Crossroads

Out she walked feeling like she had had enough of it all, the women had been nice enough but for this or that reason, her cards were just not what she wanted.

Sometimes bobby wondered if it was worth the hassle and what profit did she make on them after all, once she added up her time in producing the cards, and the materials she probably just broke even, she was really very tired and decided to go home.

All at once her mobile phone rang, she stared at it, annoyed with it's intrusive ringing, 'Private number calling ' it displayed, she was in no mood to talk to anyone, gingerly she answered it 'Hello'

'Hello is that Finger Bob designs?'
'Yes it is, how can I help you'

'Well my husband bought me one of your cards for my birthday, and I thought it was so very lovely, do you do Wedding invitations, I have a very busy bridal boutique and we are constantly asked for nice Wedding invitations, I was wondering whether you may be interested in doing the invites for us....'

Bobby took a breath not quite sure how that would work 'Well I am interested in branching out but how would that work?'

"Well I am not sure either but perhaps we can get together for a chat my name is Kate Johnson, I have an idea that we would charge a commission so you are providing a service for us, we wouldn't want much it would just be so nice to offer this service to our brides and I have seen your cards and they are exactly what my brides would love, and with 90% of brides, money is no problem, you can charge what you like, I'll call you again tomorrow and we can arrange a time and place."

'Yes' Bobby agreed 'that would be OK, I'll speak to you tomorrow,' Oh dear she thought, as she hung up the phone 'I don't know the first thing about wedding stationary?'

Don't get caught out like Bobby!

Read our guide to wedding Stationery

Over one quarter of a million people get married in the UK each year, which makes for a sizable market in card sales

The markets consists of one or more of the following;

Wedding invitations
Reception invitations
Place cards
Thank you cards
Menus
Orders of service
Reply cards
Wedding favours

Or better still all of the above, making it probably the most profitable market for the handmade card maker.

Recently larger commercial card makers such as Talking Pictures have targeted the wedding market, the reason for this is simple, profits, the card manufacturer gets to deal directly with the client, in most cases the bride or brides mother, no retailer, no thirty days credit terms, they get payment upfront and best of all there is little professional competition.

In creating invites you have three avenues of approach.

A. Set designs.
Set designs are probably best for you, the card maker, you can make the designs economical to produce, concentrating on time and material costs, this however may not suit your customer.

B. Bespoke design.
Letting the customer design the cards for you to make is the least favourable method, you won't know how long each card will take or how the materials will perform, best to stay well clear of this kind of card making!

C. Customisable.
Is by far the best situation for you and your customers, you present a portfolio of designs, say between ten and twelve, the customer can then mix and match using the example cards adding or subtracting materials from each design.
The advantage is that you'll know roughly how much time and the material costs that are involved for any one design, plus you'll also increase your chance of a sale by not being too rigid in your product design.

Wording for your wedding invites.
These days invitation wording is not as formal as it once was, most brides will already have an idea of the wording they require, you will need the ability to alter the text, as long as you have access to an ink jet or laser printer then it should be no problem.
You can of course offer some examples such as:

Note. That the recipients name does not need to be printed, it is quite common for the bride or brides mother to write the name by hand, you can offer this service at an additional cost but it is very time consuming.

Place cards.
Place cards can be offered, they are normally sold blank with the name hand written by someone connected to the bride or groom with exceptionally good handwriting!

You can offer this service but again it is time consuming and spelling errors can occur, causing more problems than it's worth, if you do offer this make sure you build error and return costs into your price. I.e. for every ten cards you make, charge for an extra one, this way, when you get returns the cost is covered.

Thank you and reply cards.
The Reply card can be a small card (100 mm x 100 mm) that can be included with the invite, handmade can work out expensive for the customer.
Thank you cards are normally hand written personalised by the bride, handmade are not often used.
Bearing these points in mind it may be a good idea to find a trade supplier of printed Thank you and reply cards that you can include in your range and offer for sale to your customer.

Order of service and menus.
Can be flat A5 or A4 folded, Ink jet printers should not be used for menus as even a small amount of liquid will make the ink run, most print shops will print them for you very cheaply using a laser printer.

Wedding favours.
A wedding favour is a gift given by the Bride to all female guests at the reception meal.
Normally an ornately decorated box or silk purse containing a small gift, traditionally Almonds but can be anything of the brides choice.
Again this is a product that you can purchase trade and sell on if you do not want to get involved with production.

Always remind customers that mistakes can happen, they may have forgotten someone, or may write out a name incorrectly, therefore it's always a good idea to order more invites that they actually need.

Promoting your services
By far the best way is to visit local wedding shops, talk to the owner and try to set up a commission based sales system, i.e. you would leave a portfolio at the shop, any sales made would be subject to a commission paid to the shop owner.

If you attend craft fairs make sure people can see your wedding portfolio.

Most local newspapers have a bridal section, try a test run of advertising for a month or so, local papers can be very effective.

Copyright © kookykards 2002

Amy worked full time as a secretary in a bank, she longed to be able to give up her job, for the last six months she had been attending craft fairs, where she sold her work that she made in her spare time......

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