More pens and a few questions

[ajmw89]

Hello chaps,

All I'm confident that my lathe can handle is pens, so here's some more.

3 twistys in oak, one in purpleheart (present for the Mrs) and a fountain pen in cherry for the mothership to write my wedding invites with.

All pens are finished to 600 grit abranet, 2 coats of sanding sealer and de nibbed, then down to 12000 grit pads. Then 3 coats of thin CA and microcrystalline wax

Any critique and comments would be much appreciated.

My dad took the oak twist pens and the fountain pen into work and has got people asking for prices (not something I'd anticipated just yet, but I'll take it!) How much would people think is a reasonable amount for a finished twist pen? I was thinking somewhere around the £8 mark, but not sure if I'm undercharging or not...

Cheers,

Adam

 

[winemaker]

Some nice Pens you have there. As to price its up to you but you must cover your cost in making allowing for all the sundries wood, glue, sanding sheets or discs, electric, Pen box and wear and tear of your tools & Lathe also the pen kit price. Do you want to make money comes into the question, you do not want to sell too cheaply as people will take advantage of you and not value your work. When I price my items I add up all the cost add £1 to £2 (when you buy stock etc there is a postage to take into account) for sundries and then add about £5 to £10 pounds some times more ( depending how long it took me ) for my time. There are a lot of people doing this for a living out there and you have to consider them. Some people out may disagree with what I have said but its the way I work. Hope this has helped you.

 

[Lons]

£15 is about the going rate for a twist pen.
Don't undersell your work or it won't be valued at all. If customers think they're cheap then that's exactly what they will expect - tat! Most people aren't looking for the cheapest, they want value for money which is a very different thing.
You can always drop your prices but very difficult to increase once you've set a precedent.

cheers
Bob

 

[ajmw89]

Thanks for the advice. I think £15 may be a little much. With the cricket bats I make, I pretty much double what it costs me to make one as the price. I guess £12 would be fair for a twist pen?

 

[J-G]

With the cricket bats I make, I pretty much double what it costs me to make one as the price.

Do you really mean that ?
or do you double the cost of materials ?
ie. do you include the cost of your time before 'doubling what it costs'.

 

[Waka]

Very nice pens but I wouldn't have a clue about selling costs.

 

[ajmw89]

With the cricket bats I make, I pretty much double what it costs me to make one as the price.

Do you really mean that ?
or do you double the cost of materials ?
ie. do you include the cost of your time before 'doubling what it costs'.

Double the cost o the materials (ie willow, binding, handles, stickers, scuff sheets, abrasive). I don't make much out of it, and will need to bump the price up to a level I'm not comfortable with come January as the cost of willow suitable for cricket bats is rising at a stupid rate

 

[J-G]

With the cricket bats I make, I pretty much double what it costs me to make one as the price.

Do you really mean that ?
or do you double the cost of materials ?
ie. do you include the cost of your time before 'doubling what it costs'.

Double the cost o the materials (ie willow, binding, handles, stickers, scuff sheets, abrasive). I don't make much out of it, and will need to bump the price up to a level I'm not comfortable with come January as the cost of willow suitable for cricket bats is rising at a stupid rate

Just as I anticipated. That model is only OK if you are retired, have sufficient income and are doing the work to simply keep yourself occupied. If you need to do it to earn a living - or even supplement your income - you really ought to factor in your time. I realize that this may take your work out of the commercially viable bracket but undervaluing any work is ultimately detrimental.

The same applies to the original poster in regard to the value of the pens. We should all remember that our work is not a mass market product trying to compete with the likes of product seen in TK-Max, Wilkinsons, etc.

I would sooner make one quality item selling at (say) £100 than ten similar items selling at £10 each.

 

[Neil Farrer]

I sell more pens than average and would agree that for a slimline £12 is about the minimum you should charge. (£15 for a streamlime)

There are two pricing modules you can use, bottom up or top down. If you work it out bottom up, take the cost of all the bits, including your bandsaw blades, sandpaper, glues etc, and dont forget to factor in wastage, marketing, mileage and postage to get the kit in the first place. So you now have a figure. Time, what is your time worth? Does the time have worth if without doing what you were doing, making pens, you would be doing something more profitable. If you were going to read the paper for an hour instead, then your time is worth 50p, if you were going to trade on the metals market then your time might be worth £500? This is all very well but doesnt lead to an objective way of working out what you should charge. If you do manage to attribute an hourly rate and come up with a price, you are no nearer an objective figure as you havent included your profit percentage, if indeed you do want to make a profit. When you do arrive at a selling price many first time sellers look at it and think, oh err, thats a bit expensive, I'll drop it a bit. and you're back to square One.

The other way to look at the pricing once you have satisfied yourself that you have covered your costs is to do a bottom down approach. What will the market bear? How do you find out? Test the market. Go and find ten people you dont know so you have removed the emotion from the question and decision and ask a question, How much would you think this pen would cost in the shop? Theres your answer. (Note the how much in the SHOP).

Profit isnt a dirty word, its the way of the world, be proud of your work, sadly most people undervalue theirs.

 

[J-G]

[...] There are two pricing modules you can use, bottom up or top down. [...]

Profit isn't a dirty word, its the way of the world, be proud of your work, sadly most people undervalue theirs.

An excellent treatise on a usually mis-understood subject, Neil. =D> =D>

 

[Rlewisrlou66]

Neil,
That sales model only works when you have decent shops in the area most small towns won't have a shop that sells item of this nature and you will probably get a very low "Ooooh dunno about £3!" response.

Adam,
It also depends on the age range you ask older ladies and gents would be willing to pay more for a hand crated pen, whereas young adults/teens will be less likely to even consider buying one over lets say a 5 pack of Bic pens from Wilko.
If you are looking to sell online check out the competition. Find other pen makers sites and look at their prices look at places like Parker pens and look at their prices and you will know what the online market is too.

They are gorgeous pens though keep up the good work.
Ryan

 

[Neil Farrer]

Neil,
That sales model only works when you have decent shops in the area most small towns won't have a shop that sells item of this nature and you will probably get a very low "Ooooh dunno about £3!" response.

Sorry Ryan, but I don't agree with your post. The premise of your disagreement with what I wrote is that you are being driven by your circumstances and a confined market, ie the shops of notable quality. If someone shudders at the cost, providing that you have not costed your product absurdly, move on and find someone who acknowledges the quality you have. Not everyone will want what you have at the price you ask, and his original response may well be a negotiating ploy which is actually a buying signal.

The principle of Bottom up or top down pricing is a world wide simplistic costing principle.

I make my living selling pens but that doesnt make me an expert on costing. I dont sell to shops, normally. I have built a reputation and about a third of my sales are repeat business. Selling to trade and retail are exactly the same, you just have to acknowledge that trade will demand a substantial "discount" because they are doing or require to do two significant things, firstly make money themselves and secondly, they are running your marketing department, this discount is payment for that.

 

[Rlewisrlou66]

Fair point Neil I wasn't disagreeing with you just adding to what you had said.

What I was aiming at with my post was that in this day and age it is far easier to sell hand crafted specialist items to an online market. Unless of course you have a market for it in your local area.

Say for instance - My local town is made up of both rich and poor so you might sell 25 pens if you offered them to 100 people.
The next town over on the other hand I doubt you would sell a single pen.
But go to the next town the other way and you might sell 75.

Ryan