selling my artwork

[mollykins]

As there are few jobs around me, i have decided to make some money in the summer holidays by painting and maybe doing some small 3d work then selling it.

When I went out yesterday we (my family and I) went to a little farm shop with a cafe. Upstairs was artwork, done by local artists selling for quite a reasonable price.
One of the pieces was priced at �45 and at a quality that i am perfectly capable of recreating (that's what my mum said)

Am I best off selling my work through an art shop who would charge me for selling it for them.
OR selling them on ebay (mum says that there are some days where it only costs 5p to sell something which is cheaper than the shops price would be) BUT I would only be able to sell paintings as I would be too worried to post 3d work incase it broke plus a canvas can be quite fragile aswell.

??????????????

[pastafreak]

From what little I know about selling hand-made items....I used to sell both bead jewellery and hand-painted papier mache items...it is pretty difficult. And i imagine it will be more so in the current economic climate. You are looking at those paintings as at a 'reasonable price '-but that is from the viewpoint of buyer. When it is yours hanging there ,and you feel it is worth more but the public wants everything for the cheapest amount possible...well-it will be demoralising to say the least. Also...do you know how LONG those artworks have hung there?? is it 2 weeks...0r 6 months?? As for Ebay...yes there is a time limit for sales...but things go for as little as 99p....you CAN set a higher minimum price...but there HAS to be the interest for that to happen,AND you need to factor in postage.
These are just a few things that you should consider.

[mollykins]

All very good points of view pasta but one thing; the buyer pays for postage and packaging so that means that there isn't a big chunk of my profits vanishing.

[mollykins]

I had a brainwave!

There's is a cafe near to me ( a different one to that mentioned in the question) and the walls are bare apart from a specials board.
Plus we are friendly with the owners and know many of the people that work there.

SO, i could say to them, 'i'll do paintings for your walls but they can be for sale and i'll give you some of the profits.' and because i know them they'll probably only take a small percentage and it makes the cafe look less boring doesn't it?

Is this a good idea?

[mollykins]

Plus i'll probably do the paintings in the summer (lots of school stuff to do before then), when the cafe gets busiest.

[jackthehat]

Sounds like a very good idea.
I have been into cafes/restaurants/bars where a similar sort of scheme seems to operate.

Best of luck.

[mollykins]

thanks jack.

My parents have been badgering me to get a job and when we thought of this it seems more enjoyable than doing a paper-round.

But like my art coursework, i find painting ect. easy but time-consuming but if it takes a few weeks to sell each one then that shouldn't be a problem.

Do you think they will charge.
I will be making money from it BUT . . .
-I know the people
-It will make the cafe more attractive
-I won't be making vast amounts of money
-There's a small chance that people who may buy the art might stop by when they are passing again to see if there is anything else they want and will probly eat something at the cafe aswell (but i don't know the likely hood of that happening maybe only once every couple of weeks if i'm lucky)

[bednobs]

lolol don't forget tax!

[Naomicorlett]

Gosh ! Molly will be very lucky to earn enough to pay tax... good luck...go get 'em girl.

[mollykins]

don't you have to earn about �7500 a year to pay tax?

plus i'm not going to do it all the time, only in the summer holidays and maybe the odd weekend when somehow i have no homework. (which is very unlikely)

[pastafreak]

Molly-your revised plan sounds spot-on!
it also sounds as if you've given this some serious thought. I would suggest that you also offer a 'bespoke' service...ie....a customer can request a painting of a partcular subject.....possibly at a slightly higer rate.

Whatever you do...good luck.

[Mully79]

Hi Molly

I'm an artist, and have been selling artwork on and off for the last 15 years (I'm nearly 30 now). Something I have done in my spare time, on demand, on top of my full time job.

There are tax implications, if you intend to do this very seriously I would go down the self-employed route. I only registered last year, up until that point I didn't pursue it as much as I would have liked and I earnt peanuts, so for that reason I did not register. Now I wish I had done it sooner as it's a great way to motivate yourself and makes you look more professional to potential clients.

I used to sell art on Ebay a few years back when the market was good. I deliberately did "abstract" pieces which I found easy to do and quickly, and of course were very popular. So I scoped the market and adapted my style to fit. I sold extremely well for a period of time, until the market started to get over-saturated, sales fell and selling prices dropped.

I don't sell on ebay anymore, just the effort of listing, dealing with random queries, packing, damaged or lost goods in the post, having to trail massive pieces of art to the post office, and risking low selling prices to attract a bidding war - hard work.

I have always specialised in pencil portraits, so I decided to put on a marketing drive with these. I had some leaflets printed, with my details, examples of work and mentioning starting prices (to deter people who want something for nothing). I developed my website so it had a price list, examples of work and other info. I listed on yell.com for free, kept refreshing ads on gumtree (also free), put a stack of leaflets in my local play centre and nursery. From this alone I generated enough business in August to keep me busy until Christmas. And it's also allowed me to build up a network and I get recommendations now from my original clients. I've not advertised for a while as I was just too busy but I still

[Mully79]

continued...

Many years ago I went to a couple of local art shops and they basically rented out wall space for you to hang your pics and took a commission on the sale price (if it sold). Personally for the type of work I did, it wasn't suitable (depending where you live, different types of art sell better than others). I thought it was a bit of a rip off.

I reckon if you're good enough, you make the effort to put yourself out there you will do fine. Contacts and word-of-mouth do go a long way.

(wow this is the longest reply I've ever done LOL)

[mollykins]

THANKS mull, great advice.

The thing is I haven't got as much time as people with a full time job. Sure they work about an hour more than me but i have tonnes of coursework to do. (I normally spend 1/2hr to and hour a day and about 2-4 hours at the weekends and holidays doing homework and coursework.)

[mollykins]

So would the cafe charge me and if so what kind of percentage would it be?

[Squitty]

Hi Mollykins - how about posting a picture of some of your art for us to see?

[mollykins]

I'm not trying to make this sound dodgey in anyway but . . .

Because of the coursework and everything i've mentioned, the images i post won't all be brilliant. This is because for our coursework we have to do something very different from what we have already done. But when i can paint then sell it I will only do what i'm best at, thick paints such as acrylic and poster paint(don't diss it just because little kids use it for finger painting!) on canvas, card and wood. And the final piece which i'm in the middle of doing now is paint on wood but its at school.
But i will be able to show you pictures of 3d work that i have done which is just as good if not better than the paintings i do, aswell as some of my other 2d work.

At the moment i havent got anyimages on my computer but i'll upload some and post them . . . you can't post picture so i'll put them some where not sure where yet and put a link on one of my next few answers.

[mollykins]

I have the link. Because the final pieces of the courseworks are at school, i took pictures of the parts of the coursework which are in my book

Plus i took a picture of a piece i did almost exactly teo years ago but at the time it was good and when i look at it now it is still quite good.

the first two images: the one on the left is a photo and the one on the right is a painting of the picture which is the most recent image on the page.

i haven't got a direct link to the page but if you go to this link www.molly-kins.piczo.com there is a list to the right of my picture. click on 'myphotos' and that will take you to the page. (this ight have sounded dodgey but i only just got it so i don't know how to go onto the page without being in design view)

[mollykins]

arrrrrr

the link doesn't work try this www.piczo.com/molly-kins then click on myphotos next to the picture.

[mollykins]

nope.

[mollykins]

molly-kins.piczo.com then click myphotos next to pic.

hopefully this 1 will work.