UK equivalent of buyhandmade.org

[ElaineJ]

Is there one?

I signed up to http://www.buyhandmade.org/ and there's been an increase in traffic to my website - but mainly from US (and I can't sell abroad ATM).

[Caroleecrafts]

Folksy and You Crafty Lot there are probably others but these 2 may get you started.

[ElaineJ]

Thanks for thinking.

Buyhandmade isn't a buying/selling site though - simply making the "handmade pledge" re the goods you sell and seems to generate traffic.

Folksy et al all seem to use Paypal as a payment gateway and there are reasons why that's a nogo for me unfortunately.

[snowgoose]

as far as i can tell, theres nothing like that in the UK, maybe its time someone made one

[matt.chatterley]

as far as i can tell, theres nothing like that in the UK, maybe its time someone made one

Hmm. Thats potentially interesting. It could self-fund through the sale of advertising space / sponsored links.

Perhaps a pledge list to sign up to (moderated, so that crafters sites can be quickly checked - ensure goods look as if handmade/assembled, check they are UK based, stop spam), and a cooperative blog - e.g. let pledgers make posts about what they make, and why - a sort of "interview" essentially.

If enough people here are interested, this is something I could look into setting up!

[snowgoose]

sounds like a great plan, i was thinking about something like a giant blog network with each user having thier own 'page', but maybe thats going a bit too far

[CeeGee]

I'd sign up!

ElaineJ, I think you can have just cheque payments on MISI. Not 100% sure. Might be worth having a look.

[crafty-clarie]

I'd be interested in joining. I tried buyhandmade and got nothing out of it tho'.

Claire

[matt.chatterley]

I'd be interested in joining. I tried buyhandmade and got nothing out of it tho'.

Claire

Thats the only thing - no way to guarantee a benefit

Worth doing on this sort of thing if it costs nothing to join though - at the very least, its a link to your site!

My current fledgling idea would be to allow people to also fill out a short questionairre, essentially an interview - this would give them a bit more space to talk about what they do and why, and also build up the site content so that links from it are more worthwhile (and allow for in-context linking).

I'm going to go away and do a bit of research.

[Caroleecrafts]

I would also sign up have just registered with handmade etc but agree one in the UK is well worth it.

[matt.chatterley]

I think so too, although I have a few ideas to make it a bit more useful (don't want to overcomplicate, but would be nice to split 'buyers of crafts' and 'makers of crafts').

Having spoken to a couple of folks, going to start some wheels rolling (well, given the way things normally go, push a few vaguely circular stone blocks off a hill and hope they don't fall over).. so if anyone would like to be kept posted, please send me your email (or email me - mine should be in my contact info) - I'll come back to the thread if/when something useful has happened.

[Aviya Glass]

I would be interested too. It's def about time we had a 'local site for local people'.
The US sites are all fab but I do think there is a gap for a UK or UK/Europe centric site! Good luck with your research!
What a fab new project for a new year

[staceyjlew]

Ooooh, I would be interested too. Not seen the US version as yet - going to have a look now though

Stacey

[matt.chatterley]

Just thought I'd come back to this thread quickly (sorry for dredging up an oldie!) to say that we've got a simple holding page up now at:

http://www.handmade-crafts.co.uk

and a Facebook fan page (optimistic, I know!) at:

http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Handmade-Crafts-Directory-UK/56924774621?ref=nf

Theres a sneak peak of the design in both of those, and we hope to get something more substantial up very soon!

[claireybear]

It looks great Matt! I cant beleive how quickly you have got things in motion!