Table Of ContentContributions to Management Science
Léo-Paul Dana
Veland Ramadani
Ramo Palalic
Aidin Salamzadeh Editors
Artisan and
Handicraft
Entrepreneurs
Past, Present, and Future
Foreword by
Michelle Brandstrup
Contributions to Management Science
The series Contributions to Management Science contains research publications in
all fields of business and management science. These publications are primarily
monographs and multiple author works containing new research results, and also
featureselectedconference-basedpublicationsarealsoconsidered.Thefocusofthe
seriesliesinpresentingthedevelopmentoflatesttheoreticalandempiricalresearch
acrossdifferentviewpoints.
ThisbookseriesisindexedinScopus.
Moreinformationaboutthisseriesathttp://www.springer.com/series/1505
(cid:129) (cid:129)
Léo-Paul Dana Veland Ramadani
(cid:129)
Ramo Palalic Aidin Salamzadeh
Editors
Artisan and Handicraft
Entrepreneurs
Past, Present, and Future
Foreword by Michelle Brandstrup
Editors
Léo-PaulDana VelandRamadani
RoweSchoolofBusiness FacultyofBusinessandEconomics
DalhousieUniversity SouthEastEuropeanUniversity
Halifax,NovaScotia,Canada Tetovo,NorthMacedonia
RamoPalalic AidinSalamzadeh
SultanQaboosUniversity FacultyofManagement
AlKhoudh,Oman UniversityofTehran
Tehran,Iran
ISSN1431-1941 ISSN2197-716X (electronic)
ContributionstoManagementScience
ISBN978-3-030-82302-3 ISBN978-3-030-82303-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-82303-0
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Dedicated to
Salam Salamzade (1908–1997), Azerbaijani
painter
and
Gamar Salamzade (1908–1994), the first
Azerbaijani female film director and the
creator of the first children’s film in
Azerbaijan.
Foreword
The famous French sculptor, Auguste Rodin (1840–1917), described his road to
successinthesewords:“Inshort,Ibeganasanartisan,tobecomeanartist.That’sthe
good, the only method” (Claire 2016). However, especially in the West, the link
betweencraftandartwaschallengedthroughoutthetwentiethcentury.Firstwiththe
Industrial Revolution, and later when much production became outsourced to
countries where labour was cheaper. This change in history made it difficult for
Westernartisanstomakealiving,andoverthefollowingyears,muchknowledgeof
crafthasdisappearedfromthecountrieswhereitwasnolongerneeded.
Personally,however,IfollowedRodin’sadviceandbecameacraftsmanbeforeI
becameanartistinthefieldoffashion.Yearsago,Ifinishedmytailoringdegree,and
Iremember people’sreactionwhenItoldthemaboutmychosen field.“Butwhere
will you find a job?”, many would ask me with worry in their eyes. After my
apprenticeship, I went to Paris to get experience from the city of haute couture,
afterwhichIgotajobinasmalltailorshopinCopenhagen.Here,wewouldrepair
and alter clothing which people had bought elsewhere. I later began my studies in
fashiondesignattheuniversity.
People were right about the difficulties in making a living as a tailor or fashion
artisan in Denmark because handcraft had become devalued with production
outsourcing. At a Christmas market, I sold blouses and tea towels that I had made
withmyfriendGitteLægård,atextiledesigner.Atanothermarket,Isoldhandmade
accessories (Fig. 1), but I agree that it can be difficult for the fashion artisan to
competewithcompaniesthathavebiggermarketingbudgets;however,achangein
the fashion industry has happened over the past few years, which can be advanta-
geoustoafashionartisan.AcurrenttrendbetweenWesternconsumersistooptfor
sustainable, handmade, unique, and local-made products, rather than mass-
produced, machine-made, and standard ones. Another radical change is how the
Internetandsocialmediahavechangedhowfashioncompaniesmarketthemselves
and reach consumers. To fully understand this change and how it can be an
advantage to the fashion artisan, it is essential to look at how the industry used to
workinthepast.
vii
viii Foreword
Fig.1 SellingaccessoriesinKolding;photo©JørgenOleJensen
Longbeforesocialmedia,duringthe1980sand1990s,thefashionindustrywas
more controlled and closed to the public. New collections were shown at fashion
weekstwiceayear,inmajorfashioncapitalssuchasParis,London,NewYork,and
Milano, for a limited pre-selected audience. This audience included industry gate-
keepers (influencers), fashion editors, collectors, buyers, and celebrities (Bendoni
2017). Most information about the new fashions presented at these events was not
madeavailabletotheendconsumersjustyet.
Reviews of the shows were published in industry trade journals, and collection
images were published months later in trade-only publications. These publications
werecostlyandoutofreachforthegeneralconsumer;however,afewdistribution
channelsgavethepublicaglimpseintothefashionworldatthistimeandonewas
CNN’sStylewithElsaKlench,whichairedbetween1980and2001,andanotherone
was MTV’s House of Style with Cindy Crawford, which aired between 1989 and
2000,relaunchedin2012(Bendoni2017).Sincemuchinformationwasnotrevealed
tothebroaderpublic,thepeoplewithintheindustrycouldmaintainmuchcontrol.
Bendoni(2017)arguesthatconsumersweremorepassiverecipientsbeforesocial
media,andtheyweremorelikelytoapprovethanrejectwhatwasfinallyintroduced
to them in the stores. Consumers were then influenced by celebrities, fashion
magazines, and various fashion advertisements, which gave these channels much
power.Withtheintroductionofsocialmedia,theconsumercouldnowbeinfluenced
fromanywherebyanyone,makingthesystemmuchhardertocontrol.
Giventheold-fashionedsystem,itwasratherdifficultforanewunknownfashion
entrepreneur to enter that realm. This person would be very dependent on the few
Foreword ix
distribution channels there were back then to get exposed. The Internet and social
mediahavenowgiventhesepeoplemuchmoreopportunitiesforvisibility.Fashion
editor from Hollywood Reporter and Pret-A-Reporter, Booth Moore, says: “Social
media has also created a platform for lesser-known designers to break into the
fashion world, which has disrupted the traditional top-down model of designer to
media to consumer, and made fashion more democratic and trends less rigid”
(Bendoni2017).
WiththeInternet,itbecamepossibleforfashionenthusiaststoconnectwithother
enthusiasts. Consumers were now encouraged to engage and take part in various
fashion discussions. FashionNet.com (launched in 1995) and theFashionSpot.com
(launchedin2001)weresomeofthefirstwebsitestosharefashionnewsdirectlyto
the consumer, and forums such as LiveJournal, Blogger, and MySpace enabled
anyone with interest in fashion to comment and share fashion news and opinions
(Bendoni2017).InhisbookaboutthehistoryoftheInternet,JohnnyRyandescribes
how the Internet from 2001 and onwards created a “mass collaboration between
users” (Ryan 2010). From then on, more and more fashion blogs dominated the
Internet (Mora and Rocamora 2015). Fashion bloggers were usually not
characterised as journalists but rather fashion enthusiasts writing about fashion.
They would share their everyday personal stories, present their recent fashion
purchases, and write about their fashion opinions. The approach they had to their
followerswasoftenmorepersonalandauthenticthantraditionalfashionmarketing.
Thisauthenticmarketingapproachbecamethenattractivetotheconsumer.
Asmoreandmorepeoplecreatedmanywebsites,webshops,forums,blogs,etc.,
chancesofgettingseenonthevastInternetbecamelower.ThisconcerninspiredRob
Kalin (an artisan himself) to create the e-commerce marketplace etsty.com, which
was made to allow artisans and handicraft sellers to sell their crafts. Etsy was
launched in 2005 (Althizer 2017); he struggled to get visitors to his website and
learned what power community websites could have, such as craftster.org or
getcrafty.com, where people would go and interact with other craftspeople. They
woulddiscusstopics,askquestions,getinspired,etc.Thereforeinsteadofcreating
anindividualwebshopwithhisownstore,hewantedtocreateamarketplacewebsite
with multiple stores(Althizer2017). Etsy’smissionwas tobe acommunitywhere
sellers can support each other while offering the consumer an alternative to mass-
produced products and facilitate a platform that can help each seller grow their
businesses (Pace 2013). You can only open a store on Etsy if you are selling
handmadeproducts,vintageproducts(whichare20yearsorolder),orcraftsupplies
(Etsy2021).
Other than Etsy, there are several other online marketplace options for artisans.
TheAmericane-commercecompanyamazon.comlaunchedAmazonHandmadein
2015 (Amazon Handmade 2021). They audit each applicant carefully and the
applicant’s production methods to make sure products are genuinely handcrafted.
Amazon launched this platform because they experienced a growing desire for
handmadeproductsmadebyartisans(AmazonHandmade2021).InEurope,Ama-
zonhassixonlinemarketplaces,whichcanreach28Europeancountries.Theartisan
willthereforebeabletoreachmanycountries(Amazon2021).
x Foreword
Even though Amazon’s reach is impressive, not to mention its popularity with
millions of customers worldwide, an artisan needs to find the right marketplace,
which attracts the right customers, and contribute positively to the brand feeling.
Likethephysicalworld,whereitiscrucialtochoosetherightneighbourhood,street,
orshoppingmallforaphysicalstore,itisjustasimportanttochoosetherightonline
marketplaceorplatform.
Whereas Amazon Handmade is an international marketplace, Folksy.com is a
marketplaceonlyforBritishartisans.TobeabletosellonFolksy,oneneedstohave
residency in the UK. They call themselves “The UK’s Biggest Online Craft Fair”
(Folksy 2021), and this is an example of how a marketplace can create a certain
nationalatmosphere,eventhoughanyonecanaccessitfromanywhere.
Some online marketplaces also focus on specific product categories, and within
the field of fashion, it is worth mentioning the platform Not Just A Label (NJAL).
Theyfocusonemergingfashiontalentsfromaroundtheworld,anditisaplatformto
bothgainexposureandconnectdesignerswithstylists,buyers,celebrities,andpress.
IfadesignersignsupforNJAL+,itisalso amarketplace wheredesigners cansell
their fashions. It is common to sell made-to-order items on the platform, which
meansthatthedesignerwillonlyproducethegarmentoncetheorderhasbeenmade.
Over45,000designersfrommorethan150countrieshavebeenpartofthisnetwork
(NotJustALabel2021).
Another well-known marketplace for fashion is ASOS Marketplace, which the
online fashion retailer, ASOS, launched in 2010 (Asos 2021). It is made for small
independent fashion brands andstart-ups and allows them to reach a large interna-
tional audience. More than 800 brands are selling their designs on the platform.
ASOSMarketplaceonlyallowsbrandswhoselltheirowndesignsorvintageitems,
andabrandcanstartashopontheplatformwithjustfiveitems.Somebrandsonthis
platform alsousethemade-to-orderproductionmethod,whichcanworkwellwith
artisansandsmallbrands,whocannotalwayskeepanextensivestock(Asos2021).
There are many more marketplaces, but these were examples of how fashion
artisanscanselltheirproductsandgetexposuretoalargeaudiencebybeingpartof
thesecommunities.Theygivefashionartisansthepossibilitytoreachinternational
customers, rather than just local or national. However, since most people can join
these communities, the competition for exposure is very high, and it takes a lot of
effortandtimetobesuccessfulwiththeplatforms.
Itisverycommonforfashionartisanstosellandexposethemselvesonmultiple
platforms. Some platforms offer various tools to manage that. For example, the
marketplace, Folksy, give their sellers the possibility to import listings from Etsy
(Folksy2021).Itisalsocommonforfashionartisanstousesocialmediaplatforms,
redirecting customers to their websites or marketplace profiles. Social media plat-
forms can be helpful for the artisan to get exposure, create a brand feeling, and
engage with customers. Much information is passing through social media, and
thereforeithasalsobecomeaneffectivemarketingtoolforbrands(Groothuisetal.
2020).Studiesshowthattheuseofnewmediacanbeaneffectivemarketingtoolfor
smallbusinesses.Furthermore,itispossibletoadvertiseonsocialmediawithalow
budgetcomparedtotraditionalmedia(Soedarsonoetal.2019).
