You wanna open an art or craft studio business, but wondering... how do I get started?
In this video I'm chatting with Christy Nelson, the owner of Makit Takit, a drop-in craft studio in Lincoln, Nebraska.
She's been running her craft studio business since 2016, and it's expanded to include craft classes & parties, an annual maker market, business mentoring & retreats, and a grown-up craft camp called Makit Together.
Christy shares insights on running a craft studio business, including the business model, revenue streams, and lessons learned. She emphasizes the importance of flexibility, market research, and understanding the financial costs involved.
Takeaways
Running a craft studio business involves providing a service-based experience for customers to create crafts and selling related supplies.
Revenue streams can include drop-in craft sessions, classes, camps, birthday parties, and retail sales.
Lessons learned include the importance of flexibility, market research, and being open to different customer demographics.
Consider the financial costs of payroll, rent, inventory, credit card processing fees, and marketing when planning a craft studio business.
Franchising may limit creativity and freedom, so starting your own brand within the local community is recommended.
Christy Nelson offers business mentoring for entrepreneurs interested in starting a craft studio business.
Christy is the creative business owner of Makit Takit, a drop-in craft studio in Lincoln, Nebraska.
A true boss, Christy enjoys the strategic business planning as much as making things. This has led to her expanding her business to include a mobile pop-up splatter unit, a yearly maker market, business mentoring/retreats, and a grown-up craft camp called Makit Together.
She loves to travel, drink Diet Dr. Pepper, and go to therapy. She has a husband, two grown children, and her mom is her biggest fan.
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:
Mallory
You have been running a craft studio business for a number of years now. I would love to first off kind of talk about like what that business looks like for somebody who may love making crafts, love teaching crafts, but is not sure like what the actual business entails.
Can kind of talk us through the craft studio business model and kind of how you got started with this?
Christy Nelson
Sure, there are a lot of different ways that you can run a craft studio. I'm going to talk about the way I do it and maybe give a few examples of some others that I know of.
My studio is basically run as a drop-in craft studio. So we have all the tools and supplies for people to come in. So it's a service-based but also product because they are coming in and making a product.
Mallory
Yeah, so it sounds like you're making money in a couple of different ways, right? You're making money from people paying you for art classes and from selling the supplies for the classes.
Christy Nelson
Yes. Well, they can come in and pick a project and we have everything for them to make that project. They pay me for basically that service and all of the things included. So it's just a way for people to come in, have a little fun, make something, and we can help them do that.
In my studio, we also do classes, camps, birthday parties. You know, there are a lot of different revenue streams that you kind of need to have for a business like this.
We added retail after the pandemic. That was something that we hadn't really been into before. But now that's a really big part of our revenue now. So that was a nice little pivot. But most craft studios have some component of either instruction, education, and some sort of way to create.
Some people do strictly "come in and we're making this specific thing today." Or some are a little more open-ended but mine we have set projects. They change over time but everybody knows that you're gonna find some things to paint, you're gonna find some things to do with yarn, you're gonna find button art, you're gonna find metal stamping, wood burning. We have our specific things that we do, so everybody knows that they're gonna be able to find something to make.
Mallory
How did you get started in this business and how long have you been doing this business? If people are thinking about this as a potential career path, what should they expect from your experience?
Christy Nelson
Right. Okay, so I started this business in 2016. So I'm in my eighth year going on nine.
Basically, it was something that I had been thinking about for a very long time. And I had been close to opening something similar in 2010 with a business partner and my business partner ended up moving and I wasn't in a position to do it on my own at that time. I had young children and it was just not a great time for me to be opening a business. So in 2016, I had just turned 40 and I was like, you know, if I'm going to do this, I just need to do this. And so I did.
In the past, I had been a craft blogger. So I was kind of in that industry a little bit. I had been to the trade shows. I had been working with brands and doing some of those kind of collaborations and things with their products and supplies. I just had access to all of these tools and maybe it wasn't like my jam to do something but I wanted people to be able to come in and experience a whole lot of different types of crafting or arting or whatever however you want to say it. I wanted them to be able to experience all those things so then they can decide you know like... "do I really want to get into metal stamping? Or did I just want to make one thing?"
Because I think a lot of us, especially, I'm very neuro-spicy. So when you get to that stage where you're just collecting and collecting all these crafts, is that really sustainable? Do I really need $100 worth of whatever to make this one Pinterest project?
So that was kind of like my impetus for starting the store. I was like, I want people to be able to come in. They don't have to buy a $20 pack of whatever. They can get one thing from us to make their project and be successful and be happy. And then if they want to invest in becoming a master metal stamper or whatever, then they can do that.
I wanted to give people this entry into hobbies, an entry into crafts, and trying to find out what they love. So that's what I did.
Mallory
Yeah, that's awesome. So what are some of the lessons that you learned the hard way through starting this business or maybe mistakes that you made? Or I also know that you do some mentoring for other people who are starting these types of businesses. So maybe you've seen other people make mistakes that you had sort of worn against.
Christy Nelson
Some of the biggest mistakes I made... Well, at the beginning, I think I should have started maybe a little smaller.
I also made mistakes where (this is somewhat embarrassing now because my business is based so much on children), but I didn't allow children. When I first opened, I was like "ages 10 and up only." And now my biggest, my biggest customers, like the age range is like eight to 12. They love my store.
But the good thing with a craft studio is you can pivot. Like I wasn't locked into a lot of things. Like my store was such that I could change out projects. I could bring in different instructors. So that was something that I learned early on that you have to be really flexible and see what the market will bear.
I realized really quickly that grownups don't typically invest in themselves in taking classes or just general enjoyment, which I think is a mistake (that I'm trying to remedy), but I realized that the adults were more likely to invest in their children. And so I was losing out on a huge market by not opening up the age ranges.
And at first I was just scared because I was like, I don't want little kids in here with scissors and whatever, all of my tools and just messing everything... But it turns out that the adults are just as bad about ruining tools and things than children. So anyway, that was one of my early mistakes early on was just not opening myself up to more customers.
Another thing was I probably got into a lease too soon.
Mallory
When you're advising people who want to start one of these craft studio businesses, I know that you are very strategic and like me, I love to think about big picture business plan, stuff like that. What do you advise in that regard with somebody just at the very beginning idea stages of this?
Christy Nelson
I have what I call a business plan bootcamp and we talk about just all of the strategy that needs to be involved with starting a business.
A lot of the people who would like to start a business like this are usually very creative and might not have the best business sense. And you can learn business just like you can learn creativity.
So I just like to make sure that the people who want to do something like this understand that it is very much a business and you're not just going to sit around and make things all day, which, you know, if you're getting into this business for that, I don't recommend it.
Usually in this business plan boot camp or just even strategy sessions that I hold with people who are interested in opening creative studios like this, I like to discuss the parts that aren't so fun.
You need to do market research. Can your community even handle a business like this? Are there enough people who are interested? Do you have competition?
I like to let people know that it is a business first and foremost, even though it's a really fun business to be in.
Mallory
You mentioned wishing that you had started a little smaller or maybe not jumping into a lease as soon. This is something that years ago, I was advising a friend of mine who was opening up a brick and store (and now they have it) but early on I was like, "Can you find ways to test this? Doing little pop-ups at relevant local events and partnering with other local organizations and people who will become your customers and sort of building it up that way?"
Christy Nelson
Yeah, so you want to kind of build that social proof or make yourself be an expert in the community.
A brick and mortar does provide that level of, you know, supposed expertise to people. It kind of gives you some credibility that you might not have if you're just like at a vendor fair and trying to get people to do stuff or whatever.
There is that benefit from a brick and mortar, but I don't think the cost of the lease makes up for that benefit at first. So building up a customer base is always great and getting some fans, know, letting people know that you're going to do this so that you do want to grow and you do want to be bigger.
I sometimes suggest to people that, why don't they start a mobile party business? If you're gonna have craft parties, why don't you take it to them first before them coming to you? If you're gonna host some workshops, why don't you find a venue and host a few workshops to see if it's even something that you like to do? You know?
Figure out how you're gonna accept your payments, figure out how you're going to deal with buying your supplies.
Before you jump in and do this, know, whole hog, whatever, test the waters and make sure it's something that you really wanna do because once you sign that lease, you are in.
It's really hard to get out of that lease, and you want to make sure that you are doing something that you love and knowing that there's a lot more involved than just helping people make things.
Mallory
Maybe we could dive in a little bit more to some of the rough financials or the startup costs that people need to be considering when they're putting together these business plans for this type of craft store business.
Christy Nelson
Yeah, so costs. The main costs for me right now are payroll and rent.
And I know when you're first starting, you might not be considering payroll, because you'll do a lot of the stuff on your own. But if you want to get to any place where you have any time for yourself or you want to grow your business, that's something that you need to consider.
And so when I'm doing my business plans with other people, I always tell them include people.
Include some people because if you can't run your business, you need to pay someone to do it. If something happens to you, if you need you know anything (a sick day, a vacation...), so I always include that in because a lot of people are like, "Well I don't need to pay myself right away or whatever..."
Pay yourself, pay yourself, and plan on paying at least one to two other people.
Include that in your plan and try and figure out how many revenue streams you need to be able to do that.
So payroll costs, that's going to vary depending on where you live. It's probably like a third of your total operating costs. Same thing with rent is going to be about a third of your operating costs.
And then the rest... You've got inventory, you have all the extra things that you have to pay for, like you have to pay your credit card processing fees, you have to pay your website, you have to pay any professional organizations that you're in, or like, there's just, there's a lot.
I'll just put it this way. When I started my business, I had, I think, $30,000 up for it, which is very low, actually for most people to start a business. But that's what I had right then. And I was like, OK, I'm going to use this to start whatever. And then month by month, I would invest whatever from our income to add to that.
I would say when all was said and done, I was probably $100,000 in that first year getting established of just like constant investment into my business to the point where now, you know, it sustains itself and I don't have to do that constant investment anymore. So that's nice.
But yeah, you do need like a little chunk of change to make sure that you can get things going and you also need to take into account that those first few months are slow. They're slow.
And you're spending all this time and money just trying to get people to know about you. So having a good marketing plan, a good marketing budget, like all of those things are so important.
I would say collect as much money as you can, but also make sure that when you're doing your planning, you know the things that you're gonna do to bring in revenue and that those will sustain you.
Mallory
Yeah, yeah. I'd also like to talk a little bit about franchise models versus completely creating your art or craft studio from scratch. Because I know that's a question that you've gotten a lot, right?
Thinking about all of these numbers and all of these logistics and business planning, there are, within lots of different industries, franchises, we often think about fast food restaurants like McDonald's. Right? That's a common known franchise, but there are franchise craft and art studios and sometimes people might think like, that would be so much easier. What do you recommend when people are sort of toying with that idea?
Christy Nelson
I definitely have opinions about this and like, it is definitely an opinion and you should make your own decisions about this.
For me, franchising this type of business... I don't like it.
I think that if someone is creative and wants to have this kind of business, then you don't want to be held back by a franchise.
The franchise can help you put systems and things in place, which I think are helpful. You do need those things and I can help you with that. But I think that the money it costs to have a franchise is better put into setting yourself up for success as a craft studio owner than going into this franchise model, which can tend to be quite a money drain, but you don't have as much freedom to pivot or freedom to do more of what you want. Those are my opinions on franchising.
Mallory
Yeah, well that makes so much sense to me and I've never explored a franchise model because I think like you pointed out, I think for most multi-passionate creative people like artists, makers, crafters... the joy is in the doing it our way and being creative and figuring it out and if you're just taking somebody's like, here's the box of what you're supposed to do. There's not as much fun in that and if you're not having fun in some way running your own business, you're gonna burn out.
Christy Nelson
Right. I just think that for the creative art space or studio space or whatever, a franchise model, I don't know, it just takes a little bit of the soul out of it.
A lot of people come to me and want to open a Makit Takit in other places. And I'm like, "No, open your own thing and I can help you make it yours."
If you need help with coming up with some sort of base plan to get your ducks in a row, so to speak... Like, I can help a lot with systems and finding suppliers and things like that.
But I don't need to recreate Makit Takit. Like, Makit Takit is me. I created Makit Takit and you create something else.
I have helped some other craft studio owners and I call them my sister stores. We're not affiliated in any way other than I will always have their back and I will always help them do what they need.
I think that you just need to have faith in yourself and you don't need this extra... I don't want to call it a burden because for some people franchises are freedom from doing that stuff.
But for me personally, for a creative studio, I would say just do it. Do it yourself.
Mallory
Yeah, I think too, with such a like physical location based business that really is a part of the local community. I think that's another aspect too. Like you're in Nebraska, I'm thinking I'm located in New Orleans, Louisiana, and I grew up on the Mississippi Gulf Coast and region to region... there's such different, you know, vibes and things that people are interested in.
But also by creating your own brand within your community, you can partner with that community and create a sort of third home for people, like a sense of place in a way that if you're taking a franchise, you can't really do that. It's like the locally owned coffee shop versus the Starbucks, right?
Christy Nelson
Exactly. Yeah, I think there is and there's such a pull for people to support local right now. And I think that's great. Like I want people to support their local mom and pop shops.
And I think with Millennials and Gen Z, they're to that point where they're like, yeah, we don't need another Walmart, we don't need another Olive Garden. They want to support the people in their community who are doing great things.
Mallory
Well, cool. I feel like we've covered so much good information and this is such a personalized experience... We talked about that it's really good to partner with trusted experts and people who have done it before.
If people are interested in exploring this business and want to get mentoring from you and your advice, where can they go to learn more about working with you?
Christy Nelson
My website MakitTogether.com. I have all of my business mentoring on there.
Mallory
Thank you so much, Christy.
CONNECT WITH Christy Nelson
Christy's craft studio: Makit Takit
Business mentoring for creatives: Makit Together
