It was a beautiful fall day in the Denver, Colorado area today, a clear sky, the temperature was in the mid 60s, and there was just a light breeze.
Believe it or not there isn’t very much snow in the Rockie Mountains, at least not on the Eastern side of the mountains, which is quite unusual for this time of year.
I have never attended an arts and crafts show before, either because I wasn’t aware of them, I forgot about the show, or I was working on the day of the show.
The arts and crafts show that I attended today was less than a mile from where I live. It was held in a senior recreation center in Englewood, Colorado. The show had about 90 craft people exhibiting their wares.
I wanted to attend this show for several reasons; first to see what people where selling; second, to checkout how everyones table was set up because I may be selling my photographs at a very small arts and crafts event at the end of November; third, to see if there where any photographers selling their photographs and at what price; and finally, just to look around at all of the different craft items.
I would say that the attendance at this one day event was decent, it wasn’t a huge crowd, but a nice amount of people where there, considering that Englewood is a small town. Unfortunately I didn’t see a lot of people purchasing items from the vendors. I saw some items being purchased while I was there, but not a large amount of purchases.
I was surprised that there was only one person selling handmade soap. In case anyone is wondering why I brought up selling handmade soap, it is because I make soap and I had a soap making business up until the end of 2005.
I came across 3 or 4 photographers at the event and I talked to all of them. I made notes of the size and prices of the photographs that they where selling and also the way that the photos where mounted on matte board. Some of the photographers had their photographs mounted on matte board but without a backing. I know someone that buys one of these photographs is going to stick the photo in a frame, but I am not in favor of selling photos this way, I think that the photographs look more professional if they have a backing of some type. Plus it helps protect the print.
It is very important to know what photographers are charging and what size photographs they are selling so that I know what to charge for my photographs.
The photographer whose work I admired the most is a woman in her mid fifties that had fantastic photographs of wild animals that she took in a park in the southern part of Alaska above Kodiak Island. She used a 500mm lens and her photographs of the bears and other wild animals are fantastic. She made some huge prints of these wild animal photographs. Some of her photographs where mounted and famed and some where just large unmounted photographs that she kept in a very nice portfolio.
I asked her how long she has been doing photography and she told me that she sold her first photograph in either 1970 or 1977. I don’t remember which year she said, but that is quite a long time to be doing photography.
I visited all of the tables at this event and I came across some people selling jewelry. The jewelry that they where selling was priced mostly under $35.
After checking out all of the tables of craft items at the arts and craft fair I headed over to Wal Mart to purchase a couple of items. While I was there I came across some pre-cut matte boards with a backing that are ready for mounting a photograph and placing the mounted photograph in a picture frame. These are 5 inch by 7 inch acid free matte boards which cost less than a dollar each.
The reason that I am telling you this is because if I try to purchase a sheet of matte board at an arts and craft store and have the matte board cut for me at the arts and crafts store they would charge me $8.50 for a single sheet of matte board, which comes to $1 just to cut the hole in the middle of the matte board, plus an additional 25 cents per cut to cut the matte board into 5 inch by 7 inch pieces, which is another $1 per each 5 inch X 7 inch piece of matte board because you can get 32- 5 inch by 7 inch pieces from one sheet of matte board. So buying the pre-cut matte boards is a huge savings for me.
When I go to a frame shop a women charges me $6 to have a photograph mounted on matte board with a foam core backing and enclosed in a clear plastic envelope. The size of the prints that I usually have her do for me are larger than 5 inches by 7 inches. That is a very good price, but it would be cheaper for me to do it myself even if I have to pay 25 cents per cut at an arts and crafts supply store.
I will probably order pre-cut matte boards online in the future so that I can save money.
Jim Juris
