The Ins and Outs of Successful Relationships

Compensation

Perhaps the most delicate and uncomfortable of all areas, the details around your cut vs. their cut, how you will receive payment and how often, is one of the most important.

Establishing the payment percentage up front will avoid a lot of headaches. In my experience a typical percentage is 65/35, meaning you receive 65% of the sale and the consignee receives 35%. In some situations you may find the consignee will want a higher percentage and you will need to adjust your pricing model but you will always want to keep in mind what the market will bear. Your products may not move at a higher price point which will defeat the point of having your items in the shop, other than providing you with visibility if you are able to put identifying information like a website on the product packaging.

Next you need to discuss how you will receive your percentage and on what frequency. Some of my consignees pay weekly, while others pay monthly, and this can sometimes be negotiated depending on the situation.

do come from a business background and recommend a formal contract whenever possible.

Merchandising

In most consignment situations your items will be available alongside other makers and in most cases what I like to call filler or products the store owner has purchased wholesale from a supplier. This is called cross merchandising and has many benefits, the biggest one being consumer experience where the consumer can easily select multiple items without having to search endlessly, and the result is more sales across the board. Think about the last grocery store you visited, perhaps you saw a display of avocados next to a display of tortilla chips or bread. These products compliment one another even though they are not organically the same. So if you are a jewelry maker your earrings may be on a table that also has folded shirts and jeans. A consumer will see a shirt they love and then also see a pair of your earrings that will match perfectly, and voila… a sale!

Here is an example of what cross merchandising looks like: hu·mid·i·ty is the concentration of water vapor present in the air. Water vapor, the gaseous state of water, is generally invisible to the human eye. If there is a lot of water vapor in the air, the humidity will be high. The higher the humidity, the wetter it feels outside. On the weather reports, humidity is usually explained as relative humidity.

Compensation is very important and not something you should approach lighty. Once you have agreed to terms it is important that those terms are followed, don’t be afraid to revisit this discussion if you feel something is not going according to the terms of your agreement. I do not have formal written agreements with my locations but this is typical for my area and is not something I have had trouble navigating. However I continued here...

Humidity… what is it? Why is it important? How do I account for it in my laser projects?!

While wood isn’t the only thing that can be lasered, it’s one of the most common and perhaps the most susceptible to wild swings in humidity or moisture content. In its rawest form as a tree, it survives on water and has a very high moisture content until it has been logged, transported, milled and transformed into veneers to be made into plywood or other finishes.

For the sake of this topic, let’s use Baltic Birch also known as Russian Birch, as it’s one of the most commonly used materials in the industry because of its tight tolerances, uniform color and vivid grain patterns. It’s also one of the few materials you’ll find that has every layer from top to bottom the same species making it a great option for laser cutting and engraving with consistency.

As it makes its journey from tree to plywood, with many steps in between, it’s introduced