On February 5, 2020, the CRAFTS CODE project team for RAM Central Stara Planina successfully held its second local stakeholder meeting. This took place in Elena city with the participation of craftsmen, representatives of the Ministry of Economy, creative associations, municipal administrations and specialised museums from RAM Central Stara Planina.
The participants who attended the meeting discussed frankly for more than three hours about the possibilities to recover some of the traditional technologies and at the same time to modernise the craft production. This included the difficulties of being both an artist and a manager, successful know-how of market realisation of handmade products both in Bulgaria and abroad, the challenge of working independently and the necessity to trust partners.
The craft community and the experts from the municipalities made interesting proposals for initiatives, which can be identified as good practices on the topic ''How to improve innovation applied to business models and process”.
In the ensuing discussion, the participants in the meeting highlighted the following two business models as innovative:
1. Completely independent business model (starts from the raw clay manufacturing and finally the market realisation of the product and taking the whole responsibility personally to protect one’s own reputation by working alone);
2. Small enterprise, where most of the processes are mechanised and the craftsman uses a device invented and constructed by himself for creating the shape of the very product.
After the selection of the business model RAM Central Stara Planina will start the preparation for the participation in the first Interregional Thematic Seminar, where the GOOD PRACTICE will be presented to the CRAFTS CODE project partners.
