Has your Silhouette or Cricut business taken off? If so, this article is for you: When should you hire help in your home based Silhouette or Cricut based business? This is a personal decision, but here are the warning flags that you may need some help in your small business:

• Your turnaround time is regularly “too long”. 
  • Depending on the products you sell, your turnaround time (meaning the time it takes from when the customer pays to when the item is shipped) should be around 1-2 weeks at the longest. In today’s world, customers want fast – the faster the better. If you have a turnaround time slower than 2 weeks, customers may skip your product and fine someone to make it faster.
• All of your time is being spent working on aspects of your business. 
  • You’ve heard the saying, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”. This is true for any small business owner as well. You cannot allow your business to overrun every aspect of your life. If you are always answering customer questions, making items, taking inventories, working on product launches, balancing the books, or shipping items – you may be ready for some help.
• When your time could be better spent doing something else. 
  • Sole operator, small business owners wear a lot of hats – and there are only so many hours in a day. As a creator and designer, evaluate what aspect of your business your time is best spent doing and consider hiring someone to help with smaller tasks. For example, if you work with vinyl, you could hire someone to help weed designs, place designs, package and ship items, and answer social media inquiries while you focus on designing new products and getting your product line into stores.
• You anticipate a high increase in sales in the near future.
  • If your craft business does a large amount of sales around specific times, be ready for the rush by hiring help. For example, craft sales soar during the holiday months. If you plan to increase your sales during this busy time, consider having help arranged before you need it.

A common concern that many small business owners have about adding someone to their business is that they will discover all of your crafting secrets and go into business for themselves. Savvy business owners can prevent this by having your new employee sign a non-compete agreement. A non-compete agreement is basically a legal document that states that your employee agrees to not go into the same business as you, or become your competition. I’d recommend that you have an attorney draw up a quick non-compete form for your use. However, if you’d like to write one yourself, there are some online generators that can help you get a good start.

Head to the next article in this series with some specifics on hiring help – including where to look for an employee and how much to pay them. Additionally, I’ll include a few ideas for “outside the box” employee arrangements that may help smaller businesses. I know you won’t want to miss it, so I’ll see you back on Cutting for Business tomorrow!