Pricing your work....

MaryAnn Carroll

There's nothing like a good re-run once in awhile. This post is a couple of years old, but the dilemma is still current. How do you determine prices?

Wow, that is expensive!!! I would guess that this is a reaction that you have probably heard, whether mumbled to their friend or made directly to you.

Well.... I say...

"You get what you pay for!"

After my most recent glaze firing, I was once again faced with the dilemma of pricing.  I try to be fair, but also, I put a lot of time into my work to make a high quality product, so I'm not going to give them away.  What I do is this... I base my prices on the amount of time that I put into each bead.  Beads that are basic rounds with one glaze take the least amount of time so they are the least expensive.  If a round bead, however, is large, then it takes up more room in the kiln which means fewer beads in that firing (beads cannot touch each other during a glaze firing).  In that case, that bead would be priced higher do to that fact.

Then, we have the beads above which were created from porcelain clay at the same time.  They are basically the same size (I don't measure while making beads) and both glazed.  The beads on the right cost more than the beads on the left.  Although you might think that the beads on the left look like they have two glazes, they don't.  They have one glaze that "breaks" on the edge of a ceramic piece.  This simply means that while the glaze is melting in the kiln, certain areas will puddle in greater amounts and edges, bumps, etc. will not.  Both very cool.....  but the time invested was different.

And then we have these expensive little babies that you see above.  Well....I LOVE the look (picture doesn't do them justice, but the time invested far exceeds that of some of my other beads.... 

And they all came out of this little kiln shown above.  This is a doll kiln, which is perfect for the amount that I am able to create at one time.

I also own these ceramic beads above.  I believe that they are manufactured in China.  While there is nothing wrong with them and some do have some of the same effects as my handmade, they were most likely produced in a factory, which is why the price is considerably lower than handmade ceramic beads.

Those, most likely, came from a kiln such as the one above.

So.... I hope that you learned a little more about why those of us who create handmade might need to charge more......

Like they sometimes say, "Wow!!  That is expensive!!"

I say.......

"Yup! You get what you pay for."

To see a funny little video about pricing at shows, click HERE for one of Patty's posts.

Questions I would like you to think about:

If you do not depend on your main income coming from your creations, do you think about others who do when pricing?

Do you check out your competitors to make sure your prices are in line with most of them?

Have you thought you were getting a great deal on something that looked similar to a higher priced item and turned out that when you got it, it was junk?

Please weigh in with your thoughts about pricing.....

As always, thank you for supporting artists who create handmade with handmade....

MaryAnn