halp? should I make cards?

[jeliza]

I (possibly unwisely) have two panels at Arisia, with the original intent to send just jewelry, but they said "please send prints too, we have these long hooks for mulitples, it'll be great" and suddenly I have two panels and yikes is that expensive for mailing in and it takes a lot of jewelry to fill up that much real estate (and cover costs)

But I don't actually have multiple prints of that many images, and part of my mailing-to-convention-art-shows again thing is that jewelry fits in a much smaller box, bringing shipping costs down to a place where it doesn't wipe out all possibility of profit. (Bless USPS flat rate boxes) So, I don't want to send anything bigger than, say, an 8x10.

However, the place I have had greeting cards made in the past is running a special until the 25th, so I thought, hey, I could do cards? Which I can print in sets of 4 for about $1.75 per card with teh sale on. (Sets of 25 bring that down to $1.40 per, but, um, that's a lot of cards.) Which I guess would mean pricing at $3, since convention art shows only do whole dollars.  I would probably have them in time for when i vend at Winterfest on the 5th.

But right now I hate all my genre artwork that doesn't involve glitter, and can't tell if it's a good idea or not. Any opinions on worth or the idea, and or which
would make good cards? I love my silly flowers/fish in space stuff, but oddly have only been able to sell them in non-convention environments (to anyone that isn't already a friend of mine.) I've got maybe half? of my genre work up on my website

Any word from the peanut gallery?

I've been inhaling bleach fumes for the past hour, which means my brain is fuzzy, judgment is impaired, and head is tipped with hideous spurs of pink.

I get my first results of mailing to a show either tomorrow or Tuesday; I have no idea if the box from Windycon is coming back full or empty or in between or what, just that it is on its way, and of course my brain is sure that Norwescon/Sasquan were flukes and nothing will sell ever again and I've wasted a huge amount of money and time. Becuase my brain is helpful like that.

Comments

[drakemonger.livejournal.com]

What would they cost for sets of 4 or sets of 25 *without* the sale on? If you do this with the sale and discover that, yes, you can sell them for $3 - what does that tell you? Is that a price you're going to be able to continue to sell them at, and make a profit? If not, what price would you need to sell them at, when there wasn't a sale?

Because experimenting with expanding your product line, at a low cost, is nice - only if it's an actual, potentially sustainable, extension; otherwise it's just a use of time and energy and effort that doesn't net you much in the long term.

That being said, you have a bunch of stuff I think could be good cards, and I think they would sell well at Winterfest.

[jeliza]

I do have some already, though most of my current cards aren't skiffy, and some I have ended up using when I write thank you cards to clients (mostly the pretty flowers, though). It's a 20% sale, so $3 would still be profit; not an amazing one or standard retail, but kind of a "make the table fee" thing -- they way some months Afishionado made rent on note cards and t-shirts, rather than art.

I did sell at least one card at winterfest last year, of the flower with inspirational quote variety.

[drakemonger.livejournal.com]

Get a few sets of four at 1.75; see how they sell at $3.99. If they sell well, you can move to the larger batches at the slightly hire price and still pull a decent profit per.

I suggest:

- one of the floral systems
- the fishy way
- coalesce
- whatever you think makes the best contrast with the first three