Pony jewellery - advice/feedback please? [PIC HEAVY]

SquarePeg

Teeny Tiny Baby Pony
Joined
Nov 16, 2014
Messages
28
Hi pony peoples, long time no see! I'm currently ill and very tired, this might be a bit disjointed and scrambled so apologies in advance :confused:

I'm looking for some feedback/advice. Feedback on some pony jewellery I've made and advice on how to go about selling it; I've never sold crafty stuff before and I'm not sure where to start! I know that this forum is for artwork but I'm hoping you won't mind a crafty interloper. I have some specific questions, but first there's splashy pictures and some exposition.

I'm making jewellery based on the wings of the G1 and G4 pegasi. At the moment I have two styles of G1 adult wings, G1 baby wings, G1 newborn wings and G4 adult wings, so five styles altogether.

The style 1 G1 adult size wings, here shown as two pins (they look great on either side of a shirt or coat collar):

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Style 1 G1 adult wings as a pendant on the left, and on the right is the G4 wings:

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G4 adult wings as a pendant and the back of the pendant, all the pendants have silver plated findings sealed onto the wings with more resin, so they're very sturdy:

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And some more G4 wings, the ones on the left look a little wonky as I was looking for an angle that shows off the gold sparkles in the clear blue resin:

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Semi-transparent shimmery G4 wings filled with 'bubbles' and the G1 newborn wings inset with silver stars (that you can't really see in this pic, darn) made into dangly earrings:

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G1 newborn pendants:

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A G1 baby pendant and a detail shot of a glittery G1 newborn pendant:

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G1 two-tone baby pendant:

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Style 2 G1 adult wings with butterfly embeds:

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And finally a couple more style 2 G1 pendants:

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These were all actually made four years ago and they look as good now as then, they're pretty solid. Since then my resin casting skills have improved and when/if I start making these again I'd be able to achieve a lot more different effects and colours. I also would like to make miniaturised versions of the wings to make earring studs out of.

I've worn versions of these wing pendants out and about and received lots of compliments on how cute they are, all from people who had no idea that they were My Little Pony wings.

That's probably enough exposition now! On to questions:

What would be the best platform to sell these? The pony boards/Etsy/other?

I have sterling silver chains that the pendants look great on, but this obviously pushes the price up. They can also be worn with an existing necklace, but this doesn't look quite as nice as a fitted chain. Should I offer them with chains/without or have a cheaper option such as cord?

How much of a pain is it to offer custom pieces? I can make pretty much any colour, with or without inserts, matte or glossy etc. Are commissions more of a hassle than they're worth?

And finally, any ideas on how to price these would be very, VERY appreciated!

Any and all questions and feedback welcome :smile:
 
Have you thought about conventions and stuff? I would do that first to see how people respond to your product and what sells and questions they ask about it. Then if you see that you are doing well with a booth at a con you could open an online shop and have business cards to hand out at conventions. Its always good to test a product before getting a storefront. At least that is what I have heard. It will also give you an idea of the customer base interested in this type of jewelry so you can target that particular customer base effectively. You may be surprised to find a customer base in the most unusual of places; like say an anime conference or something. A table full of G1 ponies sold in less than an hour at an anime conference in my area. One minute they had tons of ponies and within the hours every last one was gone. Who would have thought right?
 
Gorgeous! So pretty! I love it all! Awww..
 
Those look amazing!

The pony boards and Etsy might be a good place to start. It's free to list here and MLP Arena. On Etsy it only costs 20 cents to list your items for 3 months and then they charge 5% when you sell something. I'm not sure what you should charge, it all depends on how much it costs you to make them and how long it takes you. As for the chains, I would say offer the chains at such and such a price and a cheaper cord option at another price, with pics to show what they look like with each. Just don't buy a large supply of each kind until you know what most people will choose. As for customs, does it take you a long time to make up the wings, would other colors/inserts incur more cost than you could reasonably ask? If it doesn't, then offering customs might be a good idea. Just make sure to put in a disclaimer that you accept no returns on custom pieces. If you sell on Etsy or somewhere similar, make sure to list them not only as MLP wings, but angel wings, feathered wings, bird wings, maybe even fairy wings so you can get a wide variety of people looking at them.
 
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