Featured Company – Craft Village UK

Posted by GreenStreet.net on September 12, 2009

Craft Village UK is a sustainable business with no religious or political affiliation, working directly with rural Africa artisans to develop unique, sustainable, copyright-protected product lines.

Their goal is to promote fair wages and job creation in poor African communities and attract a new audience to the Fairtrade movement via contemporary statues of popular animation and film characters.

They have an exciting range of ‘Simpsons statues’ that will have a direct positive impact on the remote village of Tabaka, Kenya, where the sculptures are hand crafted by a team of master carvers and finished to a high-quality sheen by the women of the village.

The range includes 12 intricately carved busts, each standing approximately 12cm high, unique in colour and contour, signed by the individual carver and boxed in bespoke Simpsons branded packaging.

This unique mix of traditional sculpture and cartoon culture has received great reviews from CNN, The BBC, Sir Bob Geldof, and many happy customers. They also have received a personal message of support from Simpsons Creator Matt Groening. The range has strong appeal to two specific markets; the growing Fairtrade market, and the massive Simpsons collector’s market.

We asked the founder of Craft Village, 32-year-old Paul Young, what inspired him to set up this unique business and to describe the journey to where the company is now.

GreenStreet.net: Tell us a bit about yourself, and your business background.
Paul Young: “Craft Village is my first business. I studied business and accounting at Leeds Metropolitan University. After University I returned to my hometown (Darlington County Durham) and worked in various temporary jobs, from the occasional office job to working on building sites. I could never find a vocation that I was passionate about or one that held my interest for very long. I had always wanted to set up my own business and around my mid twenties I had the idea for Craft Village.”

What was the inspiration behind mixing Fairtrade with popular culture memorabilia?
“My younger sister had been living in Uganda and had sent home various statues. I was looking at a row of small stone elephant statues…and thought to myself if the carvers (who’d made them) could produce something with a popular ‘western’ theme such as ‘Star Wars’ or ‘The Simpsons’ it would be interesting to see the results.”

Briefly describe the journey from idea to finished product.
“After the initial idea I researched stone carvers in various countries. Kenya seemed a good source of sculpture. I traveled to a village called Tabaka in the stone-carving region of Kisii, Western Kenya. I took various Simpsons toys with me and asked the carvers there to sculpt statues based on the toys. We tried many different designs and styles. Over a period of several months we perfected the designs.

I knew it would be difficult to get an official License for the products. To improve my chances I made a mini documentary about the statues: who makes them; how they are made; where they are made and who would benefit etc. I registered Craft Village as an official business and submitted my Simpsons product samples and my mini-doc to 20th Century Fox in Los Angeles. After many months of dialogue with Fox I secured an official worldwide Simpsons License.

After that I had to develop a website, and packaging, and research the best sales routes – this all took about a year. Craft Village finally launched late 2007. Things were progressing but unfortunately in early 2008 problems arose with my packaging and political and tribal violence erupted in Kenya. We had to delay things and the business was put on hold for another year. Craft Village eventually re-launched in Feb 2009.

The Craft Village business model has taken over four years to come to fruition, with many setbacks and false starts along the way… but we have a great product and I am confident we are well now placed to build on this opportunity and will have a massive positive impact in Kenya.”

Tell us about the craftsmen.
“The craftsmen are amazingly talented. If they were born in a western country they would most likely be rich. We work with two groups, The Master Carvers and The Classic Carvers (approx 30 carvers in total). Ages range from early 20’s to mid 50’s. Most have no formal education and most have very big families. They’re very friendly and welcoming, extremely competitive and eager to see this project succeed.

Familiarizing the sculptors with The Simpsons was difficult. Until a couple of years ago there was no electricity in Tabaka. The carvers had no concept of what a cartoon was, let alone have any clue what The Simpsons was about. The issue of Licensing and Branding that come with a global property such as The Simpson was naturally a foreign concept to them. They’ve been very patient and very enthusiastic to learn and understand the background to the project.”

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Craft Village worked with Fox Creative in L.A. to develop bespoke branding and worked with the artisans in Kenya to create a product that improves the lives of many. After many setbacks and delays due to initial problems with packaging and violence on the ground in Kenya (and significant financial difficulties that comes with delays) Craft village now have a company and product to be proud of.

Look out for Craft Village products on GreenStreet.net soon, but in the meantime head over to the Craft Village web site.