I am a hobbyist, and my job will probably never require me to design and print anything for work.
I do really enjoy the process of conceptualizing, designing, and printing, and have done so for myself and some close acquaintances.
I’ve spent many hours/days learning the tools of the trade and was wondering if there was an opportunity to make some money as a side gig. Has anyone been successful doing this, and how did you go about it?
Here are a couple of my early designs, I plan to upload more once I clean things up a bit.
I printed some stuff that I thought was cool and just put it up on Etsy early this year at a price that would be worthwhile for me. I was shocked when the first order came in as I never thought anyone would buy it. Then the orders kept coming in and I’ve grossed about 6k so far on Etsy. It’s nice that all of my hobby equipment and filaments are paid for and that’s all I’m looking for.
I continue to randomly list stuff that I think is cool. Sometimes they sell and sometimes they don’t and that’s fine. I don’t do SEO or research keywords or advertise. If I get bored of selling prints one day then I’ll just stop.
And printing is the least time consuming part of the process. It’s the packing and taking it to the post office that takes up the most time.