When it comes to shipping your hand made crafts, you need to look into delivery methods that are both practical and safe. After all, your customers will be none too happy if your carefully crafted item arrives at its destination in many pieces instead of whole. To that end, try to get some advice from others who have been in the craft business longer than you have. Find out what supplies they use to ship their goods and what shipping options they offer to their customers. In addition, find out whether they only ship locally, within the same country or do they ship overseas to international customers.
If you are just starting out on your hand made crafts journey, international orders may not be of immediate concern to you. Nevertheless, it could well be something that you need to consider in the future as your business expands and becomes more successful.
If you design and sell hand made crafts that are breakable, such as ceramics or pottery, then you need to think even more carefully, about how you will ship your wares to customers. Buying good quality cardboard boxes of varying sizes and then carefully wrapping your items in bubble wrap or with tissue paper and in some case both is an excellent idea to help ensure that the product makes it safely to its destination and nothing is broken when it arrives.
Shipping through the postal service is usually a safe means of transport and you can set things up so you can send to customers either by way of first class mail, priority, express or regular mail. In some cases, you might even want to have your hand made crafts delivered by a courier service.
Generally, first class mail will take in the region of five to ten business days to arrive. Priority post will take three to four business days while express mail will take only one to two business days to arrive. While first class and priority mail does not offer a guaranteed delivery time, express post normally offers delivery within a set period. Insurance can be purchased as an optional extra for most postal services and in some cases, orders with a value of $100 or more must carry with them a certain amount of insurance.
When you are first starting out, shipping options and shipping costs probably will not be a problem you encounter very often. Customers at craft shows or flea markets will simply buy your crafts as is and take them away with them after they have been paid for. However, as your business grows, this is one question that will become increasingly common and something you will need to address. You might meet potential customers who like your crafts and would like to have one or more pieces sent to family or friends in other parts of the country, or even other parts of the world for gifts. This is very likely, particularly when it comes to seasonal craft shows such as those that take place on or near Christmas or Easter time.
In order to keep shipping costs low, you might be able to find a company that can sell you packaging supplies in bulk. Not only will this reduce your costs significantly but also save a lot of time by not having to go out and purchase individual materials to ship your merchandise each time.
You should give top priority to making sure that the work that you put so much time and effort into arrives safely and in one piece to its new home. Always use the utmost care in deciding both the type of packaging materials you will use to ship your hand made crafts in addition to the shipping methods you will make available to folks interested in your work. Keep your financial needs in mind always but also try to be flexible in accommodating customers whenever possible.