 Hi there, it's DJB and in this video I'm going to be talking a little bit about pricing your artwork and giving you a little bit of a background on what my artwork sells for. I think this is really valuable information. Before Model Horses I was a traditional artist so I understand the complication that comes with pricing your artwork and selling it to somebody else. It's a really difficult thing to do. We create the piece, we feel very attached to and sending a price on it we want to get what we feel it's worth because we are emotionally attached to the piece of artwork because not everybody is going to feel the same about your work. Some people are going to really appreciate it and give you exactly what you want. Some people are going to lowball you. It's a very abstract thing because people pay for your name. It's almost like brand name shopping. The more that people know who you are they want your work in their house. If nobody knows who you are and you're just kind of putting work out there generally you're not going to get a lot of interest. But the more you build your name and your brand the more you can sell your stuff for and the more sought after your stuff becomes. I really noticed that with models specifically as my account has grown and as my follower account has grown I've been receiving a lot more recognition than previously but I didn't always sell models for such high prices. I started with no one knowing who I was. I didn't have an Instagram account for my traditional artwork. I said yo I'm making models but I really didn't get follower account from that specific account. So I think the best rule of thumb is just to look at other artists. Other artists you admire how much do they sell their work for. It's a very biased thing and it's what you feel your work is worth but also what the market is saying your work is worth. Just to get kind of an idea my very first custom I ever did was this Beethoven piano mare that a stable mate is normally two to five dollars to buy. I listed her at 50 dollars and somebody did in fact buy her. So I didn't start at the top. I wasn't making a killing right away. It was a very gradual process and I had a couple flops. I painted this little paint full and she only sold for 35 dollars. Granted she was quite small so I didn't want to charge a whole lot for her. There was not a lot of work that went into her so I felt like 35 dollars was fair. That's like the price of a traditional briar. I sold this black Sabino which I really liked but he only sold for 25 dollars. So this stable mate Apollos Aponi sold for 82 but my pair of dressage force sold for 68. So it's completely different and it depends on the situation and who's interested and whether it's listed on eBay or model her sales pages. A little side note is that I do sell my models in US dollars. I live in Canada. The reason I sell my models in US dollars is because the market is in US dollars. In order for me to buy bodies and resins and other horses from my collection I need US dollars. It works in my favor right now because the Canadian dollar is really terrible. Just an example of that changes constantly but if I was to sell a model for 50 dollars I would get 66 Canadian. But normally I like to just keep the money in my PayPal, use it to refuel into the hobby buy art supplies, buy extra models, resins, whatever I need. So generally speaking I like to list all of my models and model for sales pages. You get a lot of traction there. I list them frequently on my Facebook and my Instagram so the followers all get them and I also send out an email in my mailing list to make sure that everybody knows that they're for sale. Generally speaking I can sell things off model or sales pages. I like to sell them from there. So any money I make is completely going to me. eBay charges a fee so if you list your model in eBay they will take a percentage when the model sells. So I don't love to use eBay but I've used eBay a couple times and eBay has worked in my favor. If I find I can't sell the model well or I just want to see the model go into a bidding war, list it on eBay. It's really exciting because this Bay Django which is the most expensive stablemate I have sold sold for 150 US dollars and that was on eBay which is a lot for what he was but that was a popular mold so it was a business choice. It was a marketing choice. A lot of model horses is marketing and business. It's not just painting horses and throwing them online and selling them. You have to understand what's popular, what's in, what's now. An interesting thing though that did happen was I sold a couple of re-sculpts. I had this particular one which I named Dylan. I listed them at set prices on Instagram and he sold for 110. This custom Hinto Morgan mare sold for 100 and so did this Apollousa Parajousage custom. They're a little bit different because they are re-sculpted so they're not just a repaint. You can get a little bit more. So generally for stablemates I started selling them in the 30, 40, 50 dollar range and I worked up from there and I said if I paint an Apollousa I could sell it for 60. If I paint a really complicated Apollousa I could sell it for 75. So it really varies and it really depends who's interested. Some of my work stays up forever like this Chestnut Asifino. I could not sell this horse. I don't know why. I ended up selling him for 40 dollars I think so he didn't sell it very much. Some work didn't even have to list it and there was people like jumping on. Now in traditional scale work things got a little more hazy because the work is a lot bigger. There's a lot more money going around for these customs. I've done a total of eight traditional customs I believe and I've sold seven of them. So I currently only own one. I painted this Smart Chickalina to a blue-brown paint. Now he was really nice. He had a lot of traction, a lot of people interested in him. I tried listing on eBay. He didn't sell. I ended up listing him at 275 and somebody bought him for that price. Not a great profit for the amount of work that went into that model but the sculpture wasn't great. There was nothing I did to change the mold or make him anything spectacular. He just had kind of a cool paint job. He wasn't worth 400 dollars. I feel like the amount of time I put into my custom work I will sell it for 300 dollars. I won't be bummed if it doesn't sell but I say it's worth 300 dollars. So for my traditional customs I like to open them for offers and the reason I do this is for one they're not on eBay so I don't lose a percentage of the income. Two gives everybody a fair opportunity to get in on my customs because I post a lot about them and I have a lot of interest and so when people are like is it going to be for sale I'm like yes it will but it's not a set price it'll be open for offer maybe a week two weeks a month however long I decide. It works in a way that is sort of like eBay so that the price can crawl up as the time goes on. So your work has the opportunity to make a little more than you intentionally anticipated. So if I was to list this ladyface and say yeah 300 dollars I feel like that's fair. Sell it for 300 dollars okay cool but somebody could have offered a ton more and that's exactly what happened. Ladyface was listed at 300 she sold for 500 US dollars that's a lot of money. The minority was a little less extravagant he was listed at 300 as well he sold for 350. Molly was listed at 300 she sold at 300 so it's completely up to the people but that was the interest that they had for this Giselle custom that I painted she's just a basic custom. I really liked her I kept her for a while and then I decided I would take 400 dollars for her. So I listed her for offers at that price she sold for 650 US dollars I was happy with that that felt like an accomplishment. Now the two most expensive customs that I have ever sold are my Rhian and Catel Marathon. So these are the premier club models that came out and this was my business plan investing to the premier club purchase these models as they're just coming out everybody's really excited about them paint them as fast as I can and then sell them and this business plan worked in my favor. So these models were worth about 150 dollars to buy. Originally for this Apollosa baby I said I think he's only worth I don't know 175 he's kind of small he's Apollosa so it's a little intricate and that was what I was going to list him at starting price. I had a friend come over and say don't undersell yourself this horse is worth way more than that I'd say he's worth about 300 well I guess I'll try and list him at 300 see what happens so I did listed him at 300 this horse took me four hours to paint he sold for 650 US dollars. Now the Rhian I had painted and I wasn't totally sure I wanted to sell her she turned out really nice I really liked the way that she turned out and I had someone contact me and say I'll give you $550 for her and I could pay for her tomorrow. First of all she was going to a show like the next day so I wasn't in a position to ship her or sell her that in that moment. For two I had like a ton of people inquire on this model and I was like I want everybody to have a fair chance so I declined the 550 dollar offer and said look like that's really generous I really appreciate it I'd like to list her at offers and start her at the 550 see where she goes because I've had so much interest in her I listed her for offers on model her sales pages at 550 starting offer and she sold for 950 US dollars I cannot believe it I don't know if she's worth that much but that's how much somebody felt she was worth that being said I have grown a lot and I've been painting models for two years it took me two years to be able to sell a singular model for 950 will it happen again I can't say the model horse thing is kind of flaky there's people that willing to spend money on that and the more I build my name and my brand I believe that I can sell my work for that but I don't think it's going to happen every time I don't think I'm going to list your traditional custom every few months and get 950 US for it it's showing in my numbers that it's not consistent it completely depends on the custom on the time of year on who's interested who sees it who doesn't see it sort of a situation so I think when you're pricing your work you really have to do your research you really have to understand your market you have to know what's popular I say if you're like not sure you want to sell it throw it up for offers see what you get you don't have to sell it if you don't get an offer that you appreciate but that's why I start my offers at a price that I would feel comfortable just selling the horse flat out for and then if they go up from there it's just bonus I think you have to be really realistic and look at your work with a really analytical position and say this is the amount of time it took this is the amount of resource it took and you're not always going to get what you feel like it's worth art is like that we spend so much time on art and art is such a big portion of our lives and it takes so much time and the end of it you're probably not going to get what you put into it I would say start low see what happens feel it out if you're listing your model and it's not selling lower the price you're not quite established yet don't sell your models for $300 right out the gate sell them for a little bit lower step up into your levels of sale hopefully this helped give you some insight on how much my work is sold for how I sell my work and what is the best way to go about it it's completely subjective it's all personal it's what you feel I've had people ask me to appraise their work I can't appraise work I don't know how much time you put into it I don't know how emotionally invested you are in it so I don't want to insult you and say your horse is only worth $100 when you feel it's worth $500 so list it for $500 if it doesn't sell it's not worth $500 my work is consistently sold because I'm very realistic about the price point I say I watched the market I know how much these models sell for mine is kind of at this level as it grows it'll be at a more advanced level but I'm not there yet I can't charge a thousand dollars a custom nobody will buy it thank you so much for watching and happy selling your work please subscribe for weekly wednesday uploads follow me on instagram and facebook at djb studios check out my website and sign up to my newsletter to be the first to know about commissions tutorials and sales pieces all of the tools used in this video are in the description below if you have any questions feel free to message me