CraftOps: A Complete Platform Overview

Running a maker or fabrication shop is a balancing act. You are managing customer orders, keeping machines running, tracking material costs, and trying to grow your business all at the same time. Spreadsheets and sticky notes only get you so far. CraftOps was built from the ground up to solve this exact problem: it is a complete shop management platform designed specifically for 3D printing shops, laser cutting studios, CNC machining operations, and multi-discipline fabrication businesses. Whether you are a solo maker with a handful of printers or a growing shop with dozens of machines and a full team, CraftOps gives you a single place to manage every aspect of your operation.

Job Management and Machine Integration

At the core of CraftOps is a powerful job management system that tracks every order from the moment a customer submits a request to the final delivery. Each job flows through configurable status stages, including quoting, approval, scheduling, production, quality control, and shipping. You can assign jobs to specific machines, set priority levels, and attach files like STL models, DXF cut paths, or G-code programs directly to each job record. Your team sees a real-time dashboard showing which jobs are in progress, which are queued, and which need attention.

CraftOps connects directly to your machines. For 3D printers, integrations with OctoPrint and Bambu Cloud let you monitor print progress, temperatures, and failures from the CraftOps dashboard without walking over to each printer. Laser cutters and CNC machines are supported through job queue management and status tracking, so you always know what is running and what is next in line. When a machine finishes or encounters an error, CraftOps sends notifications to the right people immediately.

Material Tracking and Cost Calculations

Knowing your true cost per job is essential for profitability, and CraftOps makes this automatic. The material tracking system lets you register every spool of filament, bottle of resin, sheet of acrylic, or block of aluminum in your inventory. As jobs consume materials, CraftOps deducts from your stock and calculates the exact material cost for each job. You set up material profiles with cost-per-gram, cost-per-sheet, or cost-per-unit pricing, and the platform handles the math. Low stock alerts notify you before you run out, and purchase order tools help you reorder from your preferred suppliers without leaving the platform.

Beyond raw materials, CraftOps factors in machine time, labor, overhead, and markup to give you a complete cost picture. When you generate a quote for a customer, the platform pulls from your configured rates and material costs to produce an accurate estimate in seconds. This means no more guessing at prices or accidentally undercharging for complex jobs.

Customer Portal, Invoicing, and Marketplace

CraftOps includes a customer-facing portal where your clients can submit new job requests, upload files, approve quotes, track the status of their orders, and pay invoices. This self-service approach reduces the back-and-forth emails and phone calls that eat into your productive hours. Customers see real-time updates on their jobs without you having to manually send status messages.

The invoicing module generates professional invoices from completed jobs, tracks payments, and supports recurring billing for repeat customers or subscription-based services. Integration with popular accounting platforms keeps your books in sync without double entry.

For shops that want to expand their reach, the CraftOps Marketplace connects you with customers searching for local fabrication services. Buyers can browse participating shops by capability, material, location, and turnaround time. The marketplace handles discovery and funnels qualified leads directly into your CraftOps job queue.

Tip: Start by setting up your machine profiles and material inventory before inviting customers to the portal. Having accurate machine capabilities and material costs configured from day one means your first quotes will be precise and professional.

What's Next

This overview covers the broad strokes of what CraftOps offers, but each module has depth worth exploring. In upcoming posts, we will walk through getting started with your first shop setup, dive deep into job management workflows, explore machine integration options, and show you how material tracking can transform your understanding of per-job profitability. CraftOps is designed to grow with your shop, so whether you are just starting out or scaling up, the platform adapts to your needs. Stay tuned for detailed guides on each feature, and reach out to us if you have questions about how CraftOps can fit your specific operation.