Chapel Prints Co - The Website
The work towards creating Chapel Prints Co began in late May 2020 when we bought our first dedicated 3D printer and began printing items to sell from our little chapel. Initially, we started with wildlife skulls and gaming figurines, and have been working away at all the necessary aspects to explore a 3D printing business since. It turns out there’s a lot to it.
These days an internet startup, even a very small one, has a lot of aspects. First of all, there’s the technical parts to 3D printing. From layer heights to nozzle temperature, when to use support, and when not to use a raft. Beyond this, you must learn how to fix the machines and each one’s peculiarities. To summarise a lot of failed prints, a surprising number of cuts and burns, and a considerable about of swearing; it has been a long year for our small Chapel Prints team…
We have printed everything from mini printing presses to Anglo-Saxon chess pieces. Skulls, figurines, and maps, aplenty. Beyond the technicality and artistry of creating, there is a lot of other stuff to worry about.
From photography to sales, from syncing accounts to writing Insta posts. It’s a difficult business and the big names of the internet - looking at you FB, Insta and Etsy – aren’t as fluffy as their ads make them appear. They want cold hard cash in exchange for getting your name out there. As satisfying as it is to present a range of products to sell; it presents the problem of how to sell them.
Chapel Prints Co has a successful Etsy page with more than a 100 items sold in less than a year – which as lockdown startups go isn’t bad. However, Etsy isn’t the be-all and end-all. It has its own limitations. We’ve been feeling for some time Etsy – intentionally or not - can be a bit of a racket. Although their listing costs are on the face of it small, to get views and purchases there is pressure to pay for Etsy Ads. To make matters worse Amazon Prime has instilled in a lot of buyers that superfast cheap postage is the norm.
Etsy really arn’t very encouraging: You know that item that takes 48 hours to print, it should really be dispatched next day. Also offer free postage to Japan while you’re at it! Joking aside and while acknowledging they provide a valuable service it can be an austere journey selling with them. Theres been multiple occasions where our sales profits for a month, entirely go on covering our Etsy Ads bill. A small postage blunder caused by the unhelpful “Worldwide Postage” option can often mean we barely cover the cost of the PLA for an item. We’ve spent £100s on social media ads that have never resulted in a single sale.
As passionate as we are, if a business is ever to come out of this startup, our small team can’t work for free! Bills must be paid, beer must be drunk, The Millie Cat requires Dreamies – other good cat treat brands available.
So here we are! The brand new specially created internet site for Chapel Prints Co. Our team has written and set up this site, all towards increasing exposure, which will hopefully lead to selling more of our wares. This site is the place to see what we’re printing in all its glorious detail. It will hopefully mean we start being paid for our time and can go on to create more interesting and unique models.
We hope you enjoying looking around and perhaps if you see something you’d like, consider supporting our small independent startup - we like to think of it as a cottage industry for the 21st century. So spent a bit of time, spend a bit of money, give a little love, like, and share. Help make Chapel Prints Co an actual paying business.
Cheers for reading. Samuel.
