BTS: Planning a year's worth of collections

Image: A calendar with all the items I'm planning for the year, organized by season. Blurred because... well it's still secret :)

The past few years of having my art business, I've always struggled to get my artwork and designs ready in time for seasons/events/holidays.

As an online business, you need to account for so many things to make sure that the item arrives *before* the event/holiday/season. This includes making samples, actually producing the artwork/designs, marketing it so that people know it exists and then shipping it well before the special date.

And I never was able to do this with enough time to breathe.

So this year, I'm trying something different. Instead, I'm planning the entire year's worth of collections and releases now! Or at least trying to.

Everything takes longer than you expect

It sounds crazy, but from experience you really do need be starting about 6-9 months ahead of time, especially if you're working with outside manufacturers to make something new. If you're doing everything in house, I think 3-5 months can be enough since you don't need to wait for shipping.

Looking at the graphic, you can see that half the time is just waiting around for production and shipping. The times I put in the graphic are just estimates, and they can vary a LOT depending on what you're making, how many you're making and how many samples/revisions you need. Larger more complex items take more time and smaller items are a lot faster.

You might remember that I began concepting the socks in June and the final products didn't arrived until November. But I had to rush my samples, rush my delivery and still ended up 1 month behind (I originally wanted them in October). I really should have started that process then in April/May.

A learning process

I am of course no expert and I'm still learning, and it's taken me years to even catch up on my shop to think this far ahead.

I try to learn as much as I can from how big companies do it by looking at when they send their marketing e-mails or when they start putting out seasonal collections in shops. I figure that these companies have whole teams behind their business strategy, so they must know something that we can learn.

Overall, I don't really see a downside to planning early if you can do it! The hardest part in my opinion is being inspired enough to be able to design Christmas items in June.