in business for yourself

Jul 01
2009

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in business for yourself
Artists – What you would pay to put your paintings in a store???

Just curious to know if any of you would rent a wall space in a store? Say, in a small city with about 30,000 people with an average income of $50,000. It would be all fine arts mostly paintings with some sculptings. The store would be in a downtown location. You would NOT have to be “exclusive” with this place like some Galleries. The store would NOT take a percentage of your sales, you would just have to pay a set amount pr. month for renting the wall space. You would be able to decorate it as you would like and change the peices when you want to. You could also put a small bio of yourself with business cards. You would not actually have to be in the store to sell. There will be a manager on to take care of sales. You can price your peices how you would like and just pick up a check at the end of the month.
I know personally I would LOVE this as an artist! I pay $200.00 pr art show and that is only for a weekend with limited hrs! I also pay that on an average pr week online!

You are going to find places like this and it just doesn’t pay normally. These are like craft malls. Even though craft malls also take a percentage.

Another thing is that cities usually have a business rule that inventory is taxable. So at the end of the year the “market place” usually takes inventory of all product in the place. Then you have to report what your COST was in materials and report it along with payment. The payment is usually around 7% of cost.

If you are trying to be a SELLER and open a business this is a failing idea. The reason being is that paintings are very expensive in a lot of cases. A customer pays by credit card costing you money, anywhere from 1.2% to 4% (Amex).. So if a customer purchases a $4000.00 painting then you (the market place) would owe as much as $160.00 for the purchase.. NOT regaining your money from the artist. So if you charge $200.00 per month to the artist then your net profit is $40.00 (if they only sell one painting)….

As for me. I’m a business owner AND an artist. I have seen many galleries come and go. The BIGGEST problem with these markets is traffic, there isn’t any. Even if every person in the city shows up the average sale is 1 out of every 10 persons to buy. This isn’t hambergers where people will come back over and over to eat again. Only so much art can be sold.

How many artists will be displayed? Right there that creates competition among the artists and lets say $200.00 per month rent. Not enough artists to buy space then the “market” can not pay their rent.

I live in a city of 250,000 people. Craft malls die because they have no DRAW.