Pressing Pause on PDFs & Blog Ads

As you may have heard, there's some new EU tax legislation coming into effect on January 1st that is causing a big headache for small businesses.

Currently, if you buy something in the EU, VAT is charged at the rate applicable in the seller's country (I don't currently charge VAT as my turnover is well below the UK's threshold for VAT registration).

From January 1st 2015, VAT on the sale of digital products and services will be charged based on where the buyer is located. So if you're in the UK and you buy an e-book or subscribe to an online magazine or download a piece of software, you'll be charged VAT at the UK rate no matter where in the world the company you're buying from is based.

This sounds like a simple change, but it's actually very, very complicated! There will also be no sales threshold, so even if you just have one digital product in your shop and make one sale within the EU that sale falls under these new rules. You can find much more info about this legislation and what these changes mean for small businesses here, here, here and here.

I don't have many PDF patterns in my shop at the moment but my business plan for 2015 had been "list lots of new patterns!!" I already have a bunch of them in progress, and have many more designs (old and new) in a notebook waiting to get stitched and photographed and written up.

One of my PDF patterns

Thanks to the new rules, I have to choose between...

A) stopping selling digital products (my PDF patterns)

B) registering for and charging VAT, upgrading / changing my shops to meet the requirements of the new legislation and doing all the complicated data-gathering and admin that goes along with that to make sure I'm complying with the law

or C) selling through a VAT-compliant reseller, i.e. a venue where they will be making the sale for me (and dealing with all the VAT stuff), taking a commission then paying me what's left.

I am choosing option C!

So, I'm going to remove my PDF patterns from my shops on December 22nd (when I'll be closing my shops for the holiday break). Then as soon as I find somewhere to sell through I will let you guys know!

I have my fingers tightly crossed that I can find a solution asap - and also that the designers I love will find solutions that work for them so I can keep buying their lovely patterns :)

In the meantime, you can buy my PDF patterns (along with lots of handmade bargains in my sample sale) from my Big Cartel shop or my Etsy shop. UPDATE: You can get 25% off patterns purchased from my Big Cartel shop with the discount code PAUSE

The new regulations also cover blog ads (the EU's explanatory notes for this new legislation includes "the provision of advertising space including banner ads on a website/web page" in their list of examples of things that fall under the new rules). I may be able to continue to sell some ads but for the moment I'm not accepting any new blog ads or renewals. All my current ads will be unaffected and will run until they expire. Many thanks to everyone who has bought an ad over the past couple of years! xxx

P.S. I am not an accountant! This post is not intended as advice, it's just to let my readers know why I'm making these changes. If you think the new VAT rules may affect you and your business, please do your own research, contact your local tax office, etc.

A Change in Direction & A Very Big Sale

I've got some news to share today... I've decided to make a big change to my business! I'm going to stop making/selling my range of handmade felt things (for a while, at least), and instead focus on designing, blogging and writing.

I've loved making and selling handmade things over the past six and a half years, but it's time for a change! There are a lot of reasons for this but a big part of it is that juggling my handmade shop with my other projects means that one side of my business is always a bit neglected as there's just not enough hours in the week to do both - not without going crazy from overwork, anyway! Instead of continuing to not-very-successfully juggle both sides of my business, I've decided to take the leap of picking a side and devoting all my working time and energy to it.
 
Making a big change like this is quite scary (okay, very scary!) but it feels like the right direction for me at the moment. I love designing things and I'm excited about having more time in my week (and space in my brain!) to do this.

I'm still going to be doing lots of crafting, and blogging about it here... and actually I'm going to have more time for blogging than usual this autumn/winter, so expect more free crafty tutorials, book reviews and other fun stuff :)

And though I'm discontinuing all my current designs (all the brooches, headbands, masks & other handmade things I currently sell in my shops), I'll still be selling a few handmade things from time to time, as I'll have samples from tutorials that'll be in need of a good home.

There will also be lots of new PDF patterns popping up in my shop(s) next year ... including tutorials for making some of my most popular designs, like the British Birds. (Psst - if there's a particular design of mine that you'd love to see as a PDF tutorial, do let me know!).

I'm excited about this new direction, and I hope you guys will be too xxx

So, I'm having a big clearance sale to sell off all my current stock! All my handmade items (the brooches, headbands, masks, ornaments, etc) in my shops are now on sale - at least 50% off their original price. Hurrah! 

The biggest range of stock is available in my Big Cartel shop, but you can also shop in my Etsy, Folksy or DaWanda shops. 

 

Big News: Farewell Felt Squares

I've got some (slightly sad) news to share today: I've decided to stop selling felt squares & craft supplies in my shops.

I've really enjoyed selling supplies - especially all that colourful felt! It's been a big part of my business identity for years now, and I've loved sending parcels out around the world and seeing what people have been making with the felt, etc.

But it's been increasingly hard for me to juggle the handmade side of my business (and my writing work) with the demands of running the supplies shops. My parents have been helping out in busy times this past year but I really need my business to be something I can sustainably run myself as a single lady without making myself nuts from overwork.

And while I currently have the space to store lots of felt squares etc because my parents are letting me run my business out of their spare room...  I'm not likely to have that space for much longer. I'm not sure exactly what my life is going to look like in the next few years, but I definitely want it to involve moving out of my parents house and into a shared flat or a small place of my own and needing space for loads of felt & other stock definitely makes that plan a lot more complicated (if not impossible!).

I'd been thinking about this stuff for a while and had been planning on gradually putting more time and energy into the other parts of my business and then winding up the supplies side of things in the next year or two, but in recent months the cost of my supplies have gone up and there have been some quality issues... and then the Royal Mail announced their new prices, and it turns out that the majority of supplies-filled parcels I post will be more than doubling in price from April (the rate for that size & weight category is going up by almost 110% which is just crazy!)... so, well, it just feels like a good time to make a change.

So, if you want some bundles of felt or any of the other supplies I've got listed, grab them while you can! The biggest selection is available in my Big Cartel shop, HERE.

I'm sad about saying goodbye to this bit of my business, and I'm sorry to be disappointing any of my regular customers...  but I hope you guys will support me while I make this leap into new things! And once all of my stock has sold, I'll be doing a post with lots of links for alternative suppliers for felt squares so my old customers can find new supplies shops to buy from.

I'll still be blogging and crafting and making handmade items and writing tutorials, and when the supplies shop is closed I'll have even more time and energy for all that stuff (hurrah!)

This sort of change is scary, but exciting too and I have lots of fun crafty things planned :)