Turned your hobby into a business?

[sumi]

I'm interested in hearing how others turned their smallholding, SS related, hobbies into businesses. Please tell what you did, how you started and share some tips for others that may want to try it.

I'll start. I started keeping a few hens about 8 years ago for eggs. We are not big egg eaters, so I sold the extra eggs to a friend and put the money towards paying for feed. Our friend told other people who started asking me for eggs and I realised there is a demand for free range eggs here... and no supply. Fast forward a few months, I had 100 chickens and nowhere near enough eggs to meet the local demand.

I was in the fortunate position that I'm allowed to sell eggs here and had a very keen market, which helped. I bought chicken feed in bulk to save money and free ranged my flock on good quality pasture (mix of grass and lucerne/alfalfa), which cut back on the feed costs. I started collecting clean, used egg boxes weeks before the eggs started coming regularly, so I didn't have to buy any, ever. I asked my customers to put in weekly fixed orders and calculated the average number of eggs I got weekly. I then took orders for around 80% of the eggs, to ensure I can meet that demand and the extras were eaten by us or sold to hopeful customers dropping in for eggs. I've made a fairly decent profit after deducting feed costs and the money spend buying and raising chicks (which was way cheaper than buying POL pullets), though it took me about 2 years. The coop and run materials was 50% reused/recycled and 50% newly bought. I've recouped all the money I spent on that when we sold our farm and I resold all the materials. I also sold older hens and cockerels hatched and raised over the years, but for them I mainly got my feed money back.

 

[Britesea]

I think part of the problem is that handmade goods have become a rarity, rather than the rule; people are unaware of how much time goes into a handmade project. They also usually have NO idea how much the materials cost.

I think it's ironic that these same people will go out of their way to buy Fair Trade chocolate and coffee, and brag about it to their acquaintances, yet expect their own countrymen and countrywomen to be willing to work for pennies.

I remember a woman picking up a $15 ring from a tray of rings I had made- it was gold-fill and tourmaline- she wanted to know if it was 14carat gold. For $15 effing dollars? puhleez!

 

[goatgurl]

kind of hard to be proud of passing down a cheap ole walmart blanket to your loved ones. i know that we all have to watch our pennys but pride in material and workmanship mean a lot.

 

[sumi]

Someone ordered a baby quilt from me, paid for it and then didn't collect it. Eventually she told me to just give it away. At the time there was a young lady working in the supermarket we frequented in town and she was pregnant, so I decided to just give her the baby quilt. We moved away shortly after and I didn't see her again for about 2 years. When I did she told me what wonderful use they had from that quilt and how much she appreciated it

 

[xoxocammyxoxo]

I haven't gotten to a point where I can say anything I'm doing is a business. I do have meal worms that I'm producing and sell to help supplement my growing hobbies. I would love to stay at home and home school my son but I just don't see that happening right now. My SO works for Amazon and makes enough money to pay the bills but that's about it. If we're ever going to buy a place, I have to get a better job. I keep hoping though that maybe I will be able to pull it off in the next three years (my son is almost 2) and I won't have to send him off to school. The problem is I think and plan a lot better when I have someone to talk to and the people I used to talk to all are gone out of my life. That's a story and a half I don't want to get into right now, but yeah.

 

[Britesea]

funny how people expect to get bargain basement prices from friends, even though they know those friends are trying to make a living... yet they are willing to pay full price to strangers

 

[sumi]

I have earned a bit of money from crocheting simple items (think dish clothes, scarves,baby sweaters, afghans) for our church craft shows. This year I am also trying my hand at simple Waldorf-type dolls, stuffed using wool from my own sheep. We shall see how it goes. I am not an expert, but I enjoy doing it and people seem to like and appreciate the things I make. Handiwork of any type seems to be a dying art in most areas where I have lived.

An old lady taught me to crochet years ago, but I never got into it. I may one, but at the moment I enjoy sewing more. The funny thing is I hated sewing until our neighbour showed me a quilt she made, 100% hand stitched…. I'm working on my 8th quilt at the moment! I got hooked after the first one. I found that not many people are willing to pay the price I have to put on a quilt for the 100's of hours of sewing I put into each of them, so I gave 5 of them away, sold 2 and the current one and the next one will finally be for myself.

 

[HomesteaderWife]

I see that this thread has not been active in some time, but I would love to give some input as to what my husband and I do. We both work from home and make enough each month from the things we sell that come from our homestead. Our two main sources of income are lumber we've milled ourselves, and art that we've made from recycled and natural materials (pallet picture frames, walking sticks, home/farm signs, bird houses, and we've started crafting with furs too). Other ways we make some income include small yard sales every other month, selling canned produce/fresh produce in season, and selling duck/chicken eggs.

We've learned that by working for ourselves from home, we do things on our own time and have room to accomplish a lot more. Our bills/spending was much higher when we traveled and held jobs (spending gas money all the time, eating out, etc) but now that we stay here we have noticed we don't need as much to get by.

 

[Mini Horses]

Hmmm -- always something, isn't it? I retired and found I couldn't adjust so do work PT. Love the farm but feel it should be more than "just" having fun. Then, maybe just having fun is enough -- guess it goes against my work ethic to be doing all the work and not getting something financial back. A lot of this is just pure work. The fun is watching kids play and chicks hatch.

IF I just bought a riding horse & trotted around every day, I could justify doing nothing more than "having fun". Not what I want to do alone.

So, my quest to make feed bills. Yep, I'm going to give much attention to an attempt to raise a lot more feed for the animals. My hens have been fantastic this winter -- eggs even in this crappy weather this week.

Really, that's what SS is about, right? Self contain.

Bad weather leaves tooooo much time to mind-wander.

 

[Hinotori]

I break even on feed for the chickens by selling eggs. I'm going to be selling some pullets this year which should cover most of the straw I need for the coops for winter. Next year I'll have silkies to sell to cover all the extra bedding and other costs.