On 2/3/14 16:07 : , Ken Norton wrote:
> A typical fair will cost you $200 for the space rent, give or take.
> Round trip travel (average across multiple fairs) is 150 miles or
> about $80 in mileage costs. Food/Drink another $20. So, your hard
> costs are $300 just to show up. Booth equipment wear-and-tear and
> display upgrade/replacement is another $50 per show. Product damage
> and "shrinkage" is at least another $50 per show. So, you're at $400
> without even considering time. Now, consider that your profit margin
> on the stuff sold is somewhere between 50% and 75% (at best), you need
> to do a little algebra.
>
> If the profit margin is 50% and you need to cover $400 for the show
> costs, that means you need to gross $800 for the show JUST to break
> even. $800 minus cost-of-goods $400 = $400, which is the cost of the
> show.
>
> Let's say you actually want to make a little money for your time.
> You'll have 20 hours wrapped up for the show (travel+show) and you
> value your time at $10 per hour. That means you need to make another
> $200 in net income. That's another $400 in sales. So, you need $1200
> in gross sales with a 50% profit margin on your inventory JUST to
> break even. Of course, the tax man wants his piece of the action, so
> you'll want to earn at least twice that amount, so you are up to $1600
> in gross sales with a 50% profit margin on your inventory. This isn't
> just for one wildly successful show, but the average for EVERY show
> for the season.
>
>
Sheri and I used to own a stained-glass studio. We used to do art
fairs. Brutal is a good term. First, you're out your booth fee
oftentimes 8 months in advance. And then there are the other costs that
Ken mentioned. Plus, if you have a studio, all of the time spent on
commissions takes away from time you have to spend making art fair
inventory, and vice-versa.
There were many fairs where we sold two little suncatchers and nothing
else. Very frustrating. So, we eventually decided to give it up and
just go to the ones we wanted to see as spectators. Eventually, we gave
up the studio as well and got adult jobs, since the studio was also not
making money. When a person comes in and says, "I can get a
stained-glass lamp from Menard's for $150. Why should I pay you
$1200?", after a while it doesn't matter how you try to explain about
creativity, artistic choices, quality of glass, uniqueness of each
piece... you simply give up and say, "I can't explain why. Go get your
lamp at Menard's" The super-cheap Taiwanese glass killed out business.
Hell, I've got a fairly gorgeous miniature Tiffany Dragonfly
reproduction on a freaking cast-bronze base with mosaic inlay on my desk
that cost me $200 at a lamp store. Glass choices are very similar to
what we would have done. But we wouldn't have even put oil in the glass
cutter for that kind of money. And I picked up a Dale Tiffany (no,
they're not remotely related to THAT Tiffany - they simply stole the
name for marketing reasons) miniature Laburnum from ebay for $75 that
has roughly 1100 tiny pieces. And it looks nice.
In the end, we chose food and housing over artistic freedom and joined
the workforce. Most of our glass and tools are still in storage - we
want to sell off the common glass and keep the fancy art glass, as we
still have some projects we'd like to do for ourselves. But we will
never again do it as a business.
--
Paul Braun
Certified Music Junkie
Valparaiso, IN
"It's such a fine line between stupid, and clever." - David St. Hubbins
"Music washes from the soul the dust of everyday life" - Harlan Howard
--
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