How to start a path toward making pottery a career? Beállítások

[beneathftr]

Hi... so I’m a 25 year old who has been slowly been struggling towards a college degree. Overall I’ve done poorly, largely due to struggles with depression(which I’m now receiving treatment for) but also due to lack passion/drive for what I’ve been studying.

However I think I’ve found something I am passionate about: pottery/wheel ceramics.

I’ve been taking weekly pottery classes at a local art center and it’s all I can think about. I spend all of my spare time reading and watching videos about ceramics. I’m also a lover of quality teas, particularly those from China and Taiwan, so my focus has been on creating Chinese/Taiwanese-inspired teawares. While I’ve been learning fairly quickly, I certainly understand that I have a lot to learn.

While I’m not fully ready to commit yet, I’ve become more and more entranced with the idea of becoming a professional potter. I understand that it will take a lot of work and is generally not the most lucrative profession, but I think I’d be fine with living a simple life if I can have a career that I’m passionate about.

My question is how best to start the path towards making a career out of pottery. Should I take ceramics classes at my local college? (Their only offering are ceramics I and II classes). Should I try to find an apprenticeship? About 45 minutes away there is a clay center that I’ve been to that rents studio space, should I ask around there?

TLDR: I’m a young amateur ceramicist considering trying to make it into a career. Theoretically, how should I go about that?

[fillerjupiter]

I've never had a problem producing an income from pottery. The first year was mostly learning. Actually, it's one of the easiest businesses I've owned. I don't explore much on the artistic side. Started a full line jewelry business to go with the pottery. I stick to free standing retail, since it's a business model I have done well with in the past.

Not sure how people go about making a purely creative pottery business. I just find pieces that work and produce them over and over. Experiment with color, but stick to 5 to 6 best selling colors. This Christmas season, I will pare down to 2 to 4 colors. Half my sales are November/December.

The economy is BOOMING. I'm seeing 50% plus sales increases this year. I don't expect that to extend to November & December, because my sales were close to cap last year. In most businesses I've owned, you see exponential growth for a few years from tweaking. After that, you set "plan" to about 10% growth. Only way I saw exponential growth was going back to that old product/market paradigm. New products/same customers always seemed to work well for me. This year the jewelry did expand my customer base somewhat by appealing to the more local market. Before, my business was 70% destination. Now it's around 50%.