Handmade Doesn’t Necessarily Mean Cheap
Why I am reluctant to take on commissions….
I often get asked if I can ‘make one of those’ for people. whether it be a blanket, a poncho, or more recently a length of crochet chain.
I really hope I do not come across as rude or dismissive when I am reluctant to quote – but I will tell you exactly why I am reluctant to quote.
Let’s use the crochet paper chain as an example….
I usually answer the question with … “Well, I will quote you but just to let you know that this crochet chain took me just under ten hours to make.” (35 links at 17 minutes per link = 595 minutes / by 60 = 9.91 hours)
At the point I don’t even mention the material cost as I would expect that paying me a decent hourly rate for 10 hours would put them right off straight away 🙂
Sometimes it doesn’t put them off so I go on to prepare the quote:
Yarn (100g of Twinkle DK) £2.70
Hourly rate – 10 hours at….. well, what is my time worth? Let’s do minimum wage at around £8.00…
So, This piece of crochet chain, barely longer than a meter will cost £82.70, please and thank you 🙂
Let’s be honest… you’re not gonna pay that are you?
You’re not even gonna pay me half… or even quarter.
The probable expected price would have been around a fiver… after all, that’s more than what you would pay for a string of fairy lights in B&M.
In other words, the yarn price is covered and here’s a little bit extra for your work.
Believe me, it happens.
What doesn’t happen so often is the understanding that THIS is my work – I cannot afford to give 10 hours (or sometimes 100 hours if it is a blanket) for free. I need those hours to work on class samples, or at this time of year, gifts for family.
My offer of….”but I could happily teach you how to make your own” often falls flat…. which confuses me somewhat. So, you don’t want to invest the time into making your own, but you also don’t want to pay me to make it for you.
I once asked a bloke who asked me to make a 100 hour blanket for his wife (and nearly fainted at the price) what he did for a living…. he was a painter and decorator, so I offered to trade hours – I will give you 100 to make the blanket, you do 100 hours of decorating for me! (I would have LOVED that – always happy to do skill trades if anyone is still reading 🙂 Anyway.. he laughed and said ‘not a chance’… so his work was obviously worth so much more than mine. He didn’t get his blanket… not from me anyway 🙂
So, after a long winded musing…. the moral of the story is, handmade doesn’t necessarily mean cheap. And if you get something handmade this Christmas then that person REALLY, REALLY loves you. Treasure it 🙂
Oh, and come and learn a craft yourself, and you can have this rant next year 🙂
Credit https://www.facebook.com/Soozintheshed/
