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we should make a bunch of these to sell.

Looking at this on another tangent, perhaps products like those shown are why Penney's is failing. Their clientele are not the folks at the top of the heap, but just regular folks.
 
leo, 250 thousand a year salaries aren't that big a deal anymore.
and I know a lot of people in the 250-500 yearly income range, and yes, they would buy something from JC Penny if they liked it.
 
Leo, I would argue that the main thing preventing you (and well.. many of us) from selling something in that price range is a lack of the arrogance required to demand the price to begin with.

This is not meant as a perjorative against those that do have it. Mearly an observation that a lot of very talented craftspeople are overly humble and it seriously restricts their ability to sell into these markets.

One of the complications is if you sell $5 widgets it sort of makes people wonder how you can also make widgets worth $500 (i.e. you've positioned yourself as a lower end provider), otoh if you only try to sell $500 widgets the market is generally a bit more rarified so if you aren't as good at marketing it might be a bit thin on the inflow side.
 
you call it arrogance, I call it confidence.

from what Ive seen on this board, most home woodworkers seem content making minimum wage in the end for their woodworking skills and products.
 
On the subject of wealthy people and their art, I have about a year of first-hand experience installing it in places like Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Malibu, and Marina Del Rey. A number of our clients were the kind of people who will spend 3-4 million dollars on a house remodel. Or a boat. :rolleyes: One pretty common trait was that they tended to be pretty frugal. Not necessarily cheap, but they paid attention to their spending and tried to watch where their money went. Most of them were very nice to work for, but the way they perceived art varied a lot from client to client.

Some of our clients could be considered collectors. They wouldn't bat an eye at spending five or six figure amounts on a piece of art. (One of our clients didn't hesitate to spend over $9000 just to put a new, narrower frame on a large piece because it wouldn't fit in the elevator of her new condo, which prevented us from getting it upstairs to install it. Add to that our installation, moving and storage charges, and she spent nearly $14,000 just to move that piece from the old condo to the new one. She wasn't real happy about it, but she made the decision to do it in about 5 minutes. She really wanted to keep that piece.) But typically, this type of folks buy work by known artists, so in a lot of cases the artwork is seen as an investment as much as something pretty for the walls. This group might balk at a $360 piece from Penny's but not hesitate to spend thousands on a Georgia O'Keefe painting. (And pay us $360 to hang it.) When they did buy something from an unknown artist, sometimes it was just because they liked it, but sometimes it was just because the artists had the confidence and chutzpah to market their work - and themselves - at that rarefied level. Some art buyers are willing to spend money on work done by unknowns, if they think the artist will eventually be famous. They care more about the maker than the product. And as has been said earlier in this thread, there are cases when they won't buy if something is priced too low. Part of that is because they perceive the piece to be a lesser value, but part of it is because they can't brag about it to their friends. There's a fair amount of one-upmanship that goes on among that demographic, and high prices are bragged about more than bargains.

Then there was the other side of the coin. We saw a good number of very wealthy clients who buy artwork simply as a decoration. They have no problem owning and displaying stuff from craft shows and places like Pottery Barn. Names meant little to nothing. The art collection was just for decoration, not investment. Price - low or high - didn't really matter as long as they liked it. Some of it was what most of us here would consider pricey - a few hundred to a few thousand bucks - but they would be just as likely to buy something off the bargain rack at Pic and Save. (And then pay us a couple hundred bucks an hour to hang it, lol.) One of our most wealthy clients had dozens of family photos lining a hallway, and they were all framed in assorted old wooden frames she'd found at thrift stores and antique shops. That house was impeccably decorated, and it also had some higher-end artwork, but I could easily see this lady buying a wood block wall hanging at Penney's if she liked it.

Of course we also had clients who weren't as wealthy, but it seemed that regardless of the economic level, it was still a mix of the "collectors" and the "decorators".
 
thankyou Vaughn.
someone who is looking for a wooden frame might not have this design in mind, but when he types wooden frame on google, that frame may pop up as a third or 8th choice.
if they like it, they will buy it and one reason is that they are thrilled its available through a reliable website like pennys, vs some unknown person trying to hawk his own artwork.
I know Id be much more confident purchasing something through a world known retail store then from joe schmo on the internet.
 
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