Pricing suggestions

[red]

i think my problem is i just dont buy much stuff so have very little idea of what things cost...

[Big Al]

iF YOU HAVE ANY HAIR LEFT IT WILL SOON BE PULLED OUT. Pricing hand made stuff is a true nightmare and one you will never be happy with, sadly. When I made candles I used to work out as a minimum my material costs + the gas / electric cost + a portion of £10.00 per hour labour for the time it took me to make the candle ( although I always made as many candles as I could in one hour) then I doubled it to sell to a shop and then doubled it again to sell to a Customer.

Fort a basic 18 hour votive it would cost me about 20p all in so I should have sold them at 40p and 80p respectivly but I valued my candles far too much and so I started selling them at £1.25 and £2.00 respectivly and at this price I could sell them all day long.

Then I came across the problem of under charging !! My "london brigade" thought that they were crap as they were "so cheap" so I ended up making candles with 100g of wax, 10g or scent in a wiskey type tumbler glass ( 4 for a pound in Asda) and charging £75 each!!

I couldn't keep up with production....


A second version was at a country fair in north yorks, big farmers /CLA affair and one pair of old dears wouldn't buy as the candles were very cheap so they must be chinese(!) I heard this and in my intimitable way I said Oi pet, I didn't think the good candles would sell so I put them under the counter. I pulled out the same candle as on the top of the table, bdoubled the price and they bought two each.....
customers don't you just bloody hate them.


I guess you need to put a big price on the items and ake sure the punters know it is made personally for them and then leave them to ponder as to wether they are worth the price.

Alan

[Green Aura]

I have worried that my prices might be lower than "handmade" expectations!

But I don't want to rip anyone off, just make a little money. Aren't some folks stupid (oooh just had thoughts of fools and money - may need to change pricing strategy - just kidding)

[snapdragon]

@ Big Al thats hilarious

not much of a consumer myself so have nottaclue as to prices, I'm one of those that goes round craft fairs for inspiration not shopping.

[Touchwood]

It's reasuring to know that other's struggle with pricing as well and it's even harder when you have to spend money "up front" before you can even think about selling.

I used to do pottery and ceramics, but I was lucky in that I had access to a kiln where I worked so could just pay for firings rather than have a hugh initial outlay (mind you clay etc was still quite exensive). When we moved to Wales OH suggested me getting my own kiln but I wasn't confident enought to go that route, so I stopped doing the pottery.

The stuff I do now has just evolved from taking the dogs for a walk on the beach and it's great cos most of the raw materials are free, it's just time, but I still worry that things are too exensive.

We've even given up selling any of our pork now, we just rear for ourselves. We put very little mark up on it and it was a better value than any free range pork around here, but people still couldn't understand why it wasn't cheaper than supermarket "value" pork as "after all, you haven't got overheads or middle men to pay"