Bree123

Hooray for your brother! My sister is the same way. She didn't ask for the quilt, but she told me how much it was worth (my jaw dropped) and has been my greatest champion. I made a pretty simple quilt when her first son was born in May & she immediately insisted that I needed to start selling them. She advises me on pricing & has a background in marketing so has provided hours of free advice on how to market my quilts to people that are willing and able to pay better. Whenever I start to panic about asking so much for a baby quilt, I phone her up & she lovingly scolds me that I'm still not asking enough for my work. She's right, of course. If it were anyone else's work, I'd be telling them to ask at least 50% more -- maybe double. Even those crappy baby quilts that fade, tear, thin & pull apart like crazy after 12-15 months from Pottery Barn sell for $150. You know they're not spending more than $20-30 on materials & probably pay the factory workers that make then less than $5 per quilt. So I don't know why I get panicky when I think about following the industry average of an 8.5% mark-up so I wouldn't have to just use my own salary to fund my business, but I do. I'm working on that ... er, rather, my sister is working on me. lol.

Thank goodness for good siblings that support what we do & want us to be able to earn enough to make art full-time rather than just once or twice a year while working at a job we hate just to pay the bills (& hopefully support our quilting habit!). If he sends more, use it to keep making art & send him a photo of your next quilt. I'm sure nothing would make him happier than to see you continuing to make beautiful things.