Originally Posted by Bottle Blonde
I have been doing research about LA service prices. I am finding the majority of LA quilters charge by the inch, and this amount is subject to how dense the quilt is to be stitched. Such as .01 for open meander, .02 for medium, .03 for dense, .04 for custom designs, so forth and so on. Then there are extra charges such as $10 to seam the backing, $10 to square the quilt top, $30 to add borders, $8 to press the quilt top....(these are just rough amounts, I'm not quoting any professionals pricing here)
Well, it all gets a little confusing, so this is my question. Do any LA quilters -- that you know of -- charge a flat hourly rate? If not, why not? If you are a quilter that hires LA service, would you rather pay an hourly rate? If so, why? if not, why not?
Very few LA quilters charge a flat rate according to the size of the quilt. Is it unwise to charge ---- say $50 to LA quilt a crib size?
I have come across a few LA machine owners that rent time on their machines. Do any of you do that? Is it profitable?
Thanks for your help, I appreciate your comments. :)
Just a few comments: All the longarm quilters that I know charge by the SQ Inch (not inch) LXW=Sq Inch. I know one lady who charges by the bobbin. Most longarm quilters do not charge by the flat rate. I don't because it is more difficult to figure out why/how to charge, (and explain it to my customer) when it is easier to just tell the customer what the rate is for the square inch. It is also difficult to keep an accurate accounting of the time it takes to quilt something, when charging by the hour, because of interruptions, etc.
The reason for different prices (per sq inch) depends on the type and/or amount of quilting to be done. A longarm quilter would be (in a sense) paying you to quilt your quilt if she was to do custom quilting and only charge a flat rate or lower price that would be acceptable for doing a simple meandering price.
Reasons for all the "extra charges" you are referring to, such as piecing the back, pressing, etc. is; these are very time comsuming tasks and your longarm quilter just wants to quilt your top and move on to another top to quilt. They do not want prepare the top (pressing, clipping threads) for quilting or finish the quilt, i.e. binding, unlelss they are paid for their time.
It may sound like a lot of money to pay to have a top quilted, but longarm quilters are not getting rich off of their customers.
Hope this helps. Ellen