Ep 3

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 Right, We're back and we've got a nice question.. One from Lintpress on Instagram, who says, How do you get your art seen by people that want to buy it? And then in the same vein, Raffaella Taylor said, I know I keep mentioning markets, fairs and selling prints, but I would find it interesting to get deeper into this topic.

The interview that was recently posted on the business course was a great start. But I'd find it interesting to go into a bit more depth or cover some specific areas. It seems like a lot of people on the business course are also interested in this as an additional revenue stream.

But I want, but wondering if it's worth it. From what I've gathered, Tanya and Helen both have experience running online shops and making prints. So I'd be interested to hear more about your experience with this. Is it really possible to make money? Is it more of an expensive hobby? Yeah, brilliant. [00:01:00] Yeah, I had an online shop for a few years and it was brilliant. It wasn't just a hobby. It did make money. I'm trying to remember how much it made us. Maybe. About 11, 000 pounds a year probably, but that did take a lot of work It was good as an extra stream of income, but I had to keep on top of it all the time I haven't got a huge Instagram following, but I've got enough that would send people to the shop So I think if you don't have social media somewhere with a good group of, it doesn't have to be a huge amount of people but people who love your work and want to buy it.

Without that I would say an online shop is quite hard. You could start your shop and your social media at the same time and build them both up together, that would work. But it was worth it, it was really good, I enjoyed doing it. And I stopped doing it because I'd just juggled so many projects and my head was just spinning in all directions and in the end I had to decide whether which things were a priority.

So yeah, we closed our shop, but it did, it worked brilliantly, as long as I was always sending out [00:02:00] newsletters and posting on Instagram. They had to be consistent. Yeah. But also that was two of you, wasn't it? Because you're Gerry's Prince as well, because when you said, 11, 000 a year, That's a lot.

That's really good for a side gig for a shop. Yeah, and I was doing all the marketing. So there were two of us with stuff in the shop, but I was doing all the marketing work, which was a lot of work. We didn't share that. And Jerry's work, we sold the majority of Jerry's work. Which are higher priced prints.

Yeah, because his work, he makes huge, big whale prints. Actually, I haven't included the whale prints. We sold those completely separately in another way. We'd have an online exhibition. Okay. which would last a weekend and people could go to the website just for that weekend and we'd sell about 10 of them and they were about a thousand pounds each.

So we also have, we still do that actually, we'll carry on doing that. But that was it is a shop, but it was done in a very different way. It was doors open, doors are closed and that was a good way of doing it actually. And we still do that because it's an intense little bit of marketing, but once you're [00:03:00] finished.

But Gerry's not into doing any of that marketing stuff and I love it. So I, that's my job. And because Gerry doesn't like doing any of that at all, we decided we would close the shop because it was a lot of work for me and I've got so many other plates to spin. But, yeah, it does work. That was based on a good Instagram following.

You'd say that's the how to comes from building your following. And your newsletter. And the newsletter. Because I always think emails It gets much easier for somebody to click on a link in an email and buy something than to get a link on social media and go off social media. It's tricky on Instagram because they've got to go back to your profile and click your little list of links.

Yeah, so it was a mixture of Instagram and Instagram saying to people, join the newsletter. And then once they're on the newsletter, then it's easier to have those links. And like you said before, Instagram is not your property. And the following there could disappear in a day once you're gone.

account is hacked as it may inevitably one day happen or not, if you're lucky. So building the emails on the newsletter, it gives you your real estate to [00:04:00] contact that list of people again. And they will always, that will always be your own list. Your list doesn't have to be long either. They just have to be good, fans who really like your stuff and really want to buy it.

So you don't have to have a massive newsletter. I think when we were running the shop, my newsletter was It was quite low, I'm trying to think now, maybe 700 people, which is not That's not bad. It's not, it's definitely not bad, but it's not in the thousands. I have got thousands now. I'm just remembering back when we had the shop, it wasn't huge, but there was enough people that people would come and buy the stuff.

And Katie, you did calendars, didn't you? Yeah. a great time doing calendars because I'd exper I'd like dabbled with Etsy and I found that the, for me anyway, like the fees that Etsy took were high and then the amount of time hanging around at the post office for the occasional sale, like it just didn't work out as being worth it and it did feel like an expensive hobby.

But then I discovered the idea of pre selling things, so I created calendars, I like mocked up the design, [00:05:00] told people it was available on my, on how to, like on my email list and on social media and then people would pre order them And then it meant that I only printed as many as I'd sold, so there wasn't excess stock hanging around.

And it meant I could give people special offers they'd get a little bonus planning, wall planner thing that was, like, really inexpensive to print for me if they booked, if they not booked, if they bought it by a certain date. And yeah, for me that was a really consistent earner.

I'd get, about a thousand pounds per year. So it was only November, December doing it. That'd be about a thousand pounds and probably five or six hundred pound of that was profit and at that time That was it like a big chunk of money covered my Christmas expenses I could buy all my Christmas presents with it.

And also I really enjoyed doing it and I roped in Cameron, my husband, to help me pack them up and he loves doing that sort of thing So I'd pack them up and post them and yeah That's why Jerry and I worked well with the shop because he loved rapping and I don't really like doing that So I would do the sales bit and he would do all the [00:06:00] wrapping and go to You need like somebody who loves marketing and somebody who loves packing and posting.

Because you completely underestimate how much time you're going to be faffing around in a domestic post office with everyone tutting behind you because you've got a load of stuff in one go or that you're going back frequently taking one thing at a time because you've sold another print. But your calendar, It's such a good idea because you've harnessed your art to a practical product.

So people can persuade themselves, this is, I'm not just buying a piece of art for the wall. This will be useful for other people's presence or useful for me. So looking at selling your art should be, can you put your art onto something that is, and inevitably anything on paper is cheap to produce. It's cheaper than stuff on plastic like, phone cases and all the stuff that comes with the dropshipping, which is a bit tricky, isn't it?

Then there's environmental issues and how you feel about mass producing stuff, but paper is a winner. I know we found that every time we made a new product, we made sure [00:07:00] that we considered the size of the envelope before we made the product. And when we had the product made, we would buy the envelopes and the packaging and the little freebies that went inside and the tissue paper and everything for every single thing we had, because there was no point making a new product.

And then you launch it and you're selling it. Oh no, we have no envelopes. I've got to go to the shops and get the envelopes or they don't fit. All the posters is going to be more than expected and we lose a load of profit. So it's always a good idea to consider the packaging and the cost of postage and the freebies that are going to go in there, stickers or postcards or whatever, with every single new product that you put in the shop.

And get your postage right as well. Because a lot of the stuff I sell online and Etsy is about Hong Kong. I send loads of it to America or to Canada. Yeah, that's still on there because that will, the reason I sell prints online came about as an accident, which is maybe the way other people do it.

You have a show, you put all that hard work into a show. I sold lots of prints, the show finished and [00:08:00] then people kept saying, can I still buy some of the prints? So I thought At the time, this was probably about 2012, Etsy's great as a place to sell and as a kind of catalogue of all your work and the prints that are available, so I loaded it all up and then I used to sell very frequently from that and as there's a diaspora of either expats who loved Hong Kong who've gone back to their home countries or Hong Kongers that have left and gone to their own countries, I do loads of worldwide postage and It's a real pain in the butt because some of the prices are really high like sending to the US or Canada is in the 18 pound range So you really have to check out Whether you're gonna do it in mailers or flat pack are the flat pack strong enough to take an a3 Image would they get bent and then the girls at the post top say don't put fragile on it because they'll bend it just for a laugh So You know, mailers mailing roles are difficult because your work is going to be all springy and it'll, if they try and force it and lay it flat, it will get a crease in it.

So you have to put in instructions on [00:09:00] how to open, open the package. But it's been a really good thing to do because the work is very subject specific. I don't have to do much marketing on it because people are actually searching something like map of Hong Kong or Chinese New Year. So I haven't got a newsletter or anything to sell it.

I just left the work there knowing that I could continue to print these things. And that would be a nice cupboard to sell it from. So that's how you're getting, you're working for people that want to buy it is just by describing it. And then Etsy shows it to people that are looking for that sort of thing.

In theory, I put all the right hashtags on it. But then when I try to search myself from outside, it doesn't, I don't find that it's there easily. So I don't know, maybe there's a glitch in the universe there. But then. After the prints, I started making them into cards and I met this lady who runs Indie Retail Academies at Clare Yates and she's so brilliant and that was pretty life changing.

So we put Clare in our business [00:10:00] course talking about how to sell to shops. So that's the second stage. You can sell business to consumer, i. e. sell your art to individuals, or you can sell to businesses. who will get your art in front of other people. So Claire's is all about how, from a shopkeeper's point of view, she owns a indie retail kind of art and design shop in Biggar in Scotland.

And she knows what it's like from her side of the counter, when artists want to sell their cards or their prints or, the crafts or whatever, and it's just invaluable the stuff she talks about. So we have got her to talk specially to illustrators about what kind of things have higher profit margins, are easier to deal with, and shops like to sell, and greetings cards is one of them.

We've also got we've got another card manufacturer on the business course, lovely Hadley Paper Goods. And she goes into the nitty gritty of the profit margins and production good ideas about producing cards and finding good printers, because that's a great area for illustrators to [00:11:00] get into.

If someone loves your card, they might actually buy a print off you after they've bought a few cards. or they send your card to someone who they think will like that work, who will then look you up on the back and maybe buy art prints. So it's like a calling card, or your own marketing that actually makes a bit of profit at the same time.

So I did a batch of cards, I learned how to do a line catalogue, and I sent it to The new super huge gallery in Hong Kong called M plus and they've got two shops because the gallery is so huge. It's like the Tate Modern, but in Hong Kong and they ordered full range and they keep ordering more every time I make a new one and they order from me every two months.

So I just do one client because that can get really complicated if you're managing too many clients and they want to do things instead of buying wholesale. Retail, they want to sale and return, which is really complicated. That must be hard for cards because they might get handled and then sent back.

Yeah, and really hard for prints and worse for stuff like wrapping paper, which you [00:12:00] would, wrapping paper would be a dream for illustrators to do, but the delivery, the manufacture, the sale or return, or then saying, Oh, it's got all bent, so we'll just put it in the bin. And you can't remember how many you sent in the first place.

And unless you like Excel spreadsheets, sale or return is a nightmare. Yeah. I think in general, it's best to avoid that, isn't it? Sale or return. That you've bought these, you have to sell them now.

But if it's not cards that you're selling or products, there are some other ways about it. Like you can go to, is it print space? Yeah, print space. You can scan your work in and specify what kind of paper and everything. and then advertise it in your shop and then every time one is sold, Print Space send it out.

Yeah, they've made it really easy. I think they've got something called, is it called, it's not Creative Boom, Creative Space, Creative something. And they have a whole book on how to sell your art using their system and they will promote your artwork as well. And you don't even have to sign the stuff, they'll print it directly [00:13:00] from Print Space and send it out for you.

Like you were saying, if you advertise it on your. on your website and they have a whole On Facebook, there's a really good group, Allied 2 Print Space, that do free online courses about how to sell art. And there's a book also called The Artist's Guide to Selling Work by Annabel Ruston, published by Bloomsbury.

Further reading. Yeah. If you want to read more. Nice. Also, I feel like in products, like when you're selling your own work, you have much more scope and leeway for pricing, don't you? Yeah, because if people are buying your work, they want your work. They're not like, how am I going to get the cheapest card?

They're like, I love Helen Stevens work and I want a lion on a card. Not that you have a lion on a card. Who is this person? I love this person. And then, I think you, yeah, you can mess around with it a bit. Not mess around, you can experiment scientifically and say if it's four pound, how much, how many do I sell?

If it's, Yeah. How much profit am I making? How much profit am I having? We had this whole conversation, Gerry and I, when we [00:14:00] were, when we had the shop. So he sells his original whale prints over, he opens the doors for a weekend and closes them, but he also makes these whale posters. So they're not hand printed, those are you know, printed somewhere else.

Are they litho or? They're just a very nice quality poster with a whale image on it that's not quite the same as the original artwork. But sometimes he'll do batches where he'll get the poster, and then he'll do one layer of screen printing of neon fish over the top or something. I think we've got one like that.

Yeah, so those, because those are a much cheaper price point, we don't put them in the weekend, exhibition. We put those in, we used to put those in the shop that's open all the time. So those posters, cause they were hand finished. They were, I think we were selling those for about a hundred pounds each and they sold really well.

They were our biggest seller. Cause if you couldn't afford the print that was nearly a thousand, you might be able to buy the poster and it was hand finished. And then we had this conversation [00:15:00] about shall we, the whale images are so popular. Should we put them on the front of notebooks or postcards or whatever?

Yeah. but we decided against it because then you could get the whale image much cheaper, and would it spoil the sales of the Does it cannibalize the main one? Yeah, so because Jerry is really known for those whales and the prints are so beautiful and high end and he makes a nice, it makes, it's worth imprinting them because he makes good prints.

Money on them, then it's not worth the say printing them on a t shirt or a postcard or a card Yeah but that's we had a chat about it numerous times and always kept coming back to know Let's just keep those as they are because what if you've got the whale print and it's a thousand pounds and then you've got a whale lampshade and it's a hundred.

It makes the original print not seem worth the money, I think it's worth thinking about if you want to keep something special. Yeah, but there's an argument. Not [00:16:00] totally against what you've just said, but to make yourself affordable, especially for fine artists. Do you remember when I told you we were having that kind of mentorship from Kerri Hand?

There was a group of us in Berwick that were picked and anyway, we work with this amazing mentor. If anyone wants to look her up, she's called Kerri Hand, C E R I. and then hand as normal. And she has a really good podcast and she talks to more fine artists and sculptors and architects and all different sort of areas.

One section of the things she was talking about was if you only sell a painting four times a year and your paintings sell at 8, 000 pounds, then how do you live on that income? And she was saying, even in fine art, it's worth making a smaller, more affordable version of. your work so that people can buy into it.

There's, that's a bigger jump than Jerry's Thousand Pound Wales, but I think it's really relevant for people who, their work takes a long time and it has a high value. A bit like the Andrew Cranston [00:17:00] show that was in the the gallery in Wakefield. They have one, etching for sale there because of course no one can afford one of his gorgeous paintings but he must have been to Kerry Hand and she'd be like, yeah make an etching and do it in an edition of 800 so that you can sell that for, maybe 200 pounds.

So there's an accessible aspect to your work. So you can find a way that doesn't cannibalize it or doesn't use the whale as a faux motif or kind of branding thing, but it's a bit of Jerry that people could have.

We did, we had the posters. So there was 100, but yeah, I don't know whether we were right or wrong, really. The posters sold incredibly well because it was definitely the next stage down from the original print, and it's horses for courses, isn't it? Some people do have the money to buy the unique individual piece.

There are plenty of people to buy those. We always sold out every time, even whether you think, Wow, that's a lot of money, that, isn't it? There are always [00:18:00] plenty of people who wanted them. We have waiting lists for them. That's amazing. And also that thing of don't price things based on what you think is expensive because the people who are buying from you have a lot, have a far better income more likely than an artist.

I had a good conversation with your sister years ago, Katie, before I knew you. She was pricing. She's a photographer, isn't she? And she does wedding photos and she told me that she thinks about what you would expect to pay if you were gonna have somebody take your wedding photos and then triple it.

Wow. That's what she, that's how she came up with her. Fay. And she's hugely busy, isn't she? Yeah. Actually, she knows all that's going on She's I'm gonna stop doing weddings. I'm gonna and she carries on every year. So She's so sociable. I bet she loves it. She is, yeah. She likes talking to people. Yeah.

But then the opposite of that is you go on Etsy and people are putting out prints, I don't know whether they're gclays or whether they're just printing them out from inkjet printers so they'll fade away, and those prints are selling for, they're putting them for 10, 15 pounds. It's [00:19:00] way too cheap and it pulls the whole market down.

You do wonder whether it actually works for those people. For those people, is it a hobby? You don't know, do you, whether it actually works? I can't imagine how you make that work. I think that's where it's really important not to look at what other people are doing as well, because, yeah, you don't know if it's a hobby, you don't know if they've got a secret pile of money that they're actually living on.

Yeah, exactly. And they can afford, they're just looking to sell and they enjoy the buzz of the sell, but it's not, important to them. I don't think I'd really want to go to print something out and go to the post office for 10 pounds. Yeah. Especially our post office, when you take your post office, when you take the cost of the post office and the time it takes you to join the queue and wait there, it's not worth it.

And the cost of packaging, I think that's really important to actually really price up, like the packaging, the postage, the cost of making the thing, and then your time as well. I think people always forget about their time. The emails back and forth. Yeah. Have you sent it yet? Yeah, it's on its way. I can't get, you do wanna make a profit otherwise.

What's the point? But then I have really good friends who run a shop and they sell Lots and lots [00:20:00] of very low cost things like postcards and badges and things, but they sell in such massive quantity that they're at the post office every day with four bags for life or more. And they have an arrangement with the post office.

You can do the drop and what's it called? Click and drop or I don't know what it's called. They just leave their bags there. They don't even have to join the queue. And every day they've got a guaranteed huge quantity of stuff that goes all over the world. So they've got very low cost.

Price points. Price points, but they sell in such massive quantity, it makes it worth it. It's like anything is annoyingly, there's no right or wrong answer. It's either do it really cheap and sell loads of them or do it a bit more pricey, sell a few. Yeah. And then there's in, in market, in person markets.

So we have Taryn on the course talking about selling at fairs and That's a lot of work, but then on the same hand, a couple of years ago, I saw the Glasgow print or the Glasgow illustrators fair in action, maybe print fair and it just blew me away. I felt so excited that each illustrator's stall was three deep in people [00:21:00] grabbing at prints and all the different stuff.

There were lots of Scott like football scars with illustrator designs on it, badges, all sorts of stuff. And the majority of people at that fair were selling in huge volume. It was two days. The place was hot and steamy and noisy. And I was like, let's do one of these in Berwick. So I think if you go to a fair that's marketed properly and there's a buzz about it, you can do really well there.

And that's the thing with fairs, they're not all created equal. Yeah, we did a pop up shop in town once, didn't we? That was really good. That was really lucrative. cutout? You were in Canada maybe? And I made a cardboard cutout of you and you just stood behind the till all day. I was amazing I wasn't there.

That's me. That was incredible that, Gerry and I. Had lots of artwork because we were running the shop. We just put all our stuff from the shop in there It was brilliant because there was a real buzz about it Everybody was out and was well worth it. And we did a mini one Do you remember the first one we did at Christmas here?

In your [00:22:00] kitchen. Yeah. Yes. And we invited good friends because A lot of people in Hong Kong used to do sales like that. Someone who'd got the biggest house would ask everyone else to come to their house, bring their stuff. And then you just give people lots of nice drinks and cakes and then they, we sold a lot even just in the little home fair.

That's a brilliant tip in itself, to get your work in front of people that want to buy it, set up your own thing, invite the people. Yeah, it's a bit like the, some of those kind of small bespoke fashion items fashion brands will do things like a sample sale and they send it on a private list.

Everyone's are you going to that sample sale? It's in a weird old factory down the back street and it's full of posh ladies I mean, the jumper people out in Galashiels. all the women who go off to buy some faulty cashmere, you can't move. I need to ask you about this after the podcast.

What knitwear is to be had in Galashiels? I need to know about this. Cause all the factories were there, weren't they? All the cashmere factories and some of the best fair isle jumpers known to humanity. You [00:23:00] can really create a buzz around a little kind of homemade in my kitchen sale.

We had a lot of fun that first one. Yeah, we did. It was really good. Your house makes everything look very glamorous though. Yeah. . My son would just say it's full of crap. . That's how you make a glamorous house full of rubbish from antique shops. Should we say goodbye then we'll do another question in the next episode. See you there. Okay. Bye bye. Goodbye.