I have finally gotten to a point with my chainmail, that I can no longer ignore the need to raise my prices. I have been holding off doing so for so long, but now I can't keep putting it off.
Before everything shut down, I knew my prices were pretty low, but I loved making the things, and I have had other ways to make up the difference in my booth. My price point seemed to be good, and I was selling pretty well, so I didn't want to put my sales in jeopardy.
At one of my recent cons, I got to meet and geek out with another chainmailler! It was so exciting to actually talk with someone who know what I was talking about and knew about the community. We mostly made different things, so we weren't competing much against each other, either.
It was she that unfortunately broke the news to me that supply prices have gone way up, recently. Up until now, I have been using my large stockpile to keep making my stuff, and I haven't had to worry about the rising prices much. After she let me know, I promptly went to my phone to verify, and I discovered that my main supplier has bumped up all their prices, particularly around the rubber rings that (if you haven't figured out by now) I use a LOT. With the 75% price hike on those, I can no longer just ignore it and recoup the difference with other items.
I'm going to do this in stages. Starting with the website listings, I am going to reprice all my chainmail. My next convention will see the first bump of the prices. The next con after that will be the final bump up. I haven't wanted to do this, and I'm hoping that my sales don't suffer because of it. I held off as long as I could, though.
All that being said, I want to encourage anyone who reads this to support your local and small businesses. Right now, prices everywhere are going up. Nobody actually WANTS to raise their prices, but with supply chain issues, etc, it has become a necessity all around. The smaller businesses don't have as much capital to be able to make it through the harder times, so they need all the help they can get.