Take the guess work out of pricing your handmade creations with our Free Crafters Cost Calculator.
Our Free Crafters Cost Calculator is designed especially for makers, artists, and small business owners who create personalised and handmade products. Whether you’re just starting out or already selling, this easy-to-use tool helps you calculate a fair, profitable selling price that covers your materials, pays you for your time, includes your overheads, and ensures you make a healthy profit. By entering a few simple details, you’ll see exactly how your price is built — with the option to add VAT, round to retail-friendly numbers, and instantly adjust for different scenarios. No more undervaluing your work — let our Free Crafters Cost Calculator guide you towards prices that sustain your passion and your business.
SELECT YOUR FREE CRAFTERS COST CALCULATOR
A lightweight calculator for crafters. Enter the basics, get a recommended price.
HOW TO USE THE CRAFTERS COST CALCULATOR
|
FIELD NAME |
MEANING AND TIPS |
|---|---|
| Currency Symbol |
The symbol for your currency. For South Africa, use |
| Materials Total |
The total cost of all raw materials used in making the product. Include everything you use up: vinyl, blanks, ink, paper, glue, packaging, etc. |
| Time (hours) |
How long it takes you to make one unit from start to finish, including prep and cleanup. |
| Hourly Rate |
The amount you want to earn per hour for your time and skill. This should be at least your local minimum wage – ideally higher to reflect your expertise. |
| Overheads (%) |
Covers your business expenses that aren’t in materials, e.g. electricity, rent, equipment wear, software, marketing. Enter as a percentage of (materials + labour). 10% is a common starting point. |
| Profit Margin (%) |
The extra percentage you want to add on top of all costs to grow your business and reinvest. 20–50% is typical for handmade goods. |
| Round to .99 (ex VAT) |
If ticked, your price before VAT will round up to the nearest whole rand/dollar minus 1 cent, e.g. R250.00 → R249.99. This is a common retail pricing tactic. |
| Add VAT |
Tick if you’re VAT-registered and must charge VAT on your sales. |
| VAT Rate (%) |
The VAT percentage. In South Africa, it’s 15%. Only used if “Add VAT” is ticked. |
If you have any suggestions or updates that you would like us to make to the Free Crafter Cost Calculator, please email them to [email protected]. If you have any ideas of other tools you would like us to look into then also make sure you let us know. Our Free Crafter Cost Calculator was also created using our custom GPT we call “Ask vocarius“.
This is the perfect crafters companion as Ask vocarius is a Custom GPT that we have built to help you. It has been trained to be your Go To for questions you have about crafting. We are continually teaching it new new information so that it can provide you with the latest and most accurate information available.
This is a free tool (in case you missed that) that you can use to ask questions on how to use your products, ask for product ideas or even ask for business advice if you are running your crafting hustle as a business.
Don’t forget that we also sell a wide variety of Filter Parts, Cotton Fabric, Beverage Service, and other crafting goodies. Our Open Ended Spanners and Poe & Optics is compatible with both Cricut and Silhouette machines.