making ready made frames that sell well
Posted: Tue 22 Jan, 2019 10:37 am
I have been noticing that it is possible to make ready made frames that customers will buy in reference to the usual mass produced offerings from normal non-picture framing sources. In particular, I produce a useful level of left over oak mouldings that remain after making oak frames to order. Of course, I cannot sell RMF's for the same price as frames that are produced specifically for customers orders, but I am still looking to get a better price than the "run of the mill" mass produced stuff.
What I am finding is that the secret is that successful RMF's have to be something that customers will regard as really special and obviously above average quality and perhaps something which visitors to their homes will regard as demonstrating their hosts good taste. We all end up with a quantity of left over backing board, mountboard and glass, which often gives us the opportunity to produce really stunning RMF's with tastefully wider mounts for smaller photos and artworks.
The only difficulty is having enough quality left over bits of moulding to produce the frames which are large enough to accommodate the larger mounts. This only takes a bit of thinking about while you are working to produce your normal custom framing. Very often, the difference between producing off cuts that are barely big enough to make a decent looking frame and a much better proportioned frame is only an extra couple of inches and in financial terms choosing to maximise the potential value of your usable off cuts by not cutting them too small when using better quality mouldings can increase the money that you can charge for the RMF's you make from your off cuts.
Obviously less exciting mouldings are not worth doing this which and in general, I don't bother to do anything with off cuts that are not large enough to put back into stock. but bin them instead. I have certain mouldings which I generally like to keep a reasonable quantity of and this particularly applies to my favourite oak mouldings and having a good stock allows me to make my customers frames some that I obtain a good match between all four lengths of moulding used on each frame, so to some degree I can pick and choose where I will cuts mouldings so as to maximise the useful size of my off cuts.
I regard my off cuts of backing board, mountboard and glass, when they are below a certain size as basically of no value, particularly as they have already been included in the cost charged for making frames. So in order to gain worthwhile value from these bits, I am looking to avoid producing too many off cuts which are unnecessarily small, so as to maximise the potential for producing higher value RMF's. There are limits to when I will do this as there is no point in generating too many RMF's as you can only stock and display so many, some my intentions to maximise my off cuts depend upon my potential to display and sell RMF's.
I suspect that not everyone will share my thinking, particularly those with busier businesses and look forward to hearing comments from others.
What I am finding is that the secret is that successful RMF's have to be something that customers will regard as really special and obviously above average quality and perhaps something which visitors to their homes will regard as demonstrating their hosts good taste. We all end up with a quantity of left over backing board, mountboard and glass, which often gives us the opportunity to produce really stunning RMF's with tastefully wider mounts for smaller photos and artworks.
The only difficulty is having enough quality left over bits of moulding to produce the frames which are large enough to accommodate the larger mounts. This only takes a bit of thinking about while you are working to produce your normal custom framing. Very often, the difference between producing off cuts that are barely big enough to make a decent looking frame and a much better proportioned frame is only an extra couple of inches and in financial terms choosing to maximise the potential value of your usable off cuts by not cutting them too small when using better quality mouldings can increase the money that you can charge for the RMF's you make from your off cuts.
Obviously less exciting mouldings are not worth doing this which and in general, I don't bother to do anything with off cuts that are not large enough to put back into stock. but bin them instead. I have certain mouldings which I generally like to keep a reasonable quantity of and this particularly applies to my favourite oak mouldings and having a good stock allows me to make my customers frames some that I obtain a good match between all four lengths of moulding used on each frame, so to some degree I can pick and choose where I will cuts mouldings so as to maximise the useful size of my off cuts.
I regard my off cuts of backing board, mountboard and glass, when they are below a certain size as basically of no value, particularly as they have already been included in the cost charged for making frames. So in order to gain worthwhile value from these bits, I am looking to avoid producing too many off cuts which are unnecessarily small, so as to maximise the potential for producing higher value RMF's. There are limits to when I will do this as there is no point in generating too many RMF's as you can only stock and display so many, some my intentions to maximise my off cuts depend upon my potential to display and sell RMF's.
I suspect that not everyone will share my thinking, particularly those with busier businesses and look forward to hearing comments from others.