This is the second part of the Home Business Idea of the Week featuring Jewelry Making.

Questions to Answer in Jewelry Making Business Planning

A jewelry-making home business begins with a well-crafted business plan. Conventional business plans build the plan around the expectation that a business will flourish.

Home business plans, however, should be framed around contingency, or emergency measures that should be taken should the business how signs of failing. This is especially true for jewelry-making home businesses, which thrive on consumer demand. For your jewelry-making home business plan, you need to outline measures to follow if your earnings fall below a certain minimum.

In particular, you will need to ask the following questions.

• What kind of jewelry will you be making? Will you confine yourself only to earrings, or to necklaces, or to all kinds of jewelry? Will you be using pearls, glass beads, or pebbles? What materials will you require? If you know exactly what kind of jewelry you are interested in selling, then you will know what materials you need to purchase, and you can better outline your budget.

• How much money do you need? Aside from the jewelry-making materials that you need to purchase, you will also need money to pay for your business name and registration, a web host service if you want to market your goods online, and a printing service if you want to create catalogs. If your business is registered with the

Securities and Exchange Commission, you will also need to pay taxes. Take all of these costs into consideration when you outline your budget and costing.

• What is your target market? Are you catering to children, teenagers, young adults, adults, or mothers? Are you catering only to women, only to men, or to both? If you know what your target market is, you will know what kind of materials to purchase, and what kind of jewelry to make.

• How much do you expect to make? If you have your budget in place, and all your materials, incidentals, and requirements taken into account, then you will be able to place a good price on your jewelry in order to make your return on investment (ROI) faster.

• How will you address emergency matters, such as lack of materials, demand, or failure to sell? As mentioned earlier, your business plan has to be built around an exit, since home businesses depend so much on consumer demand. Have your exit plans detailed, and make sure that you have a scheme to recoup your investments.

• What is your business name? Although this may seem trivial, a business name is actually important in helping your jewelry-making home business prosper. Your business name should not only be catchy; it should stand the test of time and innovation in terms of your jewelry. For instance, you could name your business "Heavenly

Beads," but will the name still hold if you are using pebbles or wood for your jewelry? Choose a name that can be used for all kinds of jewelry, no matter what the look, material, or even cost.