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How to Start a Resin Business


Creating beautiful objects using resin can go from being a fun hobby to being a lucrative side gig with just a few minor adjustments. You’ll need to create the right pieces, manage your costs, and promote your business.

Do you love working with resin and want to earn money selling the pieces you create? Read this article to learn how!

How a Resin Business Works

Epoxy resin is a versatile material that can create a wide range of decorative and useful items. The resin may be poured into a frame or mould, with inks and embedded materials adding design elements, and the result could be breathtaking wall art, a gorgeous pair of earrings, a set of coasters, or anything you can dream of.

For most people in the business, working with resin begins as a hobby. It’s easy to acquire the needed materials and start practicing. After a short time, working with resin becomes natural, and your design aesthetic takes over.

When you decide to expand your interest in resin art to include selling what you create (even if it will just be a side hustle), you’ll need to begin approaching your favourite pastime in a whole new way. You’ll have to take care of small business basics: creating inventory, promoting your products, and making sales. Each of those activities brings its challenges, but we’ll cover everything you need to do to get your resin business off the ground. 

How Much is the Resin Business Industry Worth?

A quick survey of resin items for sale on sites like Amazon, Etsy, Poshmark, and Facebook Marketplace reveals how active the market is and how much money is being made. Many people want resin art, and high demand has driven prices up. Analysts predict that, by 2027, the resin market will generate $10.3 billion.

How Much Revenue Does a Resin Business Generate?

Resin business revenue depends on many factors, including the type of resin items you’re selling, how well you minimize costs, and how you go about promoting your business. Assuming you create an in-demand item and sell everything you produce, the only thing limiting your revenue will be the number of pieces you can make.

You may come up with a hot earring design, for example, with pairs selling as fast as you can make them. With production at peak efficiency, you might create 100 pairs per month. Producing 1,200 pairs in a year and selling them at $10 per pair, you’d have annual revenue of $12,000.

Your large-scale resin wall art may catch the eye of a few local business owners and art lovers. A $500 price tag per piece would offset production costs nicely, and with just ten sales, you would pull in $5K in revenue.

These are first-year numbers we’re talking about. Your business can quickly gain momentum as you discover new, high-demand items to create, cut production costs, and improve marketing efforts.

Should You Start a Resin Business?

Creativity and an interest in selling what you make are two key requirements for someone considering starting a resin business. Another one is realistic expectations.

As it’s not likely to be a primary source of income, you’ll devote quite a bit of your downtime to the business. Imagine spending 8 to 10 hours per week making resin art and another 4 hours per week promoting and selling your pieces. If that sounds good, proceed with your plan to start a resin business.

What Do You Need to Start a Resin Business?

The supplies you’ll need to start a resin business include epoxy resin, hardener, mixing cups and stirrers, a respirator and nitrile gloves for safety, and a plastic tarp or two. Depending on the types of pieces you’re making, you may need to purchase moulds or canvases, and your designs might call for inks, glass, flowers, or other materials.

Your biggest expense will be the epoxy resin. A half-gallon of resin and the half-gallon of the chemical hardener you’ll need to go with costs about $100. Whether you’re crafting a large inventory of cool fridge magnets or pouring two massive, framed wall pieces, you will need a lot of resin.

You’ll also need a website where you can sell your items. Using a site like Amazon or Etsy would eat into your profits too much. For the price of a low-cost hosting plan, you can have a website that enables effective marketing and can include eCommerce features that enable you to sell your products online.

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How Much Do You Need to Invest in a Resin Business?

To create your initial inventory, the resin alone will cost at least $400, and you should plan to invest another $100 into moulds and other gear, plus the inks, paints, and other materials you’ll use. Also, you should set aside about $100 to get your website up and running.

With startup costs that low, money is not a major barrier to entry for resin artists who want to turn their hobby into a business. If you still face problems in funding your business, you can take out a collateral loan or a credit card to help. 

How Can You Start a Resin Business?

When you start your own resin business, you’ll fill two roles, one as the creative, artistically inclined producer of your pieces and the other as the shrewd entrepreneur that handles promotion and sales. Let’s look at four more business-focused parts of starting your resin operation.

Get an Eye-Catching Resin Business Logo

While your unique approach to design is what will engage customers initially, your resin business’s name and logo will be important branding elements. They’ll help solidify the company’s identity. Your logo should reflect the aesthetic of the items you create. In designing your logo, consider the colours and how the design will look resized. You should be able to use it on a brochure, as the image for a social media account, at the top of an invoice, and on the banner of your website.

Set Up Your Business Website

Setting up a website for your resin business involves four easy steps:

  1. Select a hosting provider and plan
    Web hosting does not need to be a big expense if you choose a shared hosting service, where one computer runs many websites. Shared hosting is the most affordable type of hosting suitable for most small businesses. You should choose a hosting plan built around WordPress since that will make creating your site very easy. There’s a competitive market for hosting, so only consider a provider if they offer low rates, free domain registration, a free SSL certificate, 24/7 support, and free training.
  2. Register a domain name
    Your domain name will represent your resin business online. You can tie your domain name to the business name, the products you make, or a memorable keyword that represents your creative approach. In any case, choose an inexpensive domain name. There’s an annual fee to keep your domain name, and the price of sought-after domain names can be very high. Note the annual fee when you register your domain name and account for that as an ongoing business cost.
  3. Design your site
    If you’re new to website design, have no fear. WordPress makes creating a website easy. WordPress hosting is the most popular option for small business owners because of the platform’s user-friendly interface and the countless professionally designed themes available. There are WordPress themes made for arts and crafts business websites and plugins that make it easy to add eCommerce capabilities to your site.
  1. Add content to your site
    You will drive visitors to your website primarily using social media. When prospective customers visit your website, they’ll have a chance to learn about the pieces you create. Ensure that your content engages readers with perfect photos of your work. Add an enticing description for each piece, perhaps explaining your artistic intentions or your process of creating the piece. Emphasize what makes your items unique and answer questions prospective customers may have.

Your business website should be the hub of all your marketing activities. When you research the hosting market, you’ll find providers offering WordPress-focused shared hosting plans with deeply discounted rates. There are some standouts among those hosting companies – look for a low-cost provider with great plan features, top-tier support, and free training. You’ll be able to easily set up a professional resin business website, and it won’t cost you a lot.

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Create a Detailed Resin Business Plan

It’s easy for a resin hobbyist turned entrepreneur to minimize the importance of a business plan. If you’re already making things out of resin, you may feel that the next step is to sell those products, and there’s not much more to it. However, when you get into the details, you’ll find that a business plan is needed to ensure success.

Capturing your revenue goals and estimated profit serves as a required gut check. Seeing those numbers might spur you to do additional market research to determine the best product to sell. You should make the kind of resin items in high demand and have a price point that will allow you to meet your revenue goal.

Your business plan should also include a year or two of financial projection – look past the startup phase and estimate operating costs, profit and loss, and cash flow.

Documenting these details in a business plan validates your strategy, and the process of creating the document can cause you to consider important factors that you otherwise would have overlooked.

Promote Your Business

Your marketing strategy should focus on social media. You’ll find communities of people interested in resin creations, plus countless groups continuously use the internet to explore various aspects of personal style and home decor.

Pinterest is a great platform for showcasing your work. Many homeowners and professional decorators spend a lot of time on Pinterest, relying on the platform to keep their room designs and decorating ideas on the cutting edge. Instagram and Facebook are ideal for building a following by engaging an interested community with details about your pieces and how you make them.

Your goal should be to create an online presence for your business. Having an account on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest, all named for your resin business, creates a unified brand image that helps people understand what you do. Your content should highlight your most popular work and drive people to your website.

How Do Resin Business Owners Pay Themselves?

If your startup funds cover the resin and equipment, you need to produce your initial inventory. You’ll see a positive cash flow early. The income should be put in a bank account that you use exclusively for your business. All future operating costs and the money you take out of the business should come from this account.

The income from your resin business is taxable, and depending on your projected revenue, you may have to pay taxes quarterly. Closely managing the business’s cash flow is not always a priority in a one-person operation, but it’s crucial for success, regardless of the size of the business.

How Should You Price Resin Products?

A quick survey of Etsy and other craft marketplaces will reveal important data: the market value of the kinds of resin pieces you make. You should price your resin pieces competitively.

After dealing with startup expenses, charging barely more than your production costs might be hard to swallow, but doing so will get your business off the ground. After your startup phase, your business will have momentum and improved production efficiency, and you’ll be able to adjust your prices to maximize profit.

Do You Need a License for a Resin Business?

Outside of the construction industry, there are typically no resin-specific license requirements for small businesses. However, even the smallest small businesses may be required to have a license to operate.

Depending on your location, you may need state or local business licenses. Additionally, your business should be registered with the state because you have to pay sales tax for items sold, plus income tax. You should obtain an EIN or employer identification number, and your business’s federal tax ID.

While most resin business owners will not have to get a license that covers working with resin, the general licensing and registration requirements that apply to any small business should not be overlooked.

Start a Resin Business and Turn Creativity into Cash

Working with resin to create beautiful art and objects with eye-catching designs is a great hobby and an even better part-time job. You can engage your creativity, flex your small business skills, and make money.

If you love working with resin and want to sell what you create, devoting a small chunk of time every week can make that happen. You’ll earn some money and have the satisfaction of sharing your creativity with the world.

Last modified on: March 4th, 2024

Categorized as Business

Tim is a freelance writer focused on helping people achieve their business goals through digital marketing.

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