Handmade goods: tracking materials

A woman who knits toys received an order for twelve bears at once. The yarn did not cover even half of it; at the market that colour was gone and the one on offer was slightly different. The order was late and the customer would not wait. This has happened to almost everyone in handmade work. The cause is simple: everybody counts finished goods, but thread, fabric, beads and findings are treated as "something that is just lying there". In fact materials are goods too: money is tied up in them, and when they run out, work stops.

Why materials count as goods

When a finished piece is sold, the money comes back. Materials sit on a shelf or in a box and hold your money. If you do not know how much is there, what runs out fastest and which colour you overbought, you lose twice: what you need is missing and what you do not need piles up. And to price a finished piece correctly you must know how much material went into it.

Three separate lists

Do not jumble everything in one notebook. Keep three lists:

1. Materials: yarn, fabric, beads, filling, findings, packaging. Each row has the name, colour or code, quantity (skein, metre, piece, gram) and the purchase date.
2. Work in progress: cut-out pieces, knitted parts, an unsewn item. This is the most dangerous group, the one that "disappears".
3. Finished pieces: each with a label and a code. A row holds the code, the finish date, the materials used, the cost price and the selling price.

When you take material into work, deduct it on the list as "taken into work", and when the job is done put the leftover back. Then you know exactly how much went into each piece, and the cost price is exact rather than a guess.

If you do not record work in progress, in a month the box yields pieces that make you ask "what was this?", and the time spent on them is wasted.

Minimum balance and colour batches

Set a minimum balance for every material. The formula is simple: weekly use × (days until your next trip for materials ÷ 7) + a reserve for one unexpected order.

Example: 3 skeins of yarn go in a week and you reach the market every 10 days. 3 × 10 ÷ 7 ≈ 4.3, rounded up to 5 skeins. Add 2 skeins for an unexpected order and the minimum balance is 7 skeins. As soon as the balance drops below 7, write "buy" on your list.

Before holidays (Navruz, New Year) orders pick up: raise the minimum balance a month ahead, because the popular colours at the market run out first.

Watch colour separately. A different batch of yarn sold under the same name may differ a little in tone. For a large order buy the yarn at one go and from one batch, and keep the batch number from the label. Record leftover fabric in metres, and put scraps shorter than 30 cm in a separate "small bits" box.

Pricing with materials in mind

When you set a price, take materials, time and packaging into account. Example: a knitted bear.

• yarn, 2 skeins × 18,000 = 36,000 so'm;
• filling 5,000, eyes and findings 2,000, packaging 3,000 so'm;
• time: 4 hours × 10,000 = 40,000 so'm.

Cost price: 86,000 so'm. If you sell it for 86,000 you get your own wage, but there is no money left for new materials, advertising or surprises. With a 35 per cent mark-up the price comes to about 116,000, which rounds up to 120,000 so'm. When yarn gets dearer, redo the sum.

Common mistakes

• keeping materials in a shared box without records;
• not recording material given away or used for yourself;
• writing the colour only as "pink" when there are five kinds of pink: you need a code or a sample;
• leaving work in progress off the list;
• setting a price without the materials, "by looking at similar things at the market".

Conclusion

Tracking materials teaches a craftsperson to work without stoppages. Three lists, a minimum balance and a cost calculation show what you have, how much of it, and how much goes into each piece. If a workshop collects a lot of materials and the storeroom at home is overflowing, the Sanab team can count everything and draw up a list.