What's it worth?

[dean_schreuder]

<p>I was recently contacted by an "Art Consultant" out of Detroit (I Googled her, she seems legit) that wishes to purchase an image from me for a client. It's a photo of Michigan's State Capital building that I took a few years ago. The problem is, I've always sold my services but I've never sold an individual image. So I have no idea where to start as an asking price... Can anyone give me a suggestion?</p>

<p>Here's the image in question...</p>

<p><a title="Michigan State Capitol Building by Dean Schreuder, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2517/4143944609_4154101629.jpg" alt="Michigan State Capitol Building" width="500" height="333" /></a></p>

<p>

[Charles_Webster]

<p>You don't "sell" images to users, you license it. The amount you charge for the license should depend on the usage (web, magazine, etc.), the "number of eyeballs" i.e., front page featured photo or buried on pg 40 as a 1/6 page item, the location i.e., regional use or national or international use, length of time it will be used, and whether or not the client wants exclusivity.</p>

<p>You can find out "typical" or recommended prices for licensing through some software like <a href="http://www.cradocfotosoftware.com/fotoQuote-Pro/demo.html">Cradoc's FotoQuote</a> or one of these web sites http://www.photographersindex.com/stockprice.htm or http://www.d-65.com/photographerresource/pricing.html</p>

<p>Or you can register at a stock photo site like Getty and find a similar image and plug in your usage figures to see what they would charge.</p>

<p>Just remember, never sell the copyright.</p>

<p><Chas><br /><br /></p>

[dean_schreuder]

<p>Thanks for the info... Also, for clarification, she wanting to purchase a print of this image from me... I didn't necessarily mean sell the image itself. She wants a 30x20 print that she'll have framed herself and it's intended to be hung in an attorney's office in Detroit. This is info I just found out in her reply email.</p>

[Charles_Webster]

<p>For a 30" X 20" print, unmounted and unframed, I'd charge ~$120. Mounting and framing will probably cost 2-3X that.<br>

<Chas><br /><br /></p>

[MichaelChang]

<p>Dean, you'll incur the cost of printing and time to have it done, retrieved, and delivered to your client. Your client will in turn have it framed and apply a markup to the final client. </p>

<p>The final cost to to the attorney starts with your pricing, and it wouldn't surprise me if this art consultant's margin is 50% (cost x 2), so this might help in your judgement on how you might go about pricing. If you price the print at, say, $300, and the framing costs $50 incurred by the art consultant, then the final cost to the attorney might be around $800 which will include her time and expenses. </p>

[craig_shearman1]

<p>$120 is way, way low for a print that large. I'd say $300 is more the least I would consider, especially considering that this is a business use not just a portrait to hang in someone's home. I'd be tempted to tell her $300 is my standard price for that size, and that for something on display in a business office I want $500 and see what she says. You can always negotiate down if she balks but if she says yes to $300 without blinking you'll wonder if you left money on the table.</p>

[enlightened-images]

<p>My standard price for a traditional print on paper is $399.95. Art consultants generally get a discount, since they re-sell the image to their client; and the client should really get it at your retail price, so think of the consultant as your middleman. Some ask for 50% like galleries do, but I generally say no to that. I offer between 15-40% based on the sale, with single image sales being at the lower end of the spectrum. You can sell them an actual print, or sometimes license them the use as a single print and deliver them a file to use for making the print themselves.</p>

[rod_melotte]

<p>And artists complain that they are struggling with sales LOL <br>

Did you take into account what others were selling naked 20x30 prints for? How much a print costs? <br>

<br />$400 for a poster size print? Are you kidding me? Gary - I know you have been in books and so forth but telling someone that they need to sell their first image for $400 is just killing a sale. You have to take into account experience and so forth. <br>

I can just see Dean quoting $400 to his buying, knees shaking and quivering voice. </p>

 

[ellis_vener_photography]

Without knowing print size and whether it will go into a commercial space - like a law office - or a private residence , and

not knowing the uniqueness of the image it is hard to know what is a reasonable expectation of the value. $400.00 to the

art consultant (and I've sold to several of them and them act as an agent for commissioned work) sounds very reasonable

to me.

 

The framing may cost the ultimate client even more.

 

How much "experience" you have, or how famous you are, does not make a bit of difference until you start getting very

well known. You are still in the business of selling a commodity and the entire point of being in business is to make a

profit. Some people will never understand that and think they should be grateful for the tiniest, most meager of crumbs.