While on vacation last week, I read a book I wanted to share with you, Craft Inc.: Turn Your Creative Hobby Into a Business by Meg Mateo Ilasco. It’s fabulous!

Meg covers everything you need to know to get your craft business off the ground: financing, legal structure, trademarks, business licenses, packaging, pricing, production, marketing, publicity, trade shows, sales, order fulfillment, and more in a fun, accessible way.

Plus, she profiles inspiring entrepreneurs and enterprises like Denyse Schmidt, KleinReid, Sunshine Scarves, Wool & Hoop, and Jill Bliss throughout the book.

After reading Craft Inc. (the Thanksgiving break would be a perfect time!), you can pick yourself up a  Craft Inc. Business Planner: The Ultimate Organizer for Turning Your Crafts Into Cash to start planning for 2010.  The Planner is rich with useful tools.

She has everything from an “open-for-business checklist,” to a pricing worksheet, to templates for designing your tradeshow booth, to marketing campaign worksheets. There is also a to-do list notepad in the front, folders in the back, and an address book separated into sections for business contacts, vendor/supplier contacts, and industry contacts.  Pretty awesome.

You can see more images of what the Planner looks like on the inside in these blog posts:

• What I’m Reading: Craft Inc. Business Planner on megan auman’s blog
• craft inc. business planner . . . on oh joy!
• craft inc. business planner on poppytalk
• meg mateo ilasco – craft inc. business planner on sub-studio design blog

What other resources would you recommend for craft entrepreneurs?

Full disclosure: I received a review copy of the Craft Inc. Business Planner.

Last week I wrote about the Right Brain Business Plan as a resource for cultural entrepreneurs who want a fun, creative alternative to the traditional business planning process.  Today we’re going to explore another fun resource, The Creative Entrepreneur: A DIY Visual Guidebook for Making Business Ideas Real by Lisa Sonora Beam.

The Creative Entrepreneur is designed to meet, “the challenges creative people have with the business side of work. ” It is full of wonderful images and visuals.  You won’t get bored working through this book!

The first chapter focuses on setting up a visual journal to record the exercises offered throughout the book.

The second chapter leads you through creating a Creative Entrepreneur Mandala that helps you find, the “sweet spot” where your Heart and Meaning, Gift and Flow, Value and Profitability, and Tools and Skills intersect.

The third chapter addresses the emotional and psychological blocks creative entrepreneurs can face with exercises like creating a left-brain/right-brain map.

The fourth chapter delves into creating a visual strategic plan which includes making a SWOT chart, and determining what your objectives are, and the strategies and tactics you’re going to use to achieve them.

The final, and fifth chapter discusses promotion, marketing and branding.

You can learn more about The Creative Entrepreneur, and Lisa Sonora Beam on her website thecreativeentrepreneur.biz, her blog Less Stress, More Joy: Adventures in Creative Entrepreneurship, and her Twitter feed, @LisaSonoraBeam

Also, check out:

• The book review, Business planning meets mixed media on The Artful Manager.
• Interview with Beam in the Arts and Healing Network Spring 2009 newsletter.
• Turning a Craft Into a Business . . ., about the book, on ABCNews.go.com,
• Podcast interview with Beam on Tranquility du Jour.

Britt Bravo also blogs for Have Fun * Do Good, BlogHer, and WE Volunteer.  She is a Big Vision Consultant.

I don’t know about you, but when I think about writing a business plan I have a burning desire to clean out my closets, reorganize my garage, and sort through the fridge.  Luckily, Jennifer Lee of Artizen Coaching has taken the dread out of writing your business plan with her Right-Brain Business Plan.

This colorful e-book, which includes a 15-minute visualization MP3, takes you through a fun, visual, and creative  9-step process to create your business plan.  The best part is that the result isn’t it some boring, spiral bound document.  Your plan can be an accordion book, a collaged box, a deck of index cards, a mobile of paper plates, a bracelet—-whatever you can dream up.

You can learn more about Jennifer Lee and the Right Brain Business Plan on these blogs and podcasts:

• My Creative Life: Jennifer Lee on Ink on My Fingers
• Interviews with Jennifer on the Tranquility Du Jour Podcast in September 2008 and September 2009 (To listen on iTunes click here)
• How to Make Your Big Vision Real: Jennifer Lee of Artizen Coaching on The Big Vision Podcast (To  listen on Tunes click here).  You can also read a transcript on my blog Have Fun * Do Good.

Women cultural entrepreneurs! Be sure to also check out Jennifer’s list of Resources for Women Entrepreneurs.

Full disclosure: Jennifer Lee is a friend (:

Britt Bravo also blogs for Have Fun * Do Good, BlogHer, and WE Volunteer.  She is a Big Vision Consultant.