Daily income?

[The Fonz]

Just wondering what other glassworkers are taking in on a daily basis, and if people are actually making a living. Trying to figure out if I should stick with it or not.
Questions.
1. How much is your monthly income before costs?
2. What is generally your bag: pipes, marbles, vessles, sculptures.......?
3. Over a month, how many hours do you spend in the shop?
4. How many hours a month for sales and marketing?
5. What % of your income do you think covers your materials and costs of
finding places to sell to and delivering or shipping.
6. What in your opinion is the best way to find shops, galleries and stores that are capable of selling your artwork? Road trips? Phone? Internet?

This is some of the stuff that makes me wonder if one can actually prosper will doing what they love. Been at this on and off for 4 years now and i'm feeling finacially frustrated. Ideas and making them real isn't the problem, it's more with finding the right type of places to sell stuff. Most of my pieces have sat in stores for too long that it is draining my wallet trying to continue. thanks for reading this

[chayes]

I make so much I got a hummer just to drive to my mailbox andTrey Anastasio does my landscaping.

But truthfuly it varies alot ya can have a good month ya can have a bad month. Some people make more for somethings others make less for the samething.
I've found a good prodo line gets the bills paid.

[lucidvisions]

Wow, correct answers on this question could be a huge book. Before I add my two cents, get Milon Townsend's book "Making and marketing better work". I believe that's the title, and it is a great book with many, many answers.

#1 My daily income varies soooo much due to so many variables that come into play. On average I would say the guys next door at Taco Bell average a better daily wage than I do.

#2 We'll make just about anything but pipes. Not a knock on the pipe makers out there but it was just too easy to get caught in the pipe rut for myself and the work could never be shown to anyone but headshops and smokers. Those clients tend to not have the income that could support our business on a regular basis. Plus, way too much competition.

We replaced the pipes with a product line of similarly priced ornaments, marbles, sculptures ect. and we are always open to taking on new projects that we've never even attempted. Not only too fill up the portfolio with new and different pieces but to challange our skills. Us doing bikes, trophys, chandeliers ect. are great examples. We always take a bit of a cut $, but it opens you up to new people/clients that end up spreading the word and coming back for seconds, and you gain a huge amount of knowledge (glass wise) so the next pieces are always better.

#3 300+ hours of studio time a month between two business partners

#4 Not nearly enough, this is our's and in my opinion everyone's weak point, but probably in the past 20 hours a month, now replaced by about 100+. Most all of us are very competant and talented artists, but on the business end we usually suck ass! Marketing is the key to being successful and it's taken way too long to figure that one out. I always figured that if a holed away in my studio challenging myself and getting better and better I would eventually get noticed somehow. Surprise, surprise....it never happened. So now we beat the bush in every avenue I can think of. There are so many venues out there to get business and you got to exhaust them all to make a living at this.

#5 Approx. 40%

#6 Just got back from the BMAC in Philly. Went to over 6 seminars (Visiting artist seminars) in two days. Taught me more about how I'm going to accomplish my goals in three days than in the past six years of being in the business. Well worth it. These seminars, and the show, talking to artists and gallery reps answered this question and many, many others.

Hope that helps a bit, I'm no expert but I do know a bit of the trials I've experienced. Oh and find Bruce Baker's website, he's got CD's that are well worth the price that can help on the marketing end, his seminars were the most helpful. Feel free to PM us if you have any specific questions. Good luck and have fun!

Josh

[ShttrdSpctrm]

daily income is unheardof to me. i mostly go for what i can accomplish in a week. so im based on a weekly or bi-weekly income. i try to make a grand worth of stuff in a week. sometimes i dont make that much, most of the time acctually. but its good to have HIGH expectations. :D :D

[$$$$$$$]

i personally won't get out of bed unless i'm going to make more than $900, i've done the math and anything less is just not worth me going to the shop you know?

[dislexei]

The thing is you have to figure out how much YOU have to make.
How much money do you need to pay the bills, how much do you need for food and fun and living.
Then you got to think about how much money it costs to work.
Like studio space, glass, electric, gas and so on.
Then you got to figure out how many pieces you can make in a month, then you got to divide the number of pieces by the amount of money you need, with an adustment for profit.

You got to take into account fixed expenses, like rent and salary.
Then you got to look into variables and direct costs, like glass, gas, oxygen.

Say overhead is 4,000. direct costs is 2,000. You make 10 pieces.
4,000 divided by 10 = 400. per piece
2,000 divided by 10 = 200. per
so then you would sell each piece of 600 dollars to pay your bills and make some extra cash.

I pretty much ripped this off from a book.:o:

[jedi glassworks]

My wife and I both blow glass, tons of pipes, no time for anyting else. We both raise our son together so one of us will watch him until his morning nap while the other works,then we both work together. The first one working will watch him when he wakes up, and until his next nap. Usually we will be done by the time he wakes up from his second nap.

We make at LEAST $300 a day and try just work 5 days a week(used to be 6 or 7 days, but we have different priotities now. We put %30 of our total income aside for the business, this helps to not be stressed out when we have to buy $2000 in glass every month.

We spend about 8 hours combined in the shop in the shop a day.

There is no best way of finding shops, all of your ideas are great(roadtrip phone internet)

I have been doing this for over ten years and my wife for over 8 years, the business side of glass as a living is definately the hardest part, but after a while, going to a new shop with CONFIDENCE in your work is a great feeling. I think the best advice I could give you is set up a schedule and stick to it. Since we have set up the schedule, we are both working less and making more money.

Good luck,
Bryan

[Swampy]

You two are working smart Bryan, you got it sussed.

[The Fonz]

Hey, thanks everyone for the input. Maybe I should have asked weekly or monthly income...The marketing and sales are definitly my weak spot, never really put a full effort into that area. The idea of having a set schedual is a good one, probably have to figure one out here pretty quick. I figured my expensise were up around %35 also, much higher than I first thought. Hope to hear some more responses!

[PortlandGlassBlowers]

I didnt know Trey mowed lawns?

[dislexei]

He drove threw my fence a couple months back. He worked off the damge by mowing my lawn and picking weeds.

[mer]

this comes up alot. check out;
http://www.thegldg.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9925
or;
http://www.thegldg.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9450
or;
http://www.thegldg.com/forum/showthread.php?t=8907
or;
http://www.thegldg.com/forum/showthread.php?t=8252

sorry if that more info than necessary. i recently learned to paste links and i might be going a little overboard. it's just so cool to be able to cite sources so easily. wish they had this option when i was in school.
peace, m