Membership
If you are interested in becoming a member of the New Orleans Craft Mafia, please take a look at our membership guidelines, then fill out the online application below.
We will then invite you to come to one of our meetings and participate in a casual interview with us and show us some samples of your work. We will be interviewing and accepting new members twice a year: once at the beginning of the year, around January, and once in the summer. While you may submit an application any time, please understand that we will not be able to let you know if you are accepted until after one of our bi-annual member applicant meetings.
For questions about joining, or questions once you become a new member, please contact tressa [at] neworleanscraftmafia [dot] com.
MEMBERSHIP GUIDELINES:
ALL MEMBERS MUST:
• Be a professional crafter.
- It doesn’t matter if you do it full-time or part-time, but you must treat your craft as a business.
- Our group is currently limited to crafters, not fine artists who specialize only in media such as painting, sculpture or photography. We love and respect those artists, but that is not what our group is about.
- We are always looking for new members whose work is complimentary, but does not compete directly with the work of our current members. We currently have a number of jewelry artists in our group, so please understand that while we are open to new jewelry artists whose work is totally different from that already represented, we are very limited in the number of new jewelry artists we will be able to accept.
- Please take a look at our current member list to get a feel for the types of crafters we currently represent.
• Maintain a good business reputation.
• Accept full individual responsibility for all legal issues pertaining to your business.
This includes business licensing, taxes, liability, etc.
• Install a link on your website to the New Orleans Craft Mafia website.
• Pay quarterly membership dues, which is currently $30.
If you choose to pay via PayPal, there is a $1.50 addition to cover PayPal’s fees.
• Check in on the online forum at least once a week to read any important notices and participate in online discussion, voting and roll calls.
This requires a time commitment of about one hour per week.
• Check emails from the email discussion list at least once a week to read any important notices.
• Have your own business website.
This can be an Etsy shop or your own separately hosted site. MySpace or Facebook profiles only do not count.
• Attend all monthly in-person meetings.
These take approximately 1.5 – 2 hours each month.
• Contribute to the group in some way.
Every member in the New Orleans Craft Mafia has equal input on how the group is run. We vote on issues and make decisions based on the majority opinion. Because we are a small group, it is important that every member takes an equal amount of responsibility in accomplishing our goals. Some of us write good press releases, some of us design great flyers, some of us know how to do HTML — but most of us can do none of those things on our own.
All together, we make a strong team. If you decide to join the group, it is important that you realize you will be expected to participate in brainstorming, and contribute some sort of skills or provide some type of services for the group.
• Follow any other new guidelines that are voted on by the group.
MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION:
