Rocky Mountain Collage Society
Best Practices I - 2010

How to price your artwork:

You want your final asking prices to be in line with what other artists with similar credentials to yours are charging for their work.

Your pricing should be consistent and without emotional attachments. Pieces you’re particularly fond of should not be priced higher, as well, pieces you don’t care for should not be priced low. Buyers/collectors don’t have the same attachments you do. But this begs the question; what if one piece has a very expensive frame on it while another of the same size has a recycled frame.

Candy says that she simply doubles the price of the frame if it is a custom frame. A $150 frame would mean a $300 price tag on her piece. That’s fine if she sells at a show or to an individual, but if you sell at a store or gallery, they usually take 50%, so this calculation wouldn’t be good. Sara Oakley once said that she has a per square inch price (we don’t know what it is). A 16 x 20 piece is 320 square inches. Multiply that by .75, for example, and that comes to $240. We don’t know if you put your frame cost on top of this figure or not. Maybe depends on the cost of the frame.

Gayle says: I usually have a benchmark: like a 16x20 is a certain amount and I go up and down from there in increments of $50. If it is a particularly good work, I might price it higher or vice versa. Having just recently earned some big commissions, my prices now have to jump to reflect the price I was paid for a certain size by the commissioning entity. I don't know if this is a good thing or not.

A simple idea is pricing your work based on time, labor, and cost of materials. Set yourself a reasonable hourly wage, add the cost of materials, and make that your asking price. If materials cost $100 and you take 10 hours to make the art at $15 per hour, then you price it at $250. You can set a timer and keep track of the time on a piece of paper if you want to be accurate.

Cathey says: Size and the market in which I am showing play a part. I watch what others are doing (those who are doing what I do) and make a comparison. Then I look at costs and see what is left over - is it enough? My range is $45 to $600. Artwork priced above that or below it haven't sold. Pricing also depends on your reputation and success.

Deb Snider says: I do strongly believe that an artist should set a price for a piece of work and then not deviate, regardless of the commission differentials at various galleries or if the artist is doing a direct sale. If an artist is web marketing, the price is the price for everyone around the world! If we change our prices for each venue, our buyers will become perturbed if they've paid a higher amount somewhere else.

How to sign your artwork:

We have been told that artwork produced by males has a higher value than artwork produced by females. It has been recommended that we sign our artwork with first initial and last name, thus no gender attachment. Some of us would like to change this way of thinking but this will require another powwow.

Make this something you notice the next time you go to a show or gallery.

Karyn Gabaldon of Gabaldon Gallery in Durango says this when I asked her about art made by females: “It 's SAD but TRUE! All the major museums and galleries USED to ONLY represent 5% women ...it has now DROPPED.”

Connie made up an art name “Kani” years ago and uses that exclusively for signature.

Deb Snider says: I sign my full name or last name, along with a copyright symbol and the year created. If I use my last name only on the front of the piece, then I have full name and contact info on the back. On fabric collages, I place all info only on the back of the piece.

How do you keep track of sales:

Connie uses Appleworks on her Mac and has a database of peoples names and addresses that she adds to with every sale from shows. She enters info from checks she receives and has a mailing list sign up sheet at most shows. On her database is the following information: Last Name, First Name, Address, City, State, Zip, Phone, Email, Comments. The comments section is useful for little notes about the people, if necessary, and, very important, which shows they came to and the year because after several years of not seeing them at our private spring show, for example, we can take them off the list, thus saving a post card stamp. It’s nice to break the first and last name apart, into separate cells, because if you want to do a search on a last name, it is easier this way.

For artwork in stores, each item has an inventory number on it. She has a sheet with inventory numbers, description, price. When something sells, it is marked off the sheet with the month and year. She can see what the stores have in their inventory at any time based on the sheet.

Deb Snider has a master notebook, with relevant data on each piece created: title, size, media, date created, price, venues at which it's been shown, who buys it and when, and any other notes that she might want for future documentation.

Gayle uses an Excel file by year. She sometimes has some sales tax to pay if she sells out of her studio and this helps to keep everything straight.

Do you keep a computer database?:

Gayle says: Yes - one for sales, one for painting inventory which includes sizes, prices, price of frame, where the painting is currently, what shows it has been in, awards if any and if lucky, who bought it. I also have an address list for openings in a different application.

See above for Connie’s database.

Deb Snider says: Yes, the notebook is computer-generated for easy updating, and I also print a hard copy each time I update the info.

How do you keep track of which pieces are in which show and when to pick them up:

Photograph each piece and print it out, even if it is a rough photo, and attach it to the paperwork. Write on the calendar the delivery and pick up dates.

Gayle says: I use the calendar on my computer for delivery and pick up date. Having all info in one place is very helpful--except if my computer crashes.

You can photograph each finished piece and have them all in a photo album with their size, how much the frame cost, where it is currently residing, if it sold, price. This should not be the portfolio book you show people because they don’t need to see the frame costs and other information.

Mac users: A local pastel artist organizes her artwork this way: First, she photographs every completed piece. She uses iPhoto where she has folders set up that have pictures of the pieces that are in a particular show. She labels the folders with the show name. These are duplicate pictures, as she keeps all the photos of her artwork in one large folder on the computer and then organizes them into folders by show or other category. There is a way to write info about each photo. Click on the “Information” box at the lower left of the screen. You can add frame cost, dimensions, who bought it, price. etc.

How should we finish the back sides of our work:

The backs should be as professional as the fronts. No tape or holes. The back of artwork is great for brochures, business cards, resumes, or whatever promotional material you have.

Gayle suggests not using Kraft paper, but foam core to finish the backs.

Method of using foam core: cut the foam core with an Xacto and straight edge on a self-healing cutting mat. Secure the foam core with a point driver tool. Michaels has an acid-free foam core product. Attach screw eyes and finish with framing wire.

Making your own frames:

Gayle gets her frames from American Frame. If it is a wood frame they send it assembled. Metal frames you need to put together yourself--although this is very easy to do. When Gayle orders from American Frame it comes with a piece of acrylic instead of glass. To replace with glass, she uses Jan at the Great Frame Up.

Another place to get frames online is pictureframes.com.

**Note: The fronts should be clean; free of fingerprints and smudges.

Ideas on where to display our work locally:

Docs on Call building, north of Patterson on 12th Street has artwork for sale.

Local churches, restaurants, doctor’s offices, coffee shops (Connie sold coffee cup clocks at Java Junction.)

What is your system for organizing your paper collection:

Connie uses shelves. Top shelf for not very often used paper. One for patterned paper, one for bright solids and one for neutrals. I have another shelf for scraps of other types of papers (watercolor scraps, wallpaper, book pages). I also have plastic bins for tiny, medium and larger scraps of papers. I have another bin for tissue papers.

Gayle says: I use those plastic see-through file envelopes you can buy at Office Depot for particular subjects like forests, buildings, textures, textiles and patterns, flowers, etc. Other than that--my painted tissue is in a collapsible laundry basket, plus two file drawers. To tell you the truth, it is mostly organized in my head. Lightweight bins are helpful. I have bins for newspapers, wallpapers, etc.

Deb Snider has cut pieces filed in a box in small baggies, by category, like flowers, humans, etc. She has several drawers for uncut papers that are filed by types of paper.

Candy says: For my organization of papers I hang one of those canvas shoe carriers that one buys for their closets. Has about 9 squares in it for papers.

Bev rolls the larger sheets and stores them upright in a basket. She doesn’t have trouble with them staying curled. She has a bin for textural materials, such as textured packing materials, e.g. bubble wrap and cardboard, screening, cheesecloth, anything that makes a mark, adhesive spreaders, combs, pointed objects, stamps.

Deb Robinson works within color schemes, so her organization is color oriented (with size and paper type too). The tiny scraps are in plastic 6X9 drawer bins by color, regardless of type of paper (tissue, painted, decorated, stamped, embossed, etc.). The stiffer 12x12 and 8X10 and 5x6 paper stock are on a book shelf in bins by colors, or packs and then some specialty types are sorted, vellum, metallic, etc. again by size. These are unadulterated sheets. Then I have a scrap file of bigger, previously used pieces that won't fit in the 6X9 drawers sorted into clear baggies or envelopes then tossed in a bin I can rifle thru easily. They are sorted by type. Japanese, painted, metallic, embellishments (small knickknacks). On a tall flat shelf I arrange all the full sheets of handmade paper lying flat. They used to be in order by color and type, but the pile is too high now. And too mixed up. I really would like to get them all in order but need a big space to sort them out and a lot of help. The whole pile is very heavy just to get down. I sort all my junk costume jewelry/doodads in plastic boxes of drawers by the color wheel, yellow, yellow green, blue green, etc. I do the same with my fabric trim, ribbons, buttons, etc., everything is by grouped by color and or material as much as I am able.

Helpful tips for studio organization:

Gayle suggests having your stuff as close to hand as possible using bins, and always have fresh water in your containers. Try to know where everything is and hope for the best.

Connie has all beads together in bead boxes by color, embroidery floss in a bin, rubber stamps and sheets of rubber together, bins for “found objects” organized by; golds, silvers, buttons, stones, “theme”, sparkly and misc.

Other ideas and thoughts:

Don't be too organized. Sometimes when you are looking for something, just the right thing will turn up unexpectedly. Trust the process.

A friend of Connie’s once told her that she doesn’t start a new project until St. Paddy's day each year. From January 'til March 17 she cleans up, organizes, plans and finishes old projects.

Cool idea: Connie took one of her pieces to Precision Printing where they lightened it up and made it as the entire background of her business card as well as letterhead. It is nice looking and professional looking.

Ideas for Best Practices II:

Compiled by Connie Smith.

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