Crafty Community - And Why it's so Important....

There's been a lot of talk in international crafty circles recently about the huge importance of community in any creative business no matter what the size or type.

Community doesn't just refer to your buying 'people' - those loyal to your brand and products, or your posse of friends and family.  

Community is also your like-minded fellow creatives those maybe you talk with on-line, see at markets, or meet up with regularly - the people who may have a completely different passion from yours - maybe you are a book binder, and they make babywear, knit, design jewellery, produce wind chimes from beer cans - the thing is you all experience the same issues - how best to ship your goods to customers, the fun of selling at markets, should you have a website or sell through another on-line marketplace, how to package, present and sell your work, the ins and outs of paypal, eftpos, and accounting. You all love what you do and you strive to do it well.

I can't speak highly enough about creative community and the benefits of belonging to one - formal or informal, via email or on an on-line forum, or down at your local cafe over a coffee.  Being in a group of people with diverse backgrounds, talents, ages and stages is inspiring!

Today, a group of us Hawkes Bay-ites from New Zealand Handmade met up for a monthly get-together we call 'Made it Here' with a little show and tell of new products mixed in amongst the coffee and eggs bene :)

New goodies, work in progress, and tools from Red Lippy, Fat Spatula, Sleep and Her Sisters, Coulter & Coulter, and Clutch Creations

Excuse the quality and poor vantage point of this photo - these are a notoriously difficult lot to photograph  so had to be done on the sly!  Left to right: Andy (Fat Spatula), Kya (Clutch Creations - back to camera), Jo (Red Lippy), Katherine (Sleep and Her Sisters), Nicola's arm (Coulter & Coulter) and Peter (Coulter & Coulter), me (Wildflower Designs) taking photo who is probably the worst at having her photo taken!

So don't hang back - look in your local community newspaper for groups to suit you, suss out Facebook/ Flickr / Yahoo / Google etc Groups with like-minded people,  sign up to Forums in Etsy / Felt.  You're sure to find your Creative Community groove!