[Music]
hi this is Cathy from easy Sunday Club
and today I'm doing a solo video on the
10 things I learned from selling
greeting cards I want to provide super
practical tips that you can take away
with at the end of the video and act on
right away these might be things that
you can only get from paid courses but I
just I feel compelled to help creatives
out there who may be struggling at the
beginning stage of their greeting card
design business and yeah let's get right
into it we have a lot to talk about so
I'm not gonna drag it out with a long
intro so the first tip is birthday cards
sell the most when I read online I found
out that about half of all greeting
cards are birthday cards and that makes
sense right because you know all your
friends and family have birthdays sure
we have anniversaries weddings and all
that but each person only has one most
likely and you don't give anniversary
cards to everybody so when I did a quick
calculation of my cards about 40% of my
cards or birthday cards and that's
probably because a couple of my non
birthday cards are super popular designs
and I've had them since the beginning
and they just been selling really great
at stores the second tip is for your
first design if you're just just
starting out for first design go with
what you're inspired by know if you're a
feminist go with an idea or just stand
by with conviction if you're new mom
maybe make the card that you wish you
got but slowly build a collection I want
to say you want to build a collection of
Elise a dozen if you want to take this
more seriously and sell it to stores and
online
because if someone just goes on your you
know Etsy shop or website
see three to four cars they don't you're
not building that trust and they won't
take you very seriously they think you
just throw something again over the
fence and see what kind of what happens
which is sort of the game we're playing
here but we also want to you know look
like we're professionals
so yeah start with what you're inspired
by don't feel pressure to make know a
dozen birthday card designs right away
if you are really drawn to another idea
just go for that and for the collection
of twelve they're suggesting again the
number you can the number is just a it's
somewhat of subjective number but I say
twelve is a fair number to put on no an
online shop so out of the twelve I would
recommend five birthday cards to wedding
or anniversary cards for for card split
between Thank You friendship cards and a
newborn a new baby card and one holiday
cards and you can tweak the numbers
depends on how you see fit and maybe
you're already known for a certain
design or you're already selling or
thinking about targeting a certain age
range or a certain you know demographic
this is kind of like a generic breakdown
of what I think a starting line should
be for greeting cards and that's even as
I start building out even as I built out
my collections by proportionally they're
kind of about the same always going to
try to develop new birthday cards and
since my other products focus on baby
and new moms I also tend to make more
Mother's Day newborn cards one of the
first cards I made which is a new work
hard it was actually repurposed for my
prints and have these are just a few
birthday cards I sells I really sell
really well I have about six or seven
first
cards now except I don't have a huge
birthday card collection and this is not
the main part of my business but no I
say start with 12 the third tip is don't
over complicate your design and stay
consistent not saying that you need to
consistently with your copy like you can
be humorous in one serious emotional and
the other sassy and sarcastic in another
that's fine too to mix it up if you have
know if you like different to express in
different ways but your design should be
similar it's like if you're gonna to
going to include some kind of
illustration on your card like all the
minor of my own watercolor design right
so if you're also an illustrator you
just want to have the same very
consistent style and by not complicating
design what I mean is you know the
materials materials you're using don't
get too fancy with envelopes I used to
buy all the love from for my grading
cards from a wedding stationery site or
even try to buy them from paper source
which is a big no-no like you can't make
any money from it which if you're
watching this video is what you're
trying to do if you go to my other
videos about I'll link it into in the
description about how to make greeting
cards and package greeting cards I have
linked the paper and envelope and
packaging materials that I use from my
greeting cards so take the guesswork out
of you and if you want to just copy
exactly what I use for the raw materials
I don't mind at all and when you pick a
paper just stick with it yeah and just
keep it simple
the fourth tip is know your cost and
price your cards fairly so you may want
to start making your own cards at home
or you want to outsource it to a printer
right away
I have always done the DIY option and by
saying DIY I don't mean
you know it looks like you made it for
your grandma when you're 12 years old or
anything it's still professional
professionally packaged with no correct
labels in the back so it looks like a
card that you would buy at a store if
you have a printer that prints color at
home right now most likely it's it could
work for printing cards right you don't
need anything large format or super high
quality to print greeting cards as long
as it can print a thicker paper stock
which a lot of the inkjet printers can
do so you can do that you will save a
ton of trial-and-error and cost upfront
costs by having to outsource to a
printers with printers you can sure you
can print them a lower volume but the
lower body is going to cost more per
card and you still have to assemble them
yourself anyway by printing yourself you
couldn't just know you can do your own
product photography once you have a
single-car printed out you can upload it
online and test it out and if no it
depends on how popular certain designs
are you can yeah you could just print
everything on demand that's so much
better especially if you're just
starting out no I'm not talking about
like building a card Empire right off
the bat and that those DS strategy can
always change down the road the next tip
number 5 is once you have your
collection offer bundles offer bundles
for your cards offer people the option
to mix and match if they like if you're
selling at no craft fairs or to
wholesale or online just keep people the
option to mix and match because people
can while people can buy a single card
from you they're paying to post
for a single card right and then you
have to pay know anywhere between $1 to
$2 to sell a single card most likely and
this will my experience to people want
to add multiple cards from you for
different occasions and this is why
having multiple birthday cards are great
too because you can sell a birthday card
but those now five and offer a small
discount one-day bundle and yeah you
don't you don't have to bundle by
occasion - you can bundle buy all of
your cards if you only have 12 to start
you can have people pick any five they
want that's something they don't have
the option of doing when they're at you
know right at our drugstore or no
hallmark you just sometimes they have
these sales but when you have a smaller
collection I think it takes the analysis
paralysis out of people and it's easier
for them to choose these cards that they
want and people often stock up on cards
for you know the next few month or when
they foresee any needs in the future so
yeah it's very likely for people with
people to buy multiple cards number six
instead of going straight to wholesale
because that might seem intimidating to
you right now it was to me for a long
time start selling them to start local
and sell them to local gift shops coffee
shops floral shops book stores these are
things that are overlooked by new
designers and I know it's still
intimidating like as a if you're an
extrovert it might be no big deal to you
but as an introvert I know doing sales
is super scary especially if you're
going in someone's store I can talk
about this in a whole other video but
selling local and starting there has
really helped me tremendously with
establishing my brands in the first
couple of years and know even now when
we started we just moved to new city
just trying to connect with no local
community and businesses
it's super valuable as I'm making this
video we're in the middle of a lockdown
a quarantine during the corona virus
pandemic so a lot of those shops are
closed but that doesn't mean you can't
work on the other things now just
establish build your collection jot down
all the ideas and file this tip for
later because eventually businesses will
be open number 7 a 2 is in my experience
the easiest size to do DIY in your home
studio the reason why is a 2 cards what
it's 5 fold is exactly half of a letter
size paper so if you take a letter size
paper and you cut it in half and by
folded it is exactly the size of a card
you waste no paper it makes it a lot
easier to cotton for and it's also a
standard size for a greeting card so
you're not cheating the system or
anything this is the single size I've
stuck with a couple times people have
asked stores have asked me if I offer
bigger sizes
I just know operationally it's going to
create more headache for me and I guess
essence this is not a dominant part a
majority part of my business I want to
just keep it simple and make it scalable
next is number eight start selling on
Etsy if you don't want to invest in your
own website with the plan to eventually
sell your website now you can watch my
other videos about Etsy and why I
decided to
website instead at the very beginning of
my business but I think s he's still the
best option right now it's the lowest
cost the easiest to start for you a few
again I don't want to pay hosting
service for your own website I know
there are other marketplaces out there
amazon's obviously the big one everyone
knows and they have a ton of greeting
cards but i find that they're saturated
with low-cost greeting cards that you
just can't survive off of as a maker
business they're selling you know twelve
dollars for pack of six that were made
overseas by a factory and a lot of times
you know there are copyright issues so
if you're worried about your design
thing copied try to avoid amazon the
beginning and just most importantly
protect your cost and and to stay
competitive and i carve out a niche for
yourself and number nine research trends
but don't copy other card designers
please like I said with the Amazon thing
just don't copy other designers we can
take inspirations when I say do research
research no I'm doing animals so I can
get an idea of what animals are popular
right now now sea otters are really
popular and that's from learning from
going to art fairs talking to customers
and selling art prints right it's not
from just copying a famous creating
designer who paint sea otters just take
it with a grain of salt
when I say research just be aware of
what's out there I go to really
successful greeting card designers like
Ric I should say stationery designers
like EE McDowell rifle paper maybe even
hallmark or your local Trader Joe's they
sell a lot of handmade cards from
smaller designers but please please
don't copy they think that people are
getting away with copying for a while
you might have caught some people
imitating other artists styles but those
don't last long because the original so
once making original designs were always
a few steps ahead of them and copying is
just not a way to build your own brand
number 10 sell your cards at local local
fairs yeah at the time this video is
made and is released you probably can't
go to any fairs due to the pandemic but
like I said they won't come back and
people will go to those fairs if you're
just solving carts don't expect to make
a huge profit from them just because
cards are lower price items and you
would have to sell a lot of volume to
make up the booth fee and all the cost
that goes into making these that into
vending on these fairs so don't expect
that to be your lifeline of no building
your car business just use that as a way
to do market research to find out what
resonates with people that's really the
easiest way to do it and comparative to
compare to cold pitching your cards to
car to a store or doing wholesale shows
it's a lot less daunting so that's what
I still I recommend to once fairs come
back and it are to get into fairs you
want to build a collection so again like
reiterating number two you want to have
a professional and left look as a
first-time vendor because a lot of times
they will accept people or businesses
I've been doing this for a while but
everybody has to do it all of these
businesses have done it for the first
time and I have done been rejected and
then I accept it too affair for the
first time so yeah don't be discouraged
by I'm going to give you one last tip
it's kind of a bonus tip it's not
something that is practical actionable
right away but just something to be
mindful of and that is you will most
likely
to create and sell other products if you
want to build a business out of this
cards alone wool is likely not a
sustainable business by itself it's fine
for just making you for fun if you
wanted to sell so family and friends the
reason why I say that is I could speak
from my own experience I started making
our prints and our prints are still a
higher margin item for me cards drive
the Vaught in volume but no it's you're
still looking at five dollar cards so
the profit margin is just not there and
if you go on any card designers almost
all of them sell other items they are
stationary brands rather than card
brands and no hallmark sells cards star
made by other by freelance illustrators
and other designers and artists that
they license from so I don't count them
as an individual card friends they're
more of a retailer for greeting cards
but again don't let that discourage you
and the reason only reason why I'm
saying this is I don't want you to take
these designs and try to make post-it
notes and note cars and calendars and
magnets right away because I want you to
just be patient and test out designs be
prolific with making new designs but
always test them out and then you can
take the ones are successful and make
them into other products that make sense
I say this card for example is one of my
popular cars for originally for
Valentine's Day but it ended up being
all occasion any time card for the
cranky fish in your life my original
print is a nine puffer fish art print I
just repurposed it into a card not
knowing that it was going to be a
popular card so just test and don't
invest yourself into building new
products because they just take time
away from you from focusing on what
works hope that was helpful
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content like this I made this video
because my greeting card videos are
getting a lot of views so I just want to
help those that may find this helpful so
thanks for watching