wholesaling Handmade Buttons

Is actually turning out to be harder than I thought it would be!

Part of the problem, I think, is that many sellers are already pricing their handmade items at wholesale prices. As well as selling commercially made items, I do actually sell handmades. Sometimes. I see a lot of people get confused about pricing, but really, it is easy.

Cost of materials + your hourly wage/overheads x time taken + % profit = wholesale
Wholesale price x N = retail, N being the markup. I double it, but everyone has their own preference. For those making small, repeatable items, you can scale up depending on order size.

Really. Not that hard.

The point about selling wholesale is that the person buying large quantities is going to be doing a lot of the work for you. They're not trying to get rich off the fruits of your labour. Really. They will have a shop to maintain, or a website to host. They need to promote, store, package and post your items. They will need to advertise. Not on free PW blogs that have a handful of readers, but targetted advertising that will bring in lots of customers. And, with all of this, they still need to have their business profitable in order to support the artisans who supply the store, increase product range and pay the bills.

Granted, not everyone is trying to run a business. For some it is a hobby, a fun pastime that brings in a bit of money. Fine. But wouldn't it be nice to actually make a bit of money?

Try pricing for retail. You might even end up selling more.