Diversification: Everybody's Doing It.

Once upon a time I thought it was funny to walk into a Music/Vacuum Cleaner Repair shop, and look at CDs while surrounded by broken vacuum cleaners.  I guess the owner had a talent, and a love for music, and couldn't decide which to follow.  Today, you walk into a bookstore, and there are toys, coffee, CDs and DVDs, etc.  Walk into a coffee shop and there's assorted snacks, CDs, mugs and other stuff.  In today's economy, it makes sense to have a variety of items to sell, since once you get the customer in the shop, you want him or her to buy something, anything.  Every store is a variety store these days.

The same applies to online stores.  Amazon and Target have thousands of items to buy, from food to clothing to books, so you can do a lot of shopping with them.  This blog is all about running a small business, though, and we especially need to think about diversifying.  But how much, and when are just two of many questions.  I've talked about Cost of Goods Sold before, and inventory, and these require a lot of thought before you go buying stuff with intent to sell.  And don't forget shipping.  The big stores can afford to offer free or discounted shipping, where such an offer from a small business can kill any thought of a profit.

Every cartoonist out there wants to sell not only their books, but t-shirts, mugs etc.  Merchandising is where the bucks are, even for the big name cartoonists. This is where Bill Watterson of Calvin & Hobbes fame had his biggest disagreement with the Syndicates, who wanted to merchandise his strip, but he felt it would compromise the strip's integrity and charm.  Which leads us to our Hot Topics for today:
Should we diversify?
If so, when?
And how much?

So should you?  Probably. Eventually.  If you've just started putting cartoons on the web, it's a bit too soon to try selling t-shirts.  Wait until you build a loyal audience, and you have some genuine interest in your stuff.  If you're running your business as a real business, and not a hobby, then those t-shirts will sit around a while, and you cannot deduct the price of them until you actually sell them.  Please read my earlier posts about Cost of Goods Sold, Pricing, and Inventory.

Print on Demand online shops allow you to put your image on just about anything these days, but I would choose a few items wisely, and focus on them.  Quality over quantity, without exhausting your audience with too much to see.

Which brings us to a point that I've discussed before about publishing, that applies to merchandise. Print on Demand is expensive.  If you price your merchandise too high, you won't likely sell it.  Price competitively, and you make no profit.   This brings us back to that earlier point about quality over quantity.  Choose an item, like a t-shirt, and look around for quality shirts at a good price.  More than likely you can even save by buying in bulk, but again, watch out how much you buy, because you may have them awhile.  You can do this with anything, of course, although to get truly competitive prices, you really need to order a lot.  Be sure you have that supportive audience.

Finally, don't forget the bottom line.  You cannot deduct the cost of items you buy to sell until you actually sell them.  The more you offer, the more inventory you have, which takes up space, and costs money that you do not get back until the merchandise is sold.  And to sell it takes time to set up a shop, to get the word out, and requires advertising.

So make sure you're really ready to take that next step into diversifying your online shop.  If you want to become a retail type store, that could work for some people, but make that your business plan.  If you're an artist, cartoonist, writer, or other creative, then it may be easier to sell your books or art through a place like Lulu, or set yourself up with a printer, get a few thousand copies of your book, and really focus on selling it.  It's simple to have a link or two on a blog or website.  It's a whole other enchilada to actually have an online shop with changing and growing merchandise.

For the right person or group, though, that online shop can keep customer interest, spread sales out throughout the year, and create focus for your advertising.

With that in mind, please consider visiting my online shop where we now offer many fine things, from books to t-shirts, and artwork and more. :0)

And did I mention that we're currently offering FREE SHIPPING for the next week or so?

Happy Holidays!    JOHN :0)

Pricing

One of the most challenging tasks as an artist running a business is to set the right price, whether it be for a service, or an item for sale. Let's take this from the top, shall we?

As an artist, you have the choice to either create work for the pure pleasure of it, or to create work for profit as well as the (hopefully) pure pleasure of it.  Let's face it... in this day and age, we find ourselves short on time, so creating art for fun is something I for one can't find the time for... I have a hard enough time finding the time to do my paying work!  I have dozens of projects just waiting in the wings for some free time to show up... projects that I know I would enjoy doing, but, with bills to pay, simply can't justify spending the time on.  So I find artistic projects that I can enjoy doing and get paid for, from my freelancing work to my comics and artwork.

I've been fortunate enough to be able to brand myself as HappyGlyphs Comics, and somehow keep everything under one roof.  This leads to trouble, though, since branding becomes a business and business comes with lots of paperwork.  The good news is that if you truly have a business, many of your expenses are tax deductible, which helps justify doing that artwork we enjoy doing.

However, as I've discussed in an earlier post, you can't deduct the cost of your goods (artwork, books, etc) until you actually sell them.  So, we have a couple of things to address: the initial price of goods, and a later discount on those goods.

First of all, you technically sell things to make a profit.  Any artist out there who has tried this is smirking right now, because let's face it... to get anywhere in this biz, many of us have had to work for free, or give stuff away, to get our names out there.  Once established, you can then try for that 'profit' stuff we've all heard about.  Selling services is one thing we can do, and selling stuff is the other.  But selling stuff usually involves an initial buying of stuff, such as paying for our art to be made as prints or into books or on t-shirts.  "How hard can this be?" you ask me.  "Just add a little extra to what you paid for the t-shirts, and that's your profit."

Not that easy.  You have to remember that your audience has an idea of what things should cost. They are not going to pay ten dollars for your comic book, or thirty dollars for your t-shirt.  You have to price competitively, which is why it is very difficult to run a small business using sites like Cafe Press or Lulu, two of the sites that I like, or the many other similar companies out there.

Your first problem is that, unless you are buying hundreds or thousands of items, you are going to be paying premium prices, prices that may already rival what your competition is selling.  For example, have you priced out the cost of a color comic book? If you are going Print on Demand, the cost of a small comic can be 3 or 4 dollars, the price that Marvel sells Spiderman for.  (and yes, Marvel is your competitor!) To make a profit, you are now asking your audience to pay more for your comic than they would for an established favorite like Spiderman.  This can work if you have lots of people out there that love your work, but remember, they have to find it first, and if it's on the web, they may have to pay shipping on top of that.  You're off to a rocky start already.

Now let's say that you've gone to a real printer, and printed a hundred comics all at a decent price so that you can make a profit and keep your audience happy.  A year goes by and you have a box of 80 comics sitting around, and you can't even deduct the price of those books yet, since they haven't sold.  Now you have to think about a sale.

At which point do you decide to sacrifice a profit just to reduce inventory and get that Cost of Goods Sold back? Well, that's up to you.  If you have new books coming out, then selling the old one at discount may be a good way to build up an audience.  If those books have been in your closet a few years now, then it's definitely time to reduce the price.  It's painful, but that's reality.  Even Disney has bargain bins, and remember... people love a bargain.  You may go a long way to improving customer satisfaction if that customer feels good about getting a bargain from you.

If you're just starting out in a small business, or considering it, this post may be disturbing.  And that's the best gift I can give you.  I don't want to discourage anyone, and frankly, us artistic types do what we have to, not what people tell us, but I promise you that unless you are some kind of world wonder, you will not succeed if you don't work smart.  Think before you act, and research, and most of all, start small.  Build up that audience before you go and try selling stuff. Show us what you got, first, and if we like it, we'll ask for merchandise.

There's a lot more we can discuss on this topic, so if I haven't covered something, please ask.  I'm always happy to answer (most) questions. :0)

And since we're on the subject, have I mentioned that I've upgraded the shop, and have many fine items for sale?

Take care,    JOHN :0)

Ghost Pirates Update



I really should write a blog about priorities, since you may be wondering how I choose what to work on and when. For instance, it's been a while since I've mentioned the Ghost Pirate Skeletons of Three Craters Lake, and with good reason.  I've been quite busy with other projects, and although I've been working on Ghost Pirates, I'm witholding the new material so that it doesn't spoil the ending.  Most of the story has been free online, but now that I'm putting together the final comic book, we don't want spoilers.

Also, as some of you may recall, Ghost Pirates started out as part of The Inquiring Minds comic strip, and so was not in comic book format.  You'd think I would have learned from 3 Knights in India, but no, I didn't.  More about that in my upcoming post about priorities.

Anyway, much of the early material from Ghost Pirates has been reformatted, digitally remastered, and in some cases redrawn.  I've also added new material to enhance the story or improve the layout, and have created my own 'handwriting' font to make the text consistent throughout.  Quite a lot of work, I must say, which explains the lack of recent updates.

I now have about 26 pages completely finished and am working on completing the book.  Originally it was to be 32 pages, with advertisements, a letters page, and a page for Fan Art, but it now looks like it could run longer than that.  I'm wondering if I should make it a two part series, or a larger comic book?  What do you think?  Any opinions?

As for the letters page and Fan Art pages, I already have one nice piece from a fellow artist.  I'll have to dig through my fan mail to see what applies to The Inquiring Minds, but meanwhile, take a chance to read through the archives, and send a letter in. Who knows, it may get published? :0)

And any cartoonists out there who'd like to have a shot at the Fan Art page, send me a small drawing of The Inquiring Minds, doing something pirate ride related.   Of course, how and what gets published are completely at my discretion, and the only compensation would be a copy of the comic book when published, and depends on space left in the final issue.
I'm really proud and excited to have another long term project coming close to completion!  Of course, that's just the art and writing... lots more to go, including some exciting news, I hope. :0)

Thanks,    JOHN :0)