Wen 丨 Chen Mingyan
DIY, full name "Do It Yourself", as the name suggests , is to do it yourself, to do what you want, unique, and completely your own work.
In recent years, with the upgrading of consumption and the prevalence of the experience economy, handmade DIY workshops have gradually become an entrepreneurial boom, and this trend has blown from abroad to a domestic first-tier city, and then from a first-tier city to Hainan.
The DIY economy that is burning all over Hainan, who added the first fire, who is relaying, and who is paying for it?
The heat of DIY begins with the market
Before the emergence of the cultural and creative market, Hainan handmade, almost ancient male cultivators and women weaving small peasant economy, although the number of people who love handmade is very large, but few people have the consciousness to transform handmade products into economic results, handmade products are only in the stage of self-sufficiency or gifts from relatives and friends, mostly for relatives and friends to teach each other simple experience, the product type is also relatively single, mostly simple and easy to learn beads, ropes, etc. The handmade products that enter the market are limited to meeting the actual needs, and the experience economy and diy culture connotation cannot be talked about.
DIY entered the market and began in the cultural and creative market, which is the consensus of many craftsmen.
In recent years, the Culture of Hainan Cultural and Creative Market, represented by the N-power Small Island Market and the Sun Moon Square Cultural and Creative Market, has sprung up, and the cultural and creative market fashion blown from first-tier cities has unexpectedly fit the temperament of the small island, quickly took root here, and with the rise of product evaluation platforms such as Xiaohongshu and entered the public's field of vision, the grass diaries marked with "Cultural and Creative Market" in various colors flew all over the sky, which greatly affected the local cultural atmosphere.
Hainan handmade workers who have long been in a state of self-entertainment have a platform to show themselves, and DIY works such as rope weaving, metalworking, pottery, fabric, and carpentry have entered the market, shining and blowing up a wave of DIY, although the works at that time were not exquisite and ingenious, and the handmade products with clear themes and complete production lines in first-tier cities are very different, but it has to be said that the atmosphere of Hainan's DIY economy has begun since then.
Some handmade people who returned from outside the island were surprised, and in addition to their daily work, they also carried large bags and small bags to join the "stall" team of Haohao Tangtang. A "part-time job" stemming from a hobby allows them to secretly observe the handicraft market in Hainan while forming a real-like handmade person on the island.
As the first craftsmen in Hainan, the Fish Treasurer and the Pan Treasurer naturally began their entrepreneurial road. At the beginning, it was out of interest, weaving beautiful small items, with the increase of works, after giving away relatives and friends, it was found that there was still a surplus, and had to find ways to push the works out, so he started a "slash youth", as the career slowly started, Pan Treasurer quit the design job and concentrated on his hobby specialty.
The "Island Little Craftsman" handicraft workshop of the fish shop was originally opened in friendship sunshine city, which is a new generation of city-level commercial complex in Hainan, surrounded by white-collar workers, students and other young customers, and most of the customers of the workshop come from here. At the beginning, the workshop only had more skilled rope weaving, beading works, did not hire clerks, members rely on hobbies and interests to get closer to each other, while learning while teaching while selling, both customers who directly came to buy finished products, there are also customers who come to experience hands-on fun, with the change of market demand, increased metalwork, fabric, pottery, old things transformation design and other products.
Image source: Island Smith
"Our customers are not limited to Hainan, there are also foreign, while operating offline stores, we have also opened up online channels, through the Xiaohongshu and other platforms to promote, foreign customers will see their favorite products will also place orders, my WeChat account will add more than 3,000 target customers." Pan said. In addition, the workshop also makes profits by organizing offline teaching salons, participating in cultural summits across the country, and cooperating with banks to complete VIP salon activities.
Compared with the handmade fish treasurer and the Pan treasurer, some Hainan handmade people choose to carry out the label of "slash youth" to the end, and Xiao Gu (pseudonym) is one of the examples. From 2010 to make the first camera strap, Xiao Gu embarked on the road of DIY leather goods, at the beginning is pure play, self-amusement, and later found that this hobby can also earn money, Xiao Gu has the idea of operating a side business, but due to the large investment in offline workshops, the cost of some equipment is tens of thousands, plus rent and other costs, Xiao Gu will set his sights on the line and open a Taobao shop.
"As a side business, there is not much time to focus, and I do not expect this to make a fortune, make a little money to maintain hobbies, the promotion of Taobao and increase the weight to see if you want to invest, the best time for business can have a turnover of 17,500 yuan per month." Xiao Gu said.
Who's playing DIY?
Douban search "DIY", there are many groups, called "manual DIY tutorial" group members have reached 403737 name, in addition, there are many carpentry, fabric, clay, crochet, cake, floral, candles and even old things transformation as the theme of the group, like DIY friends gathered here, sharing DIY tutorials and experience, they even set up a "DIY overturning group", spit on the failure experience in the process of hand-made.
For handmade enthusiasts, DIY represents a way of life and attitude to life: the current urban life is fast-paced, stressful, and handmade time is completely their own, at the same time, with the development of society, large-scale mechanized production, the products on the assembly line can not meet their needs, the need to have more "heart- and" products to make them feel the joy of life.
"You have to understand how stressful it is for someone with a family, and DIY leather goods is a way for me to decompress." Xiao Gu said.
"When I was in college, I went to the store to learn handmade flowers and pottery, and after I came out to work, no one accompanied me to the store, I was afraid, I preferred to be at home than going to the store, so I would buy some materials online and come back to do it myself, I did bookmarks, purses and carvings, painted digital paintings, and ugly wool felt." For me, DIY can decompress, but also let the lazy self move, one more skill. Xiao Guo, a handicraft enthusiast, told interface Hainan.
Yuanyuan, who once went to the store to DIY cake, said: "My friend's birthday does not know what birthday gift to send, I am not good at cooking, there is no cooking and baking tools at home, just take her to the store to make cakes, that time we are very happy, after doing a good job, there is no need to clean up the mess, how convenient." ”
On the little red book that has added fire to the DIY industry in Hainan, the notes on "DIY" have reached 1.88 million+ articles, and many Hainan netizens and merchants have promoted the experience of exploring stores and "planting grass diaries" through this platform. On the US group, There are DIY workshops in Haikou, Sanya, Chengmai, Qionghai, Wanning, Dongfang, and other cities and counties in Hainan. Overall, with the largest number of stores in Haikou and Sanya, the most complex types of operation, these workshops are mostly distributed around the business circle, not only traditional handmade items such as rope weaving, metalworking, crochet, etc., but also painting, food, beverage handicrafts have successively entered the workshop, in terms of sales, DIY cake, DIY couple ring is a hot product.
A lady who studied painting at the "Orange Beauty Art" painting museum in Friendship Sunshine City was obviously happy, "After work, I took an hour or two to learn to paint and wanted to improve my skills." During the painting process, she shouted "I was deceived by the Little Red Book", "This [North Dark Fish Blue Whale] is not entry-level at all, it is difficult to learn this at the beginning, I already know that I will not choose this, it is all completed with the help of the teacher." ”
Image source: Chen Mingyan/Photo
Interface Hainan in the metalwork-themed intersection of handicraft workshop to see that the customers in the workshop are mostly young couples, and the products consumed are mostly couples, "create a couple ring by yourself, have a lot of heart and a sense of accomplishment, and it is also very memorable." A couple laughed.
Unlike the above-mentioned respondents who love DIY, Bao Ma Xinxin cried bitterly, she thought she was "forced", and complained: "Why are there so many things in the kindergarten now?" Do parent-child handicrafts in class, do parent-child handicrafts on weekends, and do parent-child handicrafts on holidays... I'm a handicapped party! What else can I do, I can only go to the store to learn, she hurry up and give me primary school! ”
Is commercialization good or bad?
The workshops of Fish Treasurer and Pan Treasurer moved from Friendship Sunshine City to a nearby residential area, both with consideration of reducing rent under the impact of the epidemic and extending the operating time. For several years, the two treasurers did not regard themselves as pure businessmen, and after consideration, they rejected the commercial olive branch that others had extended, and in their view, "handmade" was always the most important label on them. "We prefer a free lifestyle, moving out of Friendship Sunshine City, also because there are too many constraints, not comfortable enough, although the traffic and exposure here are less, but at least it is quiet and comfortable, and our store will not receive too many people at the same time."
Hainan's DIY economy began in the market, from love, as an early group of people, in their view, this industry needs a certain amount of affection and love to insist on outputting high-quality original products, rather than simple reproduction, too commercial and assembly line, is tantamount to the original intention of DIY. But at the same time, I have to admit that as more people pour into this industry, Hainan's DIY industry has also shown an increasingly commercial situation.
"I think there's an 'inner volume.'" Pan said, "I've observed the new store, and they're fighting a price war, so a lot of people have gone there." In the eyes of the insider, if it were not for the bad materials, it would be impossible to set this price, but customers do not care about these, they only know that it is cheaper there. Just like the attitude of many freelance photographers to the assembly line photography studio in recent years, some handmade people believe that too much pursuit of profits will inevitably make the entire handmade industry into assembly line production, and the "net red model" and the same design elements will inevitably make DIY lose its soul.
However, some craftsmen are more optimistic about commercialization, and Ms. Wang (pseudonym), a handmade artist, believes: "To some extent, commercialization is also a good direction, at least so that people in this industry have money to earn." Ms. Wang studied sculpture during college, handmade is her old profession, her attitude is more open-minded, but she also said that she will also encounter the phenomenon of plagiarism and reproduction, generally lazy to defend rights.
Due to different products, the input cost of DIY workshops is not the same, such as DIY tea workshop, DIY flower workshop, etc. The investment is small, and some large-scale projects may encounter the risk of failure if they do not think carefully, and if they open a store, they may encounter the risk of failure, "There was originally a ceramic aesthetics hall, the business was good at the beginning, and then it gradually faded, before closing the store, the treasurer also asked us if we wanted to take over, and it was quite heartwarming at the time, but I thought that the cost was so high, so I put my mind at ease." Treasurer Pan said.
In addition, in addition to some of the more popular projects, at present, Hainan does not have a large number of people's hobbies, Xiao Gu sighed: "Hainan people do not seem to be very cold to leather goods, weather reasons, the use of leather goods, maintenance of leather goods is not very easy, into the exchange circle is also small, leisure culture is a kind of overflow after the prosperity, obviously we are a lot worse." ”
"After the construction of the free trade port, it is obvious that there are more tourists coming to Hainan, which is a good phenomenon, and they are more receptive to the way of life represented by handmade." The fish keeper said.
Whether it is "inner volume" and whether it is "commercial" is a question that Pan is worried about, but after figuring out the key, she began to be relieved. Regardless of how the workshop will run in the future, handmade crafts are an integral part of her life, and in the workshop, there are like-minded partners, two parrots, and a puppy.