you should be able to find at least a couple of viable suppliers here. If you’re looking for things you see all the time in artist alleys, like prints, posters, postcards, bookmarks, books, buttons, stickers, keychains, etc. We do have a bias for Canadian vendors, because we’re based out of Canada, and for companies that do business in English and have likely handled artist alley type requests before, due to our audience. We don’t list every potential manufacturer/supplier out there, and we have not personally used all of them. You can always cross-reference with other references and resources, like at the reputability of the website/organization posting it, other users’ feedback, the library, etc.Īs mentioned previously, we share a list of a broad variety of suppliers and vendors here: Remember this is the internet, so don’t forget to apply your critical thinking skills to the information you turn up. How to find a manufacturer or supplier for your product:.Here’s a guide to get you started that we found by googling “how to find a vendor” and basically enabled me to reduce the length of this post by half: There may also be pages and posts of people reviewing, discussing, or describing related things that you’ll be interested to know about too.Īnd, if you don’t know how to do something, you can also Google that. Look up the companies and see if they have reviews. Search for things like "printing” or “custom” “(thing you wanna make)” “(your geographical area)” (e.g., print custom bags Toronto or Canada or something like that). That’s why we even have the concept of, and the term for, trade secrets! The reality is that artisans all over the world have done this for thousands of years. Many people consider their production methods and sources a hard-earned trade secret for their business and their livelihood. It’s also possible it’s actually a pretty complicated process for them to get it done. It’s not unlikely that it may have taken them a significant amount of time and research to investigate for themselves, going through a process not unlike the one we’ll describe here. This doesn’t necessarily mean they are bitter, selfish people who care nothing for the happiness and success of others. There’s usually little harm in asking others, and asking questions is an important part of research, but expecting an easy answer is not realistic - especially not if you have a specific need or situation that other people don’t necessarily have.Īlso, if you’ve asked other artists who sell what you want to make, and they don’t provide an answer, it can very well be that they are not comfortable providing that information. Take advantage of them! Ask yourself - have I researched this seriously? Or am I throwing out questions hoping someone can supply ready-made answers to a single place/website/company that will make everything super easy? In the day and age of public libraries + Google, not to mention globalization and innovation making small scale technologies possible and the huge interest in maker and DIY culture, there is a wealth of information literally at your fingertips. Think like a maker/entrepreneur - because that’s what you are. īasically, it comes down to this: Do your research. So, for the sake of anyone wondering “Where can I print/make _?”, here is a rough guide on how to figure out how or where to make. We hope by sharing this, people can use this information and proactively apply it to tackle almost anything they dream of making. However, there are approaches we would take based on experience and logic. If it’s not, it’s often because we don’t know - because the product is something rather specific or specialized, and/or something we don’t have personal experience with because we don’t make/sell it. Every so often we get questions asking “Do you know where I can print/make _?” Generally speaking, if we know, it’s probably already on our resources page, along with some informational posts on this tumblr, and we’re always aiming to share new things we learn about that we think will be useful for our followers.
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