Marketing:
A Simplistic Approach To A Complex Problem
Copyright © 1999 Doug Browe
POTTERY MAKING ILLUSTRATED,
A Ceramics Monthly Supplement, undated
WHEN YOU HAVE MORE POTS on hand at any given time than family or friends want or will accept and you crave the luxury items of life (like food and shelter), it's time to concentrate on marketing.
Recently, when asked about how we market our work, I wondered just what it is I do to sell what our studio makes. The truth is, not much. But I do it well. I am not being flippant. I put very little work into marketing. What we all do, at the Hoyman-Browe Studio in Ukiah, California, is spend a lot of time making the best functional earthenware that we can, a body of work that is strong and significant to us personally.
From the beginning, some 20 years ago, I have liked the marketing side of our profession the least. I am usually not comfortable with any power figures or any people who have control over my life -- real or imagined -- so first meetings with gallery owners become a lot like misery stretching into eternity.
About 10 years ago we decided to enter wholesale shows. We did A.C.E. (American Craft Enterprises) shows three times in the mid 1980s, which for us was a great advantage. Although you are still pressing the flesh with the gallery and shop owners at wholesale shows, you only have to gear up for a short-term experience, usually four to five days. Then there's the obvious -- misery loves company. With up to 1200 other craftspeople showing in the same place at the same time, it somehow makes it easier.
Today, we still do business with most of the galleries who found us at the A.C.E. shows. I no longer dread but enjoy the time I spend with these folks, "so either I'm too sensitive or else I'm getting soft, " to quote Bob Dylan.
There are many ways to begin marketing ceramics. As Joseph Campbell put it, " Follow your bliss." The following is an outline, with pros and cons:
Retail Methods
1. Selling to family and friends. This approach has been used with great success (depending on the family's financial security) by many potters throughout history.
2. Local street fairs. Often the second sales strategy of a potter's career, they offer a near- by and fairly safe forum in which to sell your ware. The downside ranges from setting up next to a booth filled with crocheted poodles that go over toilet paper rolls, to hearing "Isn't that darling" 150 times in just about four hours.
3. Summer art fairs (or faires, as the case might be). This can be a truly great way to make a studio profitable. The advantages are: you have complete control over what you make and sell; you never have anyone calling you to complain about breakage in shipment or that the last load was not like the one before. Quality varies so you must research the shows well and perhaps do only juried ones. But sometimes these have surprises too, and they can end up in the booth next to you, making for a very long weekend. There is also a lot of time lost on the road, and loading and unloading crates of pots --all for unknown returns.
4. The storefront studio. Sales are often good when you expose people to the process, as they can see how much work it is and how little you are asking for it. The downside is you don't have the serenity and privacy that many craftspeople demand in their studios.
5. Open houses or studio sales. Almost always winners, they provide buyers the excitement of an exhibition opening, the privilege of an invitation and the opportunity to see where the work is made.
Try to time such sales to coincide with gift-related holidays like Christmas or Mother's Day. To promote our annual holiday open studio, we send invitations to approximately 1000 patrons and even buy small newspaper ads.
Wholesale Methods
1. The route. You need to stock materials and you need to sell pots, so you work out a route by which you load up the rig with your finest, drop them off at prearranged sites (e.g., shops or galleries) and pick up materials on the way back home-- taking in a good restaurant and show. This is a very efficient way to do business, but usually involves a lot of driving and a limited area of distribution.
2. Door-to-door sales. This in- volves going to a gallery district and pleading with dealers to buy your work. You must make appointments beforehand and have a thick skin, as all you usually end up with is a lot of free constructive criticism and often some destructive criticism. However, this method can work. Start by attending openings at the galleries you are most interested in; talk to the dealers about the work they represent, then decide if their galleries would be right for your work. If you think so, send in slides and a resume, then call for an ap- pointment.
3. Sales reps. The use of artists' representatives is a relatively new option that's growing in favor among studio potters. This arrangement allows the potter to pot, while the rep sells the work.
Reps often own or rent space in design centers or showrooms that are for the trade only (wholesale). All the reps seem to be- come known for a par- ticular style, as in Coun- try French or Asian An- tiques, so it's very impor- tant to select one who is excited about the look and feeling of your work. Usually 15% of sales go to the rep. Territory, percentage and payments are all open to negotiation, and need to be settled up front. Take care, though, as it is very easy to end up with too many accounts, becoming buried in orders, and flake out on the rep and client--not a good way to in- still confidence in a new account. On the downside, working with reps means a longer food chain--more mouths to feed and the possibility of more chefs to spoil the soup.
4. Wholesale shows. Professional and efficient, these shows were set up expressly for artists and craftspeople to reach a large buying group; however, participation is not cheap. By the time you pay booth, travel, shipping, hotel and food costs, it's a hell of a gamble. A bad booth location, weather or a down- turn in the economy could make your worst nightmares come true. Contact addresses, telephone num- bers and details about three of the major show promoters follow:
American Craft Enterprises (the marketing arm of the American Craft Council), 21 South Eltings Corner Road, Highland, New York 12528; (800) 836-3470. There are four A.C.E. wholesale shows at stra- tegic locations around the country each year. They are for craftspeople only; no reps or works made in any location other than the artist's own
studio are permitted. Exhibitors number as many as 1200. Entries are juried from slides; there are of- ten three or four entries per space to fill, and a certain number of spaces are reserved for repeat artists. This offers security for established artists, but makes it difficult for emerg- ing talent to get in.
Rosen Agency, Buyers Markets of American Crafts, 3000 Chestnut Avenue, Suite 300, Baltimore, Mary- land 21211; (800) 432-7238. There are three Rosen shows each year, with 300 to 1200 exhibitors, de- pending on location. No reps are allowed to exhibit. The Rosen shows were once thought of as secondary to the A.C.E. shows. Now it seems that most buyers go to both shows.
George Little Management, 10 Bank Street, Suite 1200, White Plains, New York 10606; (914) 421- 3287. George Little produces no less than 20 gift shows a year, with 600 to 2200 exhibitors each. We are talking big business here. There is currently a two-year waiting list to exhibit. Booth prices are from $8.75 to $21.75 per square foot. Artists, craftspeople and manufacturers of- ten use reps to sell their work for them at these shows. This is the marketplace for the big fish, which can work to the small fish's advan- tage--at least your work is differ- ent. And different can get you no- ticed in an increasingly murky pond.
In our studio work and marketing, we try to remember the Michael Cardew analogy of a pottery to a garden. To be a successful gardener, you should always keep your goals in mind and work continually on all fronts. In this way, the garden flourishes and has beauty and harmony at all times, rather than getting out of hand and forcing the gardener to become a policeman who with heavy hand must spend all his time correcting that which has gone awry. 
IImage: Doug Browe and Jan Hoyman conferring on designs for a wholesale order. Approximately 65% of their production is wholesaled, while 45% is retailed annually; retail prices range from $12 for a small slab plate to $1000 for a large wheel-thrown garden jars.
