This is the second in a two part series on how I price my work. I posted the first part yesterday.

Originally, this series was written for the ISGB Newsletter.  Enjoy!

Pricing Your Work

In my last article, I mentioned that pricing your beads and/or jewelry is the most stressful part of getting ready for a bead show for many people.  In this article, I’ll talk about what works for me and the really basic, straightforward formula I use.

Remember, though, this is just what works for me.  You might have something better and that’s great.  As a side note, I once had a conversation with a group of artists friends on pricing our work.  There were five of us in the group.  We came up with 7 different pricing techniques between us.  Granted, there was also some wine…

So, back to my personal pricing system for my beads.  I do the following math, and yes, its algebra.  And yes, I apologize.

(How much I want to make per hour) * (how many hours it took to make it) = X

Ok, look.  I’d like to make 30 million dollars an hour too, but that’s not going to happen.  You need to be reasonable about your hourly rate but you also NEED to get paid for your time.

(The retail value of what I spent on supplies) = Y

We will talk about what goes into this in a moment.  Hint: its more than just the glass if you’re a lampworker.

X + Y = Z (Where Z is how much I want for the item)

Now, we need to add a few more figures to Z…

If you are selling on a platform like Etsy or Ebay then you need to add the listing fees, plus the percentage they take if the item sells.

If you take credit cards, you want to include the fees upfront.  Paypal fees are 2.9% + .30 per transaction.  My fees for the Square are pretty similar.

Need packaging or shipping supplies?  Yep, you want to add that too.  I’m going to call those “incidentals.”

Complicated much?

Remember, Z is how much I wanted for that item.

Z + (Zx11%) = NewZ

I’ve found that 11% of whatever I came up with for Z covers any listing and packaging/incidentals and credit card stuff.

NewZ is what you need to sell or list your item for.

Alrighty.  You hanging in there with me?  Lets talk about the types of things that need to go into your retail value of the supplies that you use.  First of all, there’s the glass…  That’s sort of self-explanatory, but if you’re using boro or silver glass it might be more expensive than soft glass white.  Here’s a few other things you might consider adding…

• Gas.  I’m lucky.  I get oxygen and propane at a pretty reasonable rate here.  It’ll be less if you have an oxycon, though.  I figured this for me at a pretty reasonable rate of $5/day and then divide it by how many beads come out of the kiln.
• Electricity.  I figured this out at about $1/hour.  For a 10 hour kiln cycle that means that I divide $10 by how many beads come out of the kiln.
• CZs
• Metal foils or powders or leaf
• Mica powders
• Metal tubing and bead caps
• If you’re really OCD, you might consider adding a really small amount of your bead release…
• A friend and I once got into an argument (it was in play, but still raises the point) on whether there should be wear and tear on the tools and/or mandrels.  I don’t tend to add them, but you might want to.

See where I’m going with these?  All of these together would create your supplies and since you must have them in order to create your beads, then you should consider their costs.

You might also consider adding how long it takes to photograph and list items on social media sites and/or online sales sites.

The list of things to consider just keeps growing, doesn’t it?  You want to make this pricing thing a savvy business decision!  Realistically, the thing you want to do towards this end is only try to sell at venues that have buyers who appreciate handmade.