A pottery business plan sets out what you'll make and who buys it, what a piece costs and sells for, the studio and kiln it needs, and the first year month by month. Pottery is a hands business: clay and glaze cost a few dollars a mug, but throwing, trimming, handling, glazing and two firings take the better part of an hour across a batch, so the price has to pay for the time or the business pays you nothing. And not everything comes out of the kiln: a crack, a glaze crawl or a piece stuck to a shelf is a cost the plan should expect. In the example below, a potter in New Mexico sells 140 mugs, 40 bowls and 25 planters a month by month 11, makes a profit from month 2, and ends the year about $24,200 ahead on $55,400 of sales, after paying $20 an hour for the work. Below is a description example, each part of the plan, kiln loads and losses, the projection, the startup budget, and a free template.
The short version
- Describe the business in a paragraph: what you make, where you sell, the studio, the goals.
- Cost a piece with your time in it; the clay and glaze are the small part.
- Price direct and wholesale separately; wholesale mugs leave about a third of a direct one.
- Expect losses in the kiln, and price for them.
- Count kiln loads: a bowl or planter takes the space of two or three mugs.
- Budget for the wheel, the kiln and the electrician before the first firing.
- TaroStack keeps clay, glaze and finished pieces counted, with firings as batches. More below.
Part 1: the business description
Riverstone Pottery, a made-up pottery studio in Santa Fe, New Mexico, I use in these examples, writes:
Riverstone Pottery makes wheel-thrown stoneware mugs, serving bowls and planters in a small studio in Santa Fe, sold at art fairs and markets, online, and wholesale to gift shops and cafés. In our first year we plan to sell 140 mugs a month and supply 8 shops.
Part 2: what a piece costs
| Per piece | Mug, direct | Mug, wholesale | Serving bowl | Planter with saucer |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clay and glaze | $3.20 | $3.20 | $4.00 | $6.00 |
| Kiln power, a share of two firings | $1.00 | $1.00 | $1.20 | $1.80 |
| Packaging | $0.80 | $0.80 | $0.80 | $1.00 |
| Card fee, 3% | $1.14 | $1.44 | $1.65 | |
| Your time, at $20 an hour | $8.33 | $8.33 | $10.00 | $13.33 |
| Variable cost | $14.47 | $13.33 | $17.44 | $23.78 |
The time is the potter's working minutes per piece across a batch: about 25 for a mug, 30 for a bowl, 40 for a planter. A potter who prices at three times the clay is pricing the $3.20 and giving away the $8.33. How to put your time into a cost is in how to compute labor cost in baking: the arithmetic is the same at a wheel.
Part 3: customers and prices
| Product | Price | Variable cost | Contribution | Margin | A month at full speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mug, direct | $44.00 | $14.47 | $29.53 | 67.1% | 80 |
| Mug, wholesale | $22.00 | $13.33 | $8.67 | 39.4% | 60 |
| Serving bowl | $48.00 | $17.44 | $30.56 | 63.7% | 40 |
| Planter with saucer | $55.00 | $23.78 | $31.22 | 56.8% | 25 |
A wholesale mug leaves $8.67, under a third of a direct one, which is the trade for a shop selling your work every day you're not at a fair. A gift shop expects to pay about half its retail price, so your retail price has to make sense at double the wholesale; how that works is in how to price handmade items for wholesale.
Part 4: the first year, month by month
Fixed costs are $760 a month: studio rent ($400), fair and market fees ($250), insurance ($40), the website ($40), and software and card fees ($30). Sales start at 15% of full speed and reach it by month 11:
| Month | Mugs, direct | Mugs, wholesale | Bowls | Planters | Sales | Profit | Cash, year to date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 12 | 9 | 6 | 4 | $1,234 | −$19 | −$19 |
| 2 | 16 | 12 | 8 | 5 | $1,627 | $217 | $198 |
| 3 | 20 | 15 | 10 | 6 | $2,020 | $454 | $651 |
| 4 | 24 | 18 | 12 | 8 | $2,468 | $721 | $1,373 |
| 5 | 32 | 24 | 16 | 10 | $3,254 | $1,194 | $2,567 |
| 6 | 40 | 30 | 20 | 13 | $4,095 | $1,698 | $4,265 |
| 7 | 48 | 36 | 24 | 15 | $4,881 | $2,171 | $6,436 |
| 8 | 56 | 42 | 28 | 18 | $5,722 | $2,675 | $9,112 |
| 9 | 64 | 48 | 32 | 20 | $6,508 | $3,148 | $12,260 |
| 10 | 72 | 54 | 36 | 23 | $7,349 | $3,653 | $15,913 |
| 11 | 80 | 60 | 40 | 25 | $8,135 | $4,126 | $20,038 |
| 12 | 80 | 60 | 40 | 25 | $8,135 | $4,126 | $24,164 |
The year's sales are $55,428 and the profit $24,164, on top of $20 an hour for the work. The first month is a small loss, the studio rent before the sales; after that, every month pays.
Part 5: kiln loads and firing losses
Every piece is fired twice, bisque and glaze, and a mid-size electric kiln holds, in the example, about 30 mugs in a glaze firing. A bowl takes the space of two mugs and a planter three, so a month at full speed is about 295 mugs' worth of space: roughly ten glaze firings and fewer, denser bisque firings. Plan the month's making around the kiln, not the other way round.
Not everything survives. If 5% of pieces crack, crawl or stick, a month of 205 pieces loses about 10, and each lost mug has already used $12.53 of clay, glaze, firing and time. Count the losses, sell the good seconds at a discount, and price so the rest carry them; what a loss rate costs is in scrap rate formula.
Part 6: the startup budget
| Item | Example |
|---|---|
| Potter's wheel | $1,400 |
| Electric kiln | $3,500 |
| Electrician, kiln circuit | $600 |
| Tools and bats | $300 |
| Clay and glazes, first order | $500 |
| Ware shelves | $400 |
| Packaging | $200 |
| Market tent and display | $500 |
| Website | $200 |
| Product liability insurance, first year | $480 |
| Working cash | $2,000 |
| Total to start | $10,080 |
Equipment prices are examples; a used wheel or kiln lowers this a lot, and a shared studio with firing included lowers it more.
Get the template
Download the pottery business plan workbook. Four sheets: your products with price, variable cost and monthly volume at full speed; the year, month by month, with sales, profit and cash; your fixed costs; and your startup budget with working cash. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
A studio holds a lot of half-finished work: greenware drying, bisqueware waiting for glaze, finished pieces for three shops and a fair. A shop reorders 24 mugs in a glaze that's down to its last bucket, the fair stock and the shop stock are on the same shelf, and the losses from the last firing were never written down, so the cost per mug is a guess.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps materials, firings and finished pieces in one place.
Firings as batches. Each piece is a recipe: clay by the pound, glaze by the gram, with a scrap % for what the kiln takes. Recording a firing takes clay and glaze off stock at what you paid, and divides by the pieces that came out good, so a lost mug shows in what the good ones cost. Losses after the kiln come off as adjustments with their reason.
Stock where it is. The studio and a fair stall are sites, so fair stock is moved there and counted back, with no signal needed. Shops' orders are sales orders that show whether the pieces to fill them are on the shelf while you're still typing.
And the glaze before it runs out. The reorder list works in days of cover at the rate each clay and glaze really moves, and margins are reported by product and by customer, so the shops that pay their way are visible.
| The job | Notebook | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| What does a mug cost after losses? | A guess | Each firing, divided by the good pieces |
| Pieces lost in the kiln | Not written down | Yield on the batch, and recipe truth |
| Glaze for the shop's reorder | Check the bucket | The reorder list, in days |
| Fair stock and shop stock | Same shelf | Sites, counted back with no signal |
Recipes, batches, counting and margins by product and customer are on every plan, from $49 a month; a fair stall as its own site, beside the studio, is on Standard at $99. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.