Restricting the Number of Prints - A good business decision??

Oakley

Hi there,

I have my photo art up at a busy coffee shop in my town. I am getting lots of interest in my photos. One person wants to purchase an $800 30x40 canvas print. I told him he could have the one on the wall after my show is finished or I could order him a print right away. He was blown away that I would allow multiple copies to exist. I can see his point --- I mean, most other art mediums (paint, sculpture, ect.) are origionals...and that's part of their high value. Digital photography is much different. There is no limit to the number of prints out there, and that could limit it's value.

So, what do you do? Tell people this is 1 of 4? Or just sell 1. Or lower your prices knowing the same shot could and should be sold as many times possible to reap in the extra cash.

I'm curious....

Ryan

Sam

An original 30 X 40 painting would probably sell for around $5000.00 or more and there would be nothing to prevent the painter from painting as many similar paintings as he or she wanted. A print of the same painting would sell for less.

My response is simple, it is a photograph on an open addition. If it was a limited addition the cost would be substantially higher, and if only one is produced, the cost will be very high.

Sam

ChatKat

Variations
What I have done is a variation of a print when I want to create a single piece - Limited Edition - with no other copies of that genre of that image.
I limit my prints to 100 or 25 copies of a piece and I created a Certificate of Authenticity for that piece telling them which number of the series it is. If they want to limit the piece, then they can buy all the copies (price x100 or price x25).

Art Scott

in the days of film to make a Limited Edition we would run 100, 25, or how ever many in 1 run and then the neg or slide would be duplicated and the original would be "destroyed" (some used multi pin holes or cut a slit , others had their own way of destrying the orig).....digital is a bit harder....however if one is truly honest and destroys the raw file and the high resolution tiffs and jpgs and keeps lesser quality files for selling non-limited editions then that could work...............
To make his copy worth a bit more....sign it in gold acid free paint (paint pen)................this is what I offer

Oakley

Great responses everyone. I learned something today!

I have signed the copies with white acid free pen. White looks really really good on my prints.

I may make a limited addition. But I don't know if he would want to spend the thousands to make that happen.

We'll see.

Ryan

colourbox

Actually the real shocker is that your potential customer did not conceive of multiple prints. In any printmaking art, one print is rare, having an edition of multiple prints is standard.

As far as limited editions go, there's a lot of debate on this subject. One thoughtful essay is by Brooks Jensen, who argues that the traditional art world rationale for limiting an edition don't make the slightest bit of sense for photography. I agree with him and Sam's post earlier where you can do a numbered open edition.