How much would you charge?

[jacksmomma]

I have had several people approach me about scrapping for them. One in particular is a cousin who loves the look of scrapbooks, but has no desire or patience to do it herself. I would love to scrap for her, but I have no idea what to charge. I am not trying to make a living out of it, but I also do not want to work for nothing. Any suggestions? What do you think is reasonable?

(I thought or either having a set price per page period or telling her that she could buy any supplies she wanted and then charge something for my work.)

Help!

 

[ZeroToHero]

Would you use your stash, or would you go out and buy things? If you're using up some of your stash, then I would charge less, but if you buy things, keep a list of them, and add them onto the price.

As for a real solid number, it's hard to say. I will leave that up to other people... I have a skewed sense of value (I refuse to pay more than 15$ for a pair of pants, and prefer if it's under 10$), so I'm not the best person to ask.

 

[LindaBabe]

Trust me, they will not be willing to pay what it's worth! I did the analysis a few years ago when I was planning on starting a scrapbooking business. Fortunately, I got new work instead and didn't become dependant on my plan.

In order to make anything for your time, you can't really charge less than $20 per page. It would be easy to have more than $5 of materials alone in a page - and you have to figure by the time you shop for the product (even if it's in your stash, you did it), organize their photos and your supplies, design, crop, glue down, embellish, you've spent at least an hour and probably two. Adhesive, use of your tools, electricity to run your cricut, page protectors, album all factor into it.

A rule of thumb is 2 1/2 to 5 x cost of materials, depending. If the materials are cheap or the page complex then charge the higher rate.

 

[MamaDrama]

Trust me, they will not be willing to pay what it's worth! I did the analysis a few years ago when I was planning on starting a scrapbooking business. Fortunately, I got new work instead and didn't become dependant on my plan.

In order to make anything for your time, you can't really charge less than $20 per page. It would be easy to have more than $5 of materials alone in a page - and you have to figure by the time you shop for the product (even if it's in your stash, you did it), organize their photos and your supplies, design, crop, glue down, embellish, you've spent at least an hour and probably two. Adhesive, use of your tools, electricity to run your cricut, page protectors, album all factor into it.

A rule of thumb is 2 1/2 to 5 x cost of materials, depending. If the materials are cheap or the page complex then charge the higher rate.

I came to the same conclusion while looking into starting selling pages or doing books for others. Also, I personally find it very hard to scrap someone else's pics. It's such a personal thing for me. I do buy page kits if they happen to match my style and work with the pictures I have. I try to pay less than $10 for a page kit unless it's something really ornate.

 

[rlovew]

I know my SIL knits on commission and she charges 3x material cost- knowing that she is not being paid more then a $1 or 2 per hour of work but it allows her to knit without having to pay for the materials and provides her with the money she needs to buy materials for the things she wants to make for herself.

I would have to say that I would charge differently depending on the complexity of the page.

I think I would do:
material cost plus

$5 per page for 2-3 layers of paper/stickers/brads/buttons/eyelets only (any kind of these as they are paying for them)- this would be for something very basic and I would require typed journalling from anyone i was doing pages for (this would take me about 1/2 perpage to complete)

$7.50 per page- as above- adding 1 layered diecut/simple paper piecing/embossed layer per page (this would take me about an hour to complete)

$10 per page- as above but handmade paper piecing/embellishments (these would take about 1.5 hours)

Additional: all extra handmade embellishments are $1-3 each plus materials depending on the complexity and time

I am not saying anyone would be willing to pay this but I wouldn't give my time away for less than this.
Rebecca

 

[LurrrvtheDuck]

Trust me, they will not be willing to pay what it's worth! I did the analysis a few years ago when I was planning on starting a scrapbooking business. Fortunately, I got new work instead and didn't become dependant on my plan.

In order to make anything for your time, you can't really charge less than $20 per page.

Yup this is about right $20 per page and I don't think that's including materials or if the customer pays for the materials.

I asked once at my LSS because some of the teachers did this on the side side and she told me it depended on the page but averaged to $20+ per page. My reaction was . For that price I'll continue to do my own scrapping even if I had to rack my brain.

I would suggest you have your cousin buy the material and then figure out how much you want to charge her per page. But since she's your cousin I'm sure you'd give her a family discount.

 

[morgansmom2000]

I was paid $300 to make a scrapbook a few years ago. She paid for supplies on top of it, and actually even a few crop fees, but I doubt I will ever do it again. It was really hard because I felt absolutely no connection to the person and I really felt pressure to get it done! Also, it ended up being about 60 pages. Now, that figures out to $5 a page, and I didn't feel that was anywhere near enough for the amount of time it took me to do.

You may find it is the right fit for you, but it will be hard to find someone to pay you what you should get.

Good luck!

 

[Lisa]

I know of some people who charge between $25 to $40 per page. That covers the supplies.

 

[vanyel]

I know of some people who charge between $25 to $40 per page. That covers the supplies.

Wow. I could quit my job if I could get that much (and do it all the time)!

 

[LindaBabe]

Trust me, having done it a couple times, you probably wouldn't want to quit your job. It's not as fun as it sounds, and you *can't* make a living at it unless you have a lot of clients willing to pay a LOT of money. Figure conservatively 40 hours to make a 20 page album (that is 20 sides) at $20 a side =$400/40 hours = $10 per hour and that doesn't include taxes, health insurance yada yada.

 

[gssmks]

I frequent a scrapbook store that has a section of pages that the workers there have done. Basically, they have their employees, when they have free time during the day, work on pages that can be bought and you just add pictures. I have bought several of them. They do a really good job. I have paid anywhere from $7.00 to $25.00 for those pages, according to how much materials they use and how elaborate the layouts are. They have told me that they do not factor in anything for time on these projects because the girls would get paid for their time regardless. The price is the cost of materials plus 10% profit.

What I would imagine is that anyone who does not already scrap themselves will have no idea how much money will be invested in just materials. It's my opinion that you would never get to negotiating for time because they would back out when you discussed materials.