machine vs. hand sewing

I prefer to sew by hand with my appliques. I like the look and the portability. However, I see the problems with hand sewing...its slow, if you don't know what a perfectionist I am you might think the sewing is not as sturdy as with a machine and tying knots by hand is a pain. STILL with all that I like the look of a running stitch, something you can not do with a sewing machine.

Regardless, one way to decrease my base cost for wholesale items is to give sewing the design on a machine a try. I decided to start with a left-over cupcake I had on a reject onesie. I already had a hand sewn cupcake that is being shipped tomorrow to compare with. (please note the cupcake top is misshapen and was a reject item)

So let's start with the cupcake sewn by hand. Probably my fastest item to sew by hand, taking about 45 to 50min.

the stitching on the base of the cupcake is what takes the most time on this design.

Now I went ahead and stitched one on the machine. In the end I had to sew the heart by hand. It was faster and looked better when I did it by hand. I believe that stitching on the machine saved me about 12-15 min on this particular design. I used the loosest straight stitch I could trying to get a similar look to by hand...still you will never get the spacing between the stitches. Sewing machines just don't work that way.
Here is the machine one (remember...reject cupcake top)

even though this one was done with a machine it looks less professional to me...however, that might be my personal bias. If I had never seen my hand stitched ones I would think it looks cute, although lopsided.

and now for the side by side photo:
so I think I could offer the hand stitched one for $9 and the machine one for $7 each.
Next up is the bird experiment.

leave a facebook comment if you have any thoughts on this pricing/sewing dilemma issue.

wholesale mussings

I'm talking more with the women who is interested in wholesaling my items. I'm not going to mention the shop yet in case it doesn't go though. After chatting with a acquaintance who has had success with her crafting and is a pro at the wholesale thing I was in a better position to contact the shop interested in me.

Michelle, my mentor in the expansion game, had several suggestions for me. First she said that I will need to sell my stuff for less to the wholesale people than I do on etsy. The wholesale people need to feel that they are competitive with my online prices. One thing that she suggested was to up my price (online) by $1 right now and another $1 each time I get a wholesale deal. She also suggested that I set a minimum price amount that the wholesale lady needs to reach (she suggested $100).

I have thought about raising my prices....I wish my sales were more consistent, they come in spurts so I start worrying that if I go higher I won't sell. However, in person I raised my price to $14 for the winter craft fairs and I still did ok. I worry about raising my price too much on etsy because shipping costs already raise the price. I could raise my upfront price and use free shipping or I can raise my upfront price and my shipping price or I can raise my shipping price.

If I were to raise my upfront price one dollar each onesie would be $13. too bad I am incredibly afraid/paranoid about the number 13. I know it seems silly but you smash your kneecap, femur and tibia on a Friday the 13th when you are 13 years old and then tell me how you feel about the number 13.

So I think I will raise my base price by .50 and my shipping price by .50 and bada bing one dollar increase. It should be pretty easy to do as I already raised shipping on a few items by .50 and forgot about it an never did the others.

So now my base cost is $12.50 and my shipping is $2.50 giving us a total cost of $15. Michelle said I should not go below paying myself min wage...$8.75 in Oregon. My short sleeve onesies cost me $1.50 each and the long sleeve $2.00 each. I will only wholesale short sleeve. Some of my designs take about an hour to cut and sew...like the bird and cupcake....others like the rocket ship and fox take close to two hours. So I need to stick with simpler designs for wholesale.

Let's use the bird. The bird takes an hour to sew at $8.75 + $1.50 for the onesie = $10.25. Michelle suggested that I offer to sell my stuff at $9 a item and remind the shop that I have my items prices really low. So we have a $1.25 deficit. The question is can I start doing a combination of hand and machine sewing to cut down a bit on the time it takes to make the onesie but still get the look I go for? I feel like I'm cheating...but most people buy my items because they like the designs, although I think the running stitch adds to the look. Perhaps I can do layering with the machine and outline stitching by hand. I am going to start by trying to make the stitching on the cupcake bottom with the machine set at a longer stitch and then hand sew it onto the onesie. I'll post a comparison later on and update what the wholesale lady has to say in response to my email... as follows below:)

Thank you so much for your interest. I would love to know more about your boutique. Do you have a website I could visit? I have not done wholesale yet, as I have been focusing on building a customer base since July. Since I have been starting out with Etsy I have priced my items low seeing that I hand cut and stitch everything. I know usually when sellers do wholesale orders they sell their items for less than their Etsy price. Some of my designs take far more time to sew while others. I feel I have several designs I can stitch in a reasonable amount of time that wholesale pricing would be possible. I would love to know what types of arrangements you have with other people you work with and learn more about your shop. I look forward to hearing back from you!
Suzanne:)

flood of orders

I got NO orders the first three and half weeks of this month. I started to worry that no one wanted my onesies anymore....maybe my good luck before x-mass was over. Then wouldn't you know it I have made 10 sales in the last three days! It started with a friend wanting some onesies for her niece. I went on to my esty shop to remove one of the onesies from online and though...heck I'll renew a couple items while I'm at it. When I went to re-new them I though...hum the exposure on these photos looks a little off, might as well take a moment and fix them. So I took about 10 to fix the four photos and renewed the items and figure, "well there goes .80 down the drain." I guess renewing worked though because I sold sold three of those items the same day that I renewed them. Well...I might as well re-list them I though. The next day I sold two more items. This morning I figured my luck must have run out but I should at least re-list the sold items. Well low and behold I sold 3 more onesies and have gotten several emails about coustom orders and even someone wanting me to wholesale my stuff to her botique! Holly cr*p! I need to look into the whole wholesale order thing. I'm not sure how much lower I can drop my prices below what I already sell my stuff for. Is more sucess around the cornor? could I make enough money doing this that I can stop teaching full time, sub and work on my stuff. I hope so becasue I don't think I can work full time and sew fast enough to fill all these orders without having to switch to machine sewing...ewwwww.

rosettes

I'm really enjoying making new hair rosette accessory for my etsy shop. As much as I love the idea of having a separate Sweet Saffron shop I believe I need to list my stuff in my primary shop. I read on etsy that soon they will allow you to control both shops from one account...maybe this merge will allow people to see my positive feedback better. Till then I'll just say all my flowers are Sweet Saffron for Apples love oranges.

My views on my kids headbands were slow coming but are starting to build. I wonder how my adult/teen stuff will do. For now I am just enjoying making them and playing with the color pallets. If nothing else I think they will be good to take to craft shows and last Thursday.

It is so exciting to play around with the colors available to me in monochromatic, analogous and complimentary color combination. Then it is fun to name them. I am trying to go with color pallets that are inspired by the Oregon landscape.

So far I have:
June berry: raspberry, strawberry and blackberry colored rosettes.

Moss and Ivy: inspired by a walk in the temperate rain forest's of the Pac NW, shades of green and a touch of brown.

Storm Warming : inspired by storm watching at the Oregon Coast. Stormy Sky's, steal gray waves, turquoise sea glass, the power and fascination of the open ocean. Blues, gray and a touch of teal.

Jewel Box: inspired by the colors of India. Saffron yellow, a peacock turquoise, elephant gray and tropical pink. If I had a Sari I would want it in these colors.

Antique Rose: A late spring day in the Portland Rose garden. Antique, dusty rose or mauve color with one accent moss green.

Terra Firma: The colors of the earth. Goldenrod yellow, rust orange, chocolate brown, river rock gray.

The Aurora: all red and crystals. Makes me think of princesses Aurora pricking her finger on the spinning wheel and a drop of blood falling on crystalline snow...I suppose I could call it true blood if I wanted to go with the vampire thing..

Still to come...
lets do something vampire like so I'll do the
True Blood in red, black and gray

River rock: white, black and gray

June Bride: White, white and white with pearls, crystals and a bit of tulle

Bruised Ego: purple and blacks

Two paths in the woods

I'm trying to separate my blogging about my classroom and my blogging about my etsy shop and crafting. This side will be for etsy. However I can not get the layout right to save my life. ARGG