Stability V’s Creativity - Why Have Multiple Revenue Streams For Your Craft Business
Want to turn your creative passion into profit? Discover how mixing income sources can fund your craft business journey - starting with just a few hours a week!
If you're a creative soul juggling your passion with life's responsibilities this episode is for you. Discover how to build multiple income streams without sacrificing stability or rushing your creative journey. Learn practical strategies to grow your handmade business at your own pace, including how to maximise just 2-4 hours a week for meaningful progress. Whether you're transitioning from a day job or adding new income streams to your existing craft business, this episode provides a realistic roadmap for craftspeople and creative entrepreneurs who believe it's their time to shine. No more worrying about whether you're 'moving too slowly' or that 'it's too late to start something new' - this is your call to grow authentically while honouring your commitments.
Thanks for listening, please follow the podcast if you enjoyed this episode and share with a friend.
Rate, Review, & Follow on Apple Podcasts
“I love listening to The Thriving Maker podcast” – If that sounds like you, please consider rating and reviewing the show! This helps me support more people — just like you — build and grow a handmade business and life they desire.
Scroll to the bottom of the show page here, tap to rate with five stars, and select “Write a Review.” Then be sure to let me know what you loved most about the episode!
Also, if you haven’t done so already, please do follow the podcast!
Transcript:
Sarah: 0:00
Hello, in today's episode, I'm talking all about having different income streams as you start to build and grow your creative business and explore your creative passion. So, wherever you're listening and however you're listening, I hope you enjoy. Hello and welcome to the Thriving Maker podcast. This is a podcast to support makers, crafters and artists to start and grow their creative passions into thriving, profitable businesses. I'm Sarah Kavanagh, your host, and I'm passionate about all things creative and how to turn your unique talents into a thriving business giving you the lifestyle that you want. I started my own handmade fine jewellery business over 15 years ago and now also help other artisans and makers build their own creative businesses through marketing and branding and techniques and strategies I've studied, learned and put into practice along my journey. Today I want to help you to establish and grow your own design-led business so that it can help support the lifestyle that you want. Think of this as your go-to resource and check-in for all things strategy and marketing for your business, along with stories and anecdotes from my life as a creative entrepreneur. Thank you for tuning in and welcome to the Thriving Maker podcast. Hello, today I'm talking all about different income streams as you start to build and grow your creative business or you start to explore your creative passion and think about growing it into a business that can provide you with an income, and I know a lot of people when they first are starting to explore the idea of making money from their passion. Their creative passion is one. How are you going to fund it? How are you also going to fund your current life? Should you do it on the side? Should you just launch straight into it? And so I just want to touch on these questions and they're all valid questions because I think it's really important that we maintain some stability as we're trying new things and as we're growing a business or growing our creative passion. So I thought I would just talk a little bit about what it's like when you first start exploring your creative passions and building out that business and thinking about whether it will actually work for you, and I think it's really important to take your time over this and to possibly do it on the side for a while.
Many of the people who have been on the handmade business academy course have got other jobs on the side. They are working during the day and then working on their craft passion in the evening, or have another business which they do for some days of the week, and then they work on their emerging, new, creative business in the rest of the time, and so it is possible to have lots of different things going at the same time and to slowly build a business that works for you. But it does take time, and even my own personal story in my business, as it grew, I was also doing other things as well. I had a photography studio with my husband, I ran events the freelance events producer and I would travel around the country, and at the same time I was also working on learning my skills as a jeweller and starting to gradually sell my work, and so it's absolutely possible to do two different things, three different things, and even now I have the designer, maker, coach business, but I also have my jewellery business as well, and that's from the perspective of. I like to do lots of different things. I have a very busy mind and I like to try different things, and so having multiple income streams really works for me. And again, in even within the jewellery business that I have, there are different income streams for that as well. I have bespoke work and I have ready to wear pieces as well where people can just buy and they'll be sent out within a week or so.
I know when you're starting out it can be scary to put all your efforts into growing your creative passion and growing that business without knowing how it's going to work out, and so there is the wisdom in maintaining some stability, and if you have work on the side that you can keep doing at the same time as growing, developing your creative business, then that's great too. I also want you to look at having multiple income streams as building bridges. So you're going from, maybe, the work that you already do and slowly building that bridge to a new future and to something that you want a few years from now or maybe later this year, and so it's important to reframe the idea that you don't have to let go of something completely to start something else. Build slowly towards the future, build those bridges that will maintain your business going forward. And it's the same, when you are in your business, to offer different types of income streams as well, so that may be your craft that you're selling and your handmade pieces, and you may also want to explore the idea of teaching and running workshops as a second income stream and try different things as your business grows, as you grow, to keep your ideas fresh and to build out your business rather than keeping it really narrow. So those are my main touching points for this episode to help you to reframe the idea that you need to stop doing one thing to start doing something else.
If you're at the very early stages of creating your business or turning that creative passion that you have into a business, then you may want to keep doing the work or the income stream that you already have as you slowly get it to grow. And if you already have your creative business up and running, I want you to have a think about how you can add in additional income streams to help your business grow as you move forward. So that could be something like teaching an in-person workshop, if you have the space available to do that. Or it may be producing digital products which you can sell alongside your existing work, like patterns or digital tutorials as well. So there's lots of different ways, if you are already in your business, that you can add in additional income streams.
But I want to get back to where it all starts from and that first idea that you want to create a business out of your passion. How do you go about that? How do you overcome the doubt and the fear of starting something new, the time constraints of starting something new, the financial constraints of starting something new, and how you can blend into your current work situation and your current job and gradually over time, build out a creative business that you really love and is something that you really want to spend more time doing. So ways you can start to build out a little bit more time to work on your creative passion is set yourself the goal of giving yourself two hours a week to work towards your creative work, maybe two or four hours a week, so that might be one hour in the evening, four days a week or over the weekend. Dedicate a few hours a week to start to really think about your craft, to develop your skills and to develop your business knowledge as well and how you're going to run this business and how you're going to run this business and how you're going to make it into an entity that can provide you with some kind of income, and really sit down and look at your numbers, look at what time you can dedicate to it and what financially what you need to bring in, and really look at what you can cut out of your life to make time to develop this new passion that you want to build a business out of.
When you're opening up your life to something new, so developing this creative passion, you need to let go of something else. You can't do everything, but you need to gradually be letting go of something else. Now, this doesn't have to be your current job, but you do have to work out a way that you can gradually build your business, but do it with the wisdom of maintaining the stability that you need in your life. You may be in a situation where you need to build out your creative passion and build it into a business as quickly as possible so you can start making some income as quickly as possible, and that might be working around your current situation. Can you claw back some time for yourself to be able to build this passion out and to build this business that you want?
So, when you've found this extra time in the week to be able to work on your craft passion and work on your business, how are you going to maximise the time? What are you going to do that's going to bring you the most benefit as you grow your business? So, obviously, learning your skill and practising your craft is number one. You need to be able to offer good work in order for it to sell. So practicing your craft is one of the first things, but there's other things that you can do to make the most of the limited time that you might have when you're starting out and when you're juggling different things. So try and be really clear when you're creating your schedule for the week. Be really strict with yourself about what you're juggling different things. So try and be really clear when you're creating your schedule for the week. Be really strict with yourself about what you're going to do, at what time and on what days of the week you're going to be doing it.
You may want to do the admin tasks and maybe ordering stock or replying to emails or any business teachings, any courses that you might be taking. You may want to do those in the evenings, where it's going to be a bit quieter. Possibly there isn't as much daylight around, so that's something that you can possibly do in the evening. You might want to practice your production and skills. Work at the weekends, where you can work during daylight hours and get very creative around your production side of things, and I always find that I work better in the summer, when there's lots of daylight. In the winter there's the time that you in the UK that you get to work in daylight is so small and it's so much nicer to be working and to be doing production work and design work when it's actually daylight.
I know this doesn't work for everybody, but that's how I work and it might be the same for you it may not be and start to identify when you have more energy. There'll be times of the day when you have more energy. There'll be the afternoon slump, which is a nightmare if you're working from home and you have a larger lunch. I get a slump every afternoon, a three o'clock slump or two o'clock slump just before school pick up and I have no energy at all. I do my best work in the morning. So start to identify when you have more energy to do certain parts of work and also over the course of the month you will have different energy and your body will have its own cycle when you have more energy and less energy, when you feel more creative and when you feel more thoughtful and you can take on the more practical admin tasks as well. So start to identify the peaks and troughs of your creativity and when you feel really efficient to carry out certain types of work and then work that into your schedule as well, so you can make the most of how your body and mind is feeling at the same time and align that with the type of work that you want to be doing at a particular time.
And at this starting stage of building your creative business or developing a new income stream within your creative business, it's going to be something new and it's going to take you away from what you are normally doing, and so you need to be really focused and clear about your goals over this time and what it is you're working towards, and there will be times when you possibly sit for half an hour and thinking, what am I doing today, and that's really common. So don't be put off by the times when you feel like you're not moving forward at all. But you will be little bit by little bit. So stay focused and keep on track, and when you're ready to take that next step, you'll be in a strong position because you have learned the skills. You have your creative skills, you have your product developed and you'll be able to step into building your business out with more confidence. So, wherever you are, whether you're building another income stream into your current business, or whether you're wanting to grow your creative passion and start that business, start getting things in place to be able to sell your work then, whichever stage you're at, having a plan, having milestones that you're reaching for, that you're aiming for, and managing your time and looking at your finances is really key to all of this. So have those goals lined up and keep on top of them. Make sure that you are referring back to your goals that you're setting yourself to keep yourself accountable for these new steps that you're taking on and these new income streams, whether it's, as I said, whether it's that additional income stream within your business or whether it's the opportunities for selling your work for the first time. So I hope that's helped.
That's it for this episode. I just wanted to touch on the fact that having multiple things go on at the same time, multiple income streams at the same time, is absolutely fine. You have permission to grow slowly. Whether it's a new idea that you want to incorporate into your business or whether it's that very first stages of following your passions, following that creativity that you have, you can go at your own pace. You have life experience that you can take forward. You can learn from others, learn from mentors, from other creatives, from other makers, and be strategic with your growth and your ideas and follow your own heart and your own wisdom as well.
We all have our life experiences and we do know inherently what suits us and what doesn't, and what feels uncomfortable. Push yourself to the edge of feeling uncomfortable and just as you're starting to feel uncomfortable, just make a note of whether you can go a little bit further or whether it's a hard. No, whichever one it is is okay, and I always say push yourself to the edge of feeling uncomfortable, especially when you're growing something new. So I hope this has been a useful episode for you. I hope it's. It's given you permission. You don't need my permission. You have your own permission. It's given you the permission to start slowly and to have lots of different things going on at the same time. It's all okay. So I hope that's been useful. Until next time, take care and I'll speak to you soon. Bye for now.