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Best Ways to sell your creative fabric designs from home
The Makers trend for indie designers, inventors, creators and artists continues to grow.
The Makers and Creators of fabric patterns designs have also been expanding as a commercial niche.
Creativity and digitization meet again and monetizing your skills as a fabric designer or hobbyist is easier now than ever.
Selling surface patterns designs allows you to earn from your talent for designing fabric.
You do the design work once and are able to sell the patterns over and over and on multiple platforms.
If you have the talent for designing artistic fabric patterns, you can sell them online thru established and new print-on demand platforms.
Your textile designs can be sold on multiple websites, depending on exclusivity agreements.
If you know how to use texture and colors on fabric, here are some ways you can earn money from home.
While you can test and discover new patterns, here are some of the more money making ones on print on demand.
Fabric patterns you can create and sell;
- Patterns for handmade clothes
- Cricut patterns
- Vector fabric patterns
- Retro
- Checkered
- Florals
- Geometric
- Vintage patterns
- Geek
- Art Nouveau
- Chevron
Specializing in a sub-niche you can focus on specific audience. For example in the Floral fabric designs, you may want to create a core of Sunflowers, Ditsy or Fleur-de-Lis patterns.
The platforms where you can sell your textile patterns designs generally use this process.
- You create your design pattern
- Upload it to the platform
- Submit the work for publication
- Your designs get reviewed and approved
- Fabric design is placed for sale
- When sold you collect commission
How else can you make money with textile pattern designs?
A Blog, YouTube Channel or Podcast are great ways to complement your textile patterns business, wherever it may be located.
Writing an ebook to teach pattern designs and selling it on the platform of your choice is another way to earn with your skills.
The platforms below are great ways to explore your options, to learn and to monetize your fabric designs patterns.
SpoonFlower
At SpoonFlower you can sell your fabric design patterns and keep your rights.
This is a Print-on-Demand platform mainly for Home Decoration goods.
This platform allows professional designers and hobbyists to create and sell textile patterns in different categories.
This is one of the largest marketplaces for fabric designs and has a world wide reach of around 1 million shoppers per month.
Commissions at SpoonFlower range form 10 to 15 percent, depending on the sale amount.
In this design platform you create your own shop and also gain visibility thru third parties networks like Amazon, Etsy and eBay.
Improve your success rate by using the right keywords research and writing good descriptions for your products and designs.
Patternbank
This is an online marketplace for selling textile patterns, prints and other designs.
This is one of the platform that looks for experienced textile designers.
You can apply online and supply information such as; experience, online presence and a 12 patterns set to start.
Once you’re approved you can start uploading your patterns designs for sale.
The commission at Patternbank is set at 50% of the price sold. This is one of the better commissions in the print-on-demand space.
You have the option among three different Licensing Agreements to sell your work.
If you have some experience making surface patterns you can apply to join.
Related – 15 free powerful keywords for your online craft business
RedBubble
This is a large online creative community offering products like clothes, iPhone cases, stickers, stationaries, wall arts and many more.
You can open a creative shop at RedBubble and upload designs to over 70 everyday products, including clothing.
The platform claims to have millions of fans who look for unique creative products for gifts and personal use.
Contrado
Contrado is a UK based platform where you can create and sell textile design patterns.
On this website you build a store, create your designs and put it up for sale to earn 20% commission.
Contrado sells merchandise and your design can go in many of them.
Home decor, women accessories, laptop cases and stationary are some of the products created and sold there.
Big Cartel
At Big Cartel you can build your own creative design store to sell textile patterns. These patterns can be placed in many products like t-shirts, prints, arts and others.
The cost for Big Cartel store depends on the services you’ll be using.
You can build a store for free or join a premium service for $9.99 or $19.99 a month.
Related – 5 Products to sell online to make money from home
Etsy
Etsy is one of the oldest digital platforms making it possible for artists and makers to profit from their ideas.
In Etsy you create your own shop to sell your fabric design patterns. Set your own prices and pay the platform’s fees.
Unique Floral, SVG and Boho designs are very popular on Etsy.
Society6
On Society6 the slogan is, every purchase pays an artist. Everything sold there is made by artists.
The base commission rate is 10% off the price sold, but for some products the artist can earn more than that.
Art prints, framed prints, phone cases, pillows and many more items are available for sale with your designs on them.
Want to step up your textile design skills? Check out Make It In Design courses to learn from experts.
Final Thoughts
As with many of the Creatives, some Makers of textile patterns or surface pattern designs are now thriving in the digital world.
You can start building your own small business with your pattern designs in any of the platforms above.
Make sure to do your research, decide on a niche and start creating and selling.
Each marketplace has requirements unique to the business.
Find out if you’re comfortable with the platform you’re choosing. Also, understand the fees and commissions structure.
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