Pricing and ethics

Patti,

You have to consider more than just your costs. You have time, overhead, investments in equipment etc, experience, artistic talent... you name it.

I would think that's it's not ethics as much as simple pricing decisions. I hate making them too.

You charge what you feel is right, people must choose if they can afford it. You cannnot price to simply make everything affordable because eventually you'll reach a point where you've priced yourself out of the bottom of the market and are in the group of people with very little disposable income.

There is always an intangible to factor in, it's up to you to decide what your value is to add in to the materials.

I know, no help at all! But if someone else has a good formula I'd be happy to use it too.

-Su

The more common formula I've seen is 2x (or 3x) cost of materials, an hourly wage (I use the minimum wage for my state), with a higher hourly wage for more intricate pieces.

That's what I generally use. That way I make back the cost of the materials, with enough extra for it to be a profit, and enough to compensate for my time.

-Amber.

Ok, I don't know anything about making jewelry but I'll give my uneducated 2 cents. I think $12.00 for a pair of handmade earrings is too low. As someone else said, you have to consider more than cost of materials. I'll shut up now since I'm basically talking out my behind when it comes to shows and selling jewelry. Just wanted to say that $12.00 sounds low. Your time is worth more than that.

Teresa

I agree, Teresa.

another good way to judge is to go into department stores. look at how much they're charging for mass produced earrings and other jewelry items that are often made with fake gemstones, base metal findings, and so on. They're more than $12, I'm guessing. An ex boyfriend once purchased a multi-strand necklace for me from a high end department store. The gemstones were pitted and very low quality. Over half the beads were plastic. The clasp was base metal. But they were charging something like $70 for it.

-Amber.

I'll add my 2 cents also.

When I do shows we have a earring making party with myself,wife Mil and Sil, we pump out 400 earrings at a time, basicly what the ladies think looks good they put together and i do all the assembly work. Basic bead earring are $10 in ss or 14k gf, when we satart adding swaros the price goes up to $15-$20, lampwork start at $25. The more intricate the design the price goes up. I have charged $75 for swaro chandler earrings with over 30 swaros in it, gaudy UGLY but hey the woman flashed the cash!

Jim J.Redden Design snipped-for-privacy@comcast.net

Beadgasms for all!

I agree - $12 is way too low.

For wholesale, I take cost of materials times 3 for easy pieces (times 5 for difficult) and then round up. I find it works out about the same to take times 2 and add hourly wage. Remember you need to:

cover the cost of the materials make a profit have additional monies to replace materials.

keystone times three barely covers these items.

have you seen this site:

Barbara

Ok, I don't know anything about making jewelry but I'll give my

I appreciate all your comments. But, I would have a real problem charging $24.00 for a design which took less than 5 minutes to make and cost me less than $2.00 in materials. Also, people tend to (at least in this area) pay much more in a department store for an item than they will at a craft show. I find the buying public not educated in what craft show spaces cost - some guys still think the tables are free or $5.00.

I like Jim's pricing schedule though.

I think it's interesting that the concensus is that $12.00 is too low, since I regularly have people say that $12.00 is too expensive. I hear stuff like "oh, you can buy that in the dollar store.", etc.

Barbara, thanks for the home jewelry link, I'll check that out. And, I was not thinking about the "additional monies to replace the materials", that is an excellent point.

Patti

Patti

the pricing formula I recommend when asked is: cost of materials+hourly wage ($20 hr skilled labor unless you are starting/notfast then $10 or less)+10% of that total (incedentals and profit)=wholesale price

wholesale price x 2 = retail

on the website and to the public---sell retail.

I don't know much about selling jewelry either, but I think $12.00 sounds too low too. I almost never see earrings at $12.00. But I recently had a similar experience. I don't know how to price things, and slowly am learning. I had a bracelet priced at $50.00 for someone who sells jewelry for me, and I felt it was too high, and told her to price it at $40.00 instead. She told me that $40.00 was too low, and kept it at $50.00. Cyndi

Hm. My 'regular' earrings, like the ones in

are $7.-, and people find them too expensive. Of course a lot of my regular farmers market customers have too much month left at the end of the money. - Maybe I'm on/in the wrong market. > But I recently had a similar experience. I don't know how to price > things, and slowly am learning. I had a bracelet priced at $50.00 for > someone who sells jewelry for me, and I felt it was too high, and told > her to price it at $40.00 instead. > She told me that $40.00 was too low, and kept it at $50.00. I can sell single bracelets for $5.- but very rarely the double length ones that are $9.- or the quadruple length ones for $15.-

At craft fairs I observe the opposite. To some extent it depends on your customer base ...

Palms, Etc.: Tropical Plant Seeds - Hand-made Jewelry - Plants & Lilikoi

I think part of the key is finding that "perceived value" sweet spot. Sometimes if you price something too low, even though it's genuinely a fair and reasonable price, the people who look at it perceive it as being market-up junk rather than low-priced quality. That may be what the other seller you mention has discovered; perhaps she has found the sweet spot for the particular styles she sells, where people perceive them as being "nice" and a fair value for the money.

I have found that if I sell someth> I appreciate all your comments. But, I would have a real problem

It matters where you are selling what price points will hold but I don't think it's unethical to sell something with a high mark-up at all. If she can sell them at that prince and the market will bear it, good for her.

My sister told me about a boutique near her that had simple earrings with maybe one teeny tiny garnet on each one and was selling them for $80. I didn't say they were overpriced I said, GET ME (my stuff) IN THERE! :o)

Hi Patty, smile 12 for hand made Earrings are to Low smile i know you heard it but i too sometimes price to low ! I will tell you a little story My Mother who is a wonderful Artist in oils and 3d Paintings brought her work to my Gallery with a note book with the name item number size and Price for each item she wanted to sell in my Gallery! She was way to cheap! Shes been painting for many years and hence she does better then a min wage labor ! so i explain she needed to keep trackl of the time she spent on making a piece and she kept saying oh i dont know lots of hours (she is 71 and never thought about how many hours goes into her large 3 D Paintings) She can work weeks to months on a piece because you have to have your muse and feel physically able to work so we kinda figure out a basic amount of time by difficulty of the piece and I helped her raise her prices from the extreme give away not even break even Price to a Modest Price for her work and materials! Smile she forgotten that some of the frames cost as much as half of her price of a painting she was so surprised when the price climbed way up after All they are not in her house or a craft Market(nothing wrong with those) but a Gallery where most people know it wont be cheap! I do make prints for those who cant afford the painting but they are not always the full picture and never the full size! So My Friend I too have learn to Price up never down unless your having a sale then just take off the percent ! Stores mark up 500% so they can put it on sale! And as a Cheap sake i always go to the back where the sales rack is and look only there unless i forced to find something else where like a special occassion! I know they wish i buy the new item price and so should we! I have a lot of locals who wait for my sales they come in and look and when i put the sale sign then they buy because i am in a poor neibor hood but my store is also very new! And it is still very slow but i wont make it a thift shop just to sell because you will end up feeling that your spining your wheels and never getting what you need! I remember in my first shows i had bargin bags of pieces that where ok but not my best work i had those mostly for the kids but since the where 2-5 dollars i sold a lot of them and every one was happy funny they had no idea what was inside it. I would put beads,simple pendant necklaces,earrings and little christmas pins etc in them and every one who wanted a bargin for themself or kids was happy to pay that but it needs to be like that not your best work You Know!

I was thinking, too, that you need to be paid for the time you are standing there at that craft fair. Your asking price should, hopefully, cover the time it takes to sell it!

Kalera stated:

Oh yeah! And double for smiling and sitting still when all you REALLY want to do is find a bathroom then lunch at 3:45 (when you had breakfast at 6:30).

I love doing shows BUT sometimes listing auctions in my jammies at 1:30 on Monday afternoon really rocks.

KarenS

There's way too many handcrafted earrings on ebay right now, check out one of my favorite sellers, she makes lovely earrings that average $10 a pair and they are real swars, real gemstones, real silver...all the components you all use and keeps the price fun for us with a thin pocketbook.

Kitty

Patti -- what about time?

You spend a LOT of time shopping for beads, doing bookkkeeping, record keeping, other stuff besides the actual cost of the beads.

If you're consistently underselling other jewelry-makers, you need to take a good hard look at your OWN prices. If you're charging $12 for a good pair of earrings -- made with sterling silver wire and decent, well-made beads -- you are charging WalMart prices. You're making everyone else -- who have to put food on the table too -- look like greedy hucksters.

This has been discussed on RCB time and time and TIME again. People who underprice are more harmful to the business of making jewelry than people who overprice. Making jewelry is an art -- and it's WORK. I can spend entire DAYS -- days on end! -- searching down the right beads. And that's long before I get ahold of the beads and sit down to labor over them to make them into jewelry. THAT is time spent, too.

How anyone can charge even $18 for a pair of quality earrings is beyond me. I think it's a crime. You're robbing from your sisters and brothers in jewelry -- and making us look bad too. Patti, you've been in the biz a while, right? Why don't you know better?

overhead, investments in equipment etc, experience, artistic talent... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ And any training you've ever had. Any classes, internships, learning-at-the-elbow-of -- and how about travel time and expense? Gas isn't free. If you fly, that's not a minimal expense.

The guy who sucks out my clogged drain charges a base fee just to drive to my house. Aren't your skills worth even that much?

~~~~~~~~~~~~ You mean you'll be *giving*them*away*.

There's an odd psychology about buying. People will shell out money more easily for higher-priced items. They look at lower-priced items with suspicion. The conventional wisdom about this is that they're thinking, "What's wrong with it that it's so cheap?" They probably think you're selling slave-labor imports or something similar, no matter what you or your signs say. "It's $22, and GEMSTONES? It'll probably fall apart in a few weeks!" even though, as we know, it won't

-- because you made it well. DON'T SELL YOURSELF SHORT or the world will too.