The craft supply chain

Eight stages, in the order a real order passes through them. Craft sourcing fails most often between stages — sample to bulk, workshop to finisher — so each page is written around what must be agreed before the next stage starts.

Stage

Design & Sampling

Craft sourcing begins with a sample that both sides agree describes the bulk.

Stage

Raw Materials & Inputs

Clay bodies, yarn, hides, timber, metal alloy, glass cullet, dyes and finishes decide most of what a craft product will cost and how it will behave in the destination market.

Stage

Artisan Clusters & Workshops

Craft production sits somewhere on a line from a single household to a workshop of two hundred people, and the point on that line changes what a buyer can expect on capacity, consistency, lead time and compliance documentation.

Stage

Finishing & Surface Treatment

Polishing, lacquering, plating, waxing, staining, glazing and antiquing are where craft orders are most often won or lost.

Stage

Quality, Compliance & Testing

Handmade does not exempt a product from regulation.

Stage

Packaging & Fragile Handling

Craft goods break, mould, tarnish and abrade in transit more than almost any other class of consumer product.

Stage

Export Logistics & Documentation

Craft consignments are usually low weight and high volume, which makes cubic capacity, not tonnage, the freight variable that matters.

Stage

Fair Trade, Provenance & Certification

Buyers increasingly need to say something verifiable about who made an item and under what conditions.