FAQ
Questions makers actually ask
If yours isn’t here, ask us — we answer, and good questions tend to end up on this page.
Getting started
What MakerFusion is, and whether it fits how you already work.
- What is MakerFusion, in one sentence?
- It's the back office for a handmade business — inventory, recipes and real costs, orders from every channel you sell on, expenses, and the reports that tell you whether you're actually making money — in one place built around how makers work, not how accountants think.
- Who is it for?
- Makers who sell what they make: soap and candle makers, jewellers, potters, woodworkers, resin artists, fibre artists, and anyone else running a craft business. It suits you best if you buy materials, turn them into products, and sell those products somewhere — whether that's one Etsy shop or five channels at once. It also easily suits print-on-demand and digital product sellers, and we're actively working on making it fit more business types.
- Do I have to move my whole business over on day one?
- No, and we'd rather you didn't. Most makers start with one thing that hurts most — usually inventory or knowing their real cost per product — and add the rest as they go. Nothing requires anything else to be set up first.
- How long does setup take?
- A few days to a week, depending on the size of your catalogue. Adding your materials and recipes is the bulk of it. You can import products from a connected shop rather than typing them in, and you can start with your ten best sellers instead of your entire catalogue.
- Is MakerFusion finished?
- Honestly, no — it's in alpha and being built in the open with the makers using it. That means some things are still rough and new things land often. It also means when you say "it should do this too", there's a real chance it will.
Inventory, recipes & costs
The part that answers "what did this actually cost me to make?"
- How does MakerFusion know what my products cost?
- You store a recipe for each product — the materials it uses and how much of each. Your material costs flow into that recipe automatically, so the cost per unit is calculated from real numbers rather than a guess you made once and never revisited. Change a material's price and every product using it updates.
- Does it handle labour and overhead, or only materials?
- Both. A recipe carries labour time and an hourly rate alongside its materials, plus an overhead figure — so the cost you see is the full picture, not just ingredients. You also choose whether administrative time and shipping are counted in your numbers, so you can see your real hourly wage with admin included, or just your making time — whichever question you're trying to answer.
- What about products made from other products?
- Supported. A recipe can include another recipe as an ingredient, so a component you make in batches — a dyed skein, a cured resin blank, a soap base — can feed into the finished products that use it, and its cost carries through.
- Does my stock update when something sells?
- Yes. Inventory deducts automatically when a sale comes in from a connected channel or when you log one manually, and materials deduct when you record making something.
- Will it tell me when I'm about to run out?
- Set a reorder point on any material and it flags when you drop to or below it, with out-of-stock called out separately. Those low materials roll straight into a shopping list you can take to your supplier.
Selling & sales channels
Bringing orders in from wherever you sell.
- Which sales channels can I connect?
- More than most makers expect. Etsy* and Shopify sync orders, listings and fees directly. eBay, Faire, Bonanza and WooCommerce connect and sync your listings and catalogue, with order sync on the way. Square brings in your in-person and craft-fair card payments automatically, and Gumroad covers digital products and memberships. Print-on-demand sellers can connect Printful, Printify, Gelato, Prodigi, Gooten, Lulu and Bookvault, with real production costs per product. And craft fair, market, consignment and wholesale sales are all tracked too — MakerFusion is built expecting you to sell in more than one place.
- Do I have to connect a shop to use MakerFusion?
- Not at all. Manual entry works fully and is free forever. Connecting a shop saves you the typing — that's the difference, not the features you get.
- My listings and my products aren't the same thing. Does that break anything?
- No — that's a deliberate design decision. Your product is your record of what you make; a listing is how one channel advertises it. MakerFusion keeps them as separate records and links them, so one product can be listed in several places and your inventory still stays correct.
- Are marketplace fees included in my numbers?
- Yes, and they matter more than most makers expect. Channel fees are broken out in your financials, so the profit you see is what you actually kept — not your sticker price minus materials.
- Can I compare how my channels are doing?
- Yes. Channel performance sits side by side, so you can see whether the fair you drove three hours to actually beat a quiet week on Etsy*.
Money & reporting
Knowing where you stand without a spreadsheet.
- Can I track expenses that aren't materials?
- Yes — booth fees, postage, tools, subscriptions, marketing, mileage to a fair, whatever it is. Categories are yours to define, and you map them to accounting buckets yourself rather than having the app guess wrong on your behalf.
- Will this replace my accountant?
- No, and it isn't trying to. It gives you clean, exportable numbers and a profit and loss across any date range — which makes your accountant's job cheaper and your tax season much less unpleasant.
- Can I get my data out?
- Always. Inventory, orders and financial reports export whenever you want. It's your business — your records shouldn't be held hostage.
Plans, data & support
The practical questions worth asking before you sign up.
- How much does it cost?
- Every account includes the free starter tools at no cost, forever. Beyond that, MakerFusion is modular — you add only the parts you want, each with a free trial and no credit card to start. The full breakdown lives on the pricing page.
- What happens to my data if I stop paying for a module?
- It stays. Deactivating a module puts its data into read-only mode rather than deleting it, and reactivating picks up exactly where you left off.
- Who can see my data?
- You, and anyone you deliberately invite to your shop. Your shop's records are yours — we don't sell them, and we don't share them with other makers. The privacy policy sets out the specifics in plain language.
- Can I run more than one shop from one account?
- Yes — up to five, each with completely separate inventory, orders and books, switched between from the header. Handy if you run separate brands, or split a print-on-demand line from your handmade work.
- Does it work on my phone?
- It works in your phone or tablet browser and is built to be usable there, which matters most when you're standing at a fair table. A dedicated mobile app is on the roadmap, not shipped.
- Something's broken, or I need something it doesn't do. What then?
- Tell us. Email stacey@makerfusion.app or use the contact form — a real person reads it, and a fair amount of what's in MakerFusion today exists because a maker asked for it.
Still wondering about something?
There’s no support queue to get lost in — a real person reads every message.
* The term “Etsy” is a trademark of Etsy, Inc. This application uses the Etsy API but is not endorsed or certified by Etsy, Inc.