I am so glad you jumped in here and offered all of your insite! i really stopped going to the craft fairs around here...found there were a couple people pretty much giving away their small quilts and tote bags, i could not compete. I actually set my prices where i feel they are reasonable but i still make money. and i VALUE MY TIME! to me my time is very valuable and at a premium! i hate anyone wasting my time...i do not have time for that. when ever anyone asks me to sew for them...regardless of what it is...hemming a pair of pants or sewing on a button i tell them it is $20 an hour with an hour minimum. i don't care if it takes me 10 minutes to do it...i had to take the time, i'm getting paid for it. I do not make many little quilts but when i get a special order for a kids quilt smaller than a twin i try to keep it between $75 and $125. and i discuss this with the (requester) when they talk to me about making a quilt. and YES, I STAY BUSY! i always have a back-log of requested quilts...i keep raising the prices and the orders keep coming in. Once in a while i do give someone a break..but most of the time i stick to higher end prices. if i am making a quilt i think i may sell i keep track of my time...and my materials and at the end i sit down and figure out what i believe is reasonable for the finished product...usually comes out to about 3 times the cost of materials. so far when doing our taxes my quilting has been a benifit to our overall tax return. i get very frustrated with people who 'whip up' 50 tote bags, go to the craft fair and sell them for $5 each...come on, even with donated fabric it would cost more than that.
Originally Posted by UglyCook
Funny story: I know someone who was selling hand knit scarves for twice what she paid for the yarn, and she used cheap yarn so we're talking about $12 apiece. I don't know why, but she raised her prices last year and sold even more at $20 than she ever did at $12. And she's still spending about 5 bucks on yarn.