Once The Day’s editor-in-chief Larysa Ivshyna said an almost prophetic phrase: “We are so lagging behind that we could be leading from the front.” It turns out that Ukraine’s most common asset, the creative people who can make unique things with their own hands, is the trend of the third millennium, the key branch of a post-industrial economy. It is not our metal, nor even our grain, but handmade arts and crafts can lift the country from its economic misery. People only need to be protected from war and emigration and provided with a comfortable legislative environment for their creative activities.
The world has increasingly more preference for unique handmade goods. Instead of brand yet run-of-the-mill items, the customer often seeks what exists in one copy only, even if does not carry a tag with a big name.
The consumer traditionally evaluates the quality of the goods. According to Olena Vechkanova, expert on the global handmade market, Ukrainians erroneously believe that handmade articles by definition have the right to be slapdash and slipshod. “This is absolutely not so,” says the expert. “On the contrary, the most expensive and top-quality goods are handmade.”
GLOBAL TRENDS
Also, Ukrainians tend to mistakenly associate handmade arts and crafts exclusively with traditional rural crafts and artisanship like embroidery, flower crowns, or pottery. The world has long abandoned these ethnic stereotypes.
Today cultural and creative industries, where handmade belongs, make up 7 percent of the global GDP, with a 10-percent annual growth. This sphere is developing faster than manufacture and the services market. It provides jobs to 8.3 million EU citizens.
“The global community of today is no longer a community of knowledge. It is a community of creativity. As they purchase an item, people tend to care less and less for the number of goods. More often, they purchase an emotion, which is why the offer has to be unique. Industrialization, which produces a thousand run-of-the-mill items per hour, can no longer meet this demand,” shares Larysa Osadcha, Ph.D. in cultural science.
HANDMADE AND BUSINESS
Curiously enough, experts call handmade an efficient economic self-employment model, most understandable and acceptable in conditions of a crisis economy.
Handmade has come in style in Ukraine in recent years, and many Ukrainians came to see their hobbies as a way of making an extra income.
A couple of years ago, Vechkanova created her project Three-snails.com, which helps Ukrainian artisans promote their work on foreign markets. Authors can go to the site and call a price for their products. The site takes care of advertising, logistic and shipping across the world, so the artisans do not have to pay anything. The managers of the art project also offer advice as to how to make the goods even more attractive.
“To be honest, international customers are still cautious when it comes to buying Ukrainian stuff, under the influence of the stereotype ‘you have war and corruption.’ My dream, however, is to make Ukraine known first of all as a land of artisans. We do not even have to make up any new tricks, for we already have enormous numbers of professionals,” says Vechkanova.
According to her, many Ukrainian artisans are now at a loss: they do not know how to work with customers. Yet a coordinated common effort can make the handicrafts market into a powerful anti-crisis remedy and an alternative to the commodity market.
Handicrafts sell best in the US and Canada. Many Ukrainians successfully realize their goods exclusively on these markets. But as you market your products on another continent, you have to know some tricks. For instance, Canada has a ban on the import of any wooden items, so a Transcarpathian handmade wooden box can never be sold in Toronto: it will be burned right on the border. And to get to the top of the list of artisans on Etsy, one needs to have a unique offer, publish really pretty photographs of the goods, and communicate with customers in English.
According to Vechkanova, the global handmade goods market is a fast-growing and very tight one. To stand out among the wealth of similar goods, you need to have a really recognizable offer.
THE INTRICACIES OF LEGISLATION
The list of currently existing Ukrainian classifications of economic activities does not include anything describing the creation and sale of handmade goods.
It turns out that the introduction of a new type of the classification of economic activity is of top priority for artisans. This would allow them to work legally: the manufacturers of such goods would be able to officially accept this status. This means no preferences, but it would be a big step towards the transparent relations between business and state.
“Our norms simply do not provide for such kind of activities. At meetings with Yevhen Nyshchuk, the minister of culture, we have repeatedly raised this issue. At least, he assumed the responsibility to restructure the ministry and, at last for the first time in independent Ukraine, to create a department within it that would deal with creative industries. And the introduction of such classifications will be its highest priority,” says Natalia Kryvda, Ph.D., head expert of the Culture Group within the Reanimation Package of Reforms.
OLENA MYSNYK’S LEG-SHAPED BOOKMARKS BECAME A HIT ON THE INTERNET / Photo from the website BIBO.KZ
To enable any Ukrainian manufacturer to sell their handicrafts abroad, it is also necessary to ease laws and customs regulations.
Past January an initiative group was created, which is engaged in negotiating the simplification of export of Ukrainian goods and services with the government. At present, all sales contracts must be made individually, printed out, and produced to customs officers. The initiative group will instead campaign for making the offer document, published on the website while ordering an item, also valid at the moment of crossing the border.
Now the Verkhovna Rada is considering amendments to laws on export of goods. If they are passed, the situation for Ukrainian artisans will improve considerably. Businesses will not have to waste a huge amount of time on legal red tape, and will be able instead to dedicate it to their professional activity and improve the quality of their products.
UKRAINIAN ARTISANS’ SUCCESS STORIES
And yet, despite the fact that Ukraine as state is still falling behind the trends of the post-industrial world, we can be trend-setters on the level of personal achievements.
The case of Ohhio can be considered unique: this first Ukrainian handmade brand turned to the global crowdfunding platform Kickstarter to raise funds for the development of their business. Instead of the necessary 20,000 dollars they have received 173,000 and counting.
As a brand, Ohhio was created less than a year ago, but it sparkles interest across the globe. Ohhio makes stylish giant-knit items, warm and cozy, a must-have on a freezing cold day.
It will not be an exaggeration to say that handmade bookmarks by Olena Mysnyk have conquered the world. Her iconic style is already imitated by American and British companies. The original bookmark has a pair of “legs” at one end. When you close the book, it looks like someone has plunged into the story and beckons you to follow him. This accessory is both handy and pretty.
