Question about selling crafts.

I have never sold my crafts before. I do mostly tole painting. I'm not sure on how to go about doing this. Do you need an accountant?? Do you have to keep a set of books?? Do you have to charge sales tax?? How can you sell things just for a little extra money and not have to get involved with all that paperwork??
I would appreciate anyones help in answering these questions for me.
Thank you
ValJoD

Hi

You could sell your items on Etsy or in the Classified section here...I sell on eBay and never make enough to have to do any paper work...Unless you are running a business...the best person to ask about this is Cupcake...just send her a pm and I am sure she will be able to help you...

Smiles & Hugs...

I've been professionally selling crafts for about 5 years now. I do shows and have a website.

If you just want to sell on E-Bay or something like that there's not much to do with that. But if you want to do shows, or get a website down the road, then the first thing I would do it apply for a tax ID #. That way you can get your craft supplies at wholesale prices and also use it for the "juried" shows. Juried means everything there is handmade and you have to show your Craft license in your booth.

You can PM me also if you have other questions. You didn't say how far you wanted to go with selling.

I did start out with E-Bay and then went onto getting a website, etc.

I have been selling crafts for 30 years and yes like the others said, get you Tax ID# first. If you are going the craft show route then you will have a license in each of the states you are going to sell in. Right now the internet doesn't require a tax number but it is coming in the next few years.

You do need to keep track of all your sales and all your expenses. A simple accounting book will do this for you. This will help you at the end of the year so you can see if what you are doing is giving you a profit. When I was doing this full time, I did have someone do my taxes at the end of the year but now I can do them myself because I only do it part time.

There are a lot of free sites you can put your items on to see if you things will sell. Try them first---and do more than one site. I have never sold on EBay but their charges are too high for me and Etsy I did not do well so I am not there anymore. I just started my own website last year and am still building on that and have done pretty good.

Good Luck with whatever you decide.
Eva
www.ejcrafts.com

The one thing you might want to verify first is what your city and county ordinances are. I have heard stories of crafters getting into difficulties because they lived somewhere where they were not allowed to run a "business" from their home. Some areas have exempted crafting and others decide based upon the amount of traffic you would generate to your home and UPS often counts.

Some states allow one show a year sort of thing but many shows require a license. I have heard that at some of the bigger shows IRS folks show up and check every table for the proper credentials.

You can set up stores at Blujay, Ecrater and BuyItSellIt...all 100% free!!! Try those places, as it won't cost you one dime to test the waters. I have stores at all 3 sites...Blujay gets A LOT of traffic!!! It's my favorite of the three. You'll have to promote your stores a bit...start here! Also, I saw a classified section here. Have you tried that yet? It looks free, but I'm not sure. If it is, I'll post some some things there myself!!
Good luck!!

If you decide to create a website...check out my business resource site. I have tons of information and resources on how to run an online business.

Online business tools and resources at Primitive Business Junction.