I think that the Bob and Axle puppet perks are a bad idea, at least at the level you have them. For $40 & $55 how are you going to make and ship puppets? I don't think you'll have much money left over. For example, if the donor is located far away, it might cost $40-55 or more just to ship the puppet to them.

Also, I'm not sure who provided the quote for your mascot, but $750 is insanely cheap for a mascot costume. While prices obviously vary quite a bit, most professional mascots built by experienced companies cost at least $2000.

This campaign is a bit of a hard sell because you're basically asking people to subsidize the creation of a mascot that will primarily benefit you, not them. Successful crowdfunding campaigns usually either benefit a charity/good cause, or produce a tangible benefit for your audience. If your goal is to raise just $750, rather than all the trouble of a crowdfunding campaign I would just make 7-8 puppets and sell them through Ebay or Etsy for $100-150 each (plus shipping). Save up your profits and you'll have the money you need in no time.

I don't mean to sound negative, but you need a (relatively) small amount of money and you're creating a huge amount of work for yourself with the campaign. I really think a better way to go would be to do some puppet building work or even take on some extra part-time work. It won't take long to save up what you need.

First....do you really think I could get $100 for these puppets?  Maybe it is me being too critical or simply me knowing the craftsmanship, but that seems like a lot for a simple puppet like this.  It is worth a shot though

As for the asking price, that is to have our mascot turned into a puppet.  It also figures in the fees and gives me a good cushion to cover the perks.  I priced a full body mascot once and at $4,000 I never went anywhere with it.  Might need to review the wording.  As for the hard sell, I agree.  In my mind, this would be an easier sell then trying to sell stuff in a shop, but I don't give myself enough credit for things.  So I may try that route first.

As for sounding negative, if its true then it needs to be said.  That is the great thing about this community.  I posted this critique for just that, to see how others viewed it and to get tips on how they would handle it.  Thanks everyone for the tips!

First....do you really think I could get $100 for these puppets?  Maybe it is me being too critical or simply me knowing the craftsmanship, but that seems like a lot for a simple puppet like this.  It is worth a shot though

Well for PP simple sock puppet pattern that might be a bit steep but for the other patterns in the family you should charge closer to that. I would say it all depends on how unique you can make them look.  Don't forget there are puppet out there that are mass produced for cheap. http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=24984946&cp=2255963.2255970.2290615&parentPage=family  Do your puppets look like this? If so then it might be a hard sell at anything above that price. I would say the puppet I linked to is about the size of the PP simple sock puppet size maybe a bit smaller.

I don't believe that builders should undersell themselves by any means but I do think you have to be realistic when trying to sell your puppets. It can be a really tough market and you need to find something that makes your puppets stand out above others. You can't compete if you simply offer what the retail stores offer for cheap because they are mass produced. 

I don't believe that builders should undersell themselves by any means but I do think you have to be realistic when trying to sell your puppets. It can be a really tough market and you need to find something that makes your puppets stand out above others. You can't compete if you simply offer what the retail stores offer for cheap because they are mass produced. 

For some reason this sparked a thought: is it worth trying to be more 'artisan'? You know, like with artisanal bread. Really all it is is a label to make small bakeries sound like they are offering something special, something you can't get at chain bakeries or at supermarkets. I wonder if puppeteers do better at sales if their items specifically avoid the aesthetic of something done by toy manufacturers.

For instance, one might make better headway by specifically avoiding the clean Henson stereotype most people are familiar with.

Not only can you point out that it's not mass produced, but you increase the sense of value of the product, and also make it easier to charge a price that makes more sense in terms of covering costs and wages.

... Just a thought: sorry for the slight derail.

Shawn, that is kind of what I was thinking and makes sense.  I was thinking I would post a clone of the Axle character (GSP, fur mohawk, sunglasses) for $25-35.  Wheras a clone of Bob (Borsa) would be closer to $100.  But that link to Kermit...wow, that is difficult to compete with. 

Na, those are some very good points, and I think the main purpose of Etsy.  A bit difficult if you are using only patterns as a lot of Etsy puppets are clearly PP patterns.  But something to think about.

Regarding the crowdfund, while looking for T-Shirts I stumbled upon Booster.  So, I set one up copying my Indiegogo stuff. I think I like it, because you are raising funds by selling shirts.   https://www.booster.com/tygermin  Will be working on my Etsy shop this weekend. 

Na, those are some very good points, and I think the main purpose of Etsy.  A bit difficult if you are using only patterns as a lot of Etsy puppets are clearly PP patterns.  But something to think about.

That's not true, especially if you look at the PP competitions. Entrants have often found ways of showing their own style and still use the same basic pattern. The trick is to remember that the pattern is a 'skeleton' and that what you decorate the puppet with and how is what can make it stand out. If you haven't seen their past entries then you really should. There's also what Dr Puppet does - great versions of real people. His David-Tennant-as-Dr-Who puppet is one of my favourites in the whole world, highly memorable, and got a lot of people here talking and remembering his work. It's still 'classic' muppet-style puppetry, but done so well and has its own personality, that it stands out. Take a step away from what you see as competition, and just do your own thing.

Also, one of the selling points of not buying a mass-produced puppet is that it has more character. That Kermit is pretty horrid in comparison to the real thing. But it's also cheap. Which would you rather buy? A great puppet made well that costs more, or a crap puppet that costs less? There's an old designer saying: you can pick two of three things. Good, cheap or fast.

By the way, if you're selling on Etsy: don't forget to advertise that on your website. I personally had more of a following on my own website than I ever did on Etsy, but only sold via Etsy and linked directly from my site to the sales page... but I had mixed experience with it, mostly I think because adding that extra step between product sales pitch and buy button reduced enthusiasm. I found much more success simply using a shopping cart system on my own website. (E-junkie. Does all the work for you of processing payments and shipping info, for a modest cost per month. It's designed to work with both digital and physical products, so the cost increases as you use up more of their hosting space. I paid about $15/month only because I did mostly patterns. The added benefit was it always worked, provided the patterns instantly with no problems, the money went straight to my paypal account - fees being paid out via invoice rather than deducted - and I didn't need to do anything. Just add a button to your website, customise the email message, upload your product details. Done.) I'll be using E-junkie from now on instead of Etsy, but I may add a store there later just as an experiment.

Don't forget also that in terms of pricing you need to account for wages. This is where I - and I'm guessing a lot of others - have faltered. Hence the low price of $25. I know in America it's not at this level, but here $25 is basically a (award-rate) minimum wage for artists.. or anyone else in anything other than fast food, where you start on about $15 p/hour. (We don't do the whole 'waitress tipping' here so everyone gets paid per hour) The biggest problem I had was adding in wages because it would drive up the cost a great deal; even in my newly planned business I won't be able to cover my true time spent because it will turn a relatively inexpensive product into a really expensive one.

Point is, this is what Shawn means by underselling yourself. Forget about how much you value your artistic talents; forget about the competition and what they sell for; forget about how much experience you do or don't have; forget about how well known you are for your work. By underselling, he means you have time, effort and materials going into these things. And do you really want to get to the end of the day knowing that you only got paid for one hour's worth of your time, even if you spent 16 hours working on something? Because that's 16 hours you could have spent doing other work that pays properly.

Yes, you want to price it low enough that people won't balk. But one thing that bugs me is people selling puppets for $20 when it probably took them a few hours or more to make. That drags down the pricing for everyone, and also makes us end up re-educating the public when they want a commission quote (because they assume the low price is standard). I think the biggest problem when it comes to making and selling puppets is to find a little ego, enough that says "I deserve to be paid enough to eat". We - or maybe it's just been me - spend far too much time worrying about whether our designs are good enough, whether our skills are high enough, whether anyone will notice because we're new and marketing is such an uphill drag.

We spend far too much time at the mercy of what we think customers want, that we become timid and start catering to what they think they should be paying; and in the process short-change ourselves out of being able to stand up and say "no, if you want this, you're going to make sure I can pay my bills while I build it". Not saying that customers don't deserve or should get a good price or even a low one: just that at a certain point, you need to weigh whether or not you're putting too much stock in letting them be the drivers of it.

-- Sorry for the slight rant. I've just spent the past year working on things that was flat-rate based, and though I'm not complaining about the extra dough... it wasn't really extra because I could have been using that time for something per-hour based. All I'm saying is, you can see the production of puppets and new sales as a good thing, but incredibly easily miss that you're not including time as a tangible thing in your budget.

Side story: my mum used to complain about me turning down commissions on occasion. I would rock up to a discussion about a commission, ask some basic questions, get some half answers, and work out quickly that it would be a waste of my time. I'd end up having to spend hours chasing up a client when they're really not committed; putting in more hours of research because they didn't understand or know what they wanted to do; having to educate them about how puppets work to a ridiculous degree because their idea was "I want a puppet" and not much more than that... etc. And this was all for flat-fee rates where you'd put in a months work for maybe a weeks pay. So I learned to turn down these jobs because they were time-sucks and because I'd end up spending money just trying to keep the client. My mum still thinks that you take on any job because it means money. Instead I prefer to take any job *if it means profit*.

The problem with only ever having experienced per-annum wages and not commission-based is that she can't see how difficult it is to budget in time. If you spend 10 days on a per-annum/hour job, you get paid the same amount as if it took you a day, because you're on a fixed wage and your expenses are usually also covered by petty cash. If you spend 10 hours on a commission based job and you only get paid enough to cover one of those hours, and that 10 hours was because you were on the phone pricing materials, and you didn't think you'd need to do that and you haven't got enough in your commission to cover those extra costs... you've basically just lost your profits. But she continues to think that somehow just getting paid any amount, no matter how much, will make up for it. Like the money magically grows to fill your needs or something.

- My new goal after I finish my latest job is to only ever take per-hour freelance work and no -ever- flat-fees, and puppet commissions will damn well include a decent living wage if I take them at all. I'm tired of charging $5-10 per hour because otherwise a commission becomes something priced in the hundreds and people think it should cost no more than $50. You want a puppet? That's fine, but you're going to make sure I can afford to eat while building it.

A Booster campaign is an interesting concept.  Wish they gave more information on how much a person gets out of each t-shirt sell.

A Booster campaign is an interesting concept.  Wish they gave more information on how much a person gets out of each t-shirt sell.

That is the biggest problem, it is way too variable.  You get more per shirt the more they are able to print.  For mine, at 50 shirts I am getting about $8 per shirt, but if I only sell 25 then I get about $7.72 a shirt.  While I went with a "cheaper" shirt, I did go 4 color which eats into potential profits.  Had I gone with a single color, my profit margine would be higher.  The trick here is to get a full run at wholesale prices, and that is how you make your money.

We used to sell shirts with our logo and some of the characters, but they didn't sell well. When I surveyed conference guest at several locations their answers where all the same....small buget and would rather spend the money on actual product not T-Shirt. I didn't look into the site you mentioned, but we were ordering them and keeping them in stock. It was very hard to know what sizes would sell best. Ended up with inventory I finally gave away as conference prizes.

My advice, slow and steady. Take a small amount from each filming job and set it aside for the item/items you wish to purchase. There isn't a rush to have a mascot, it won't necessaraily bring in more busness, not unless your business was performing at functions with the puppet or mascot. Just my 2 cents. Also, I know you want a more professional looking puppet, but remember The Kermit, Miss Piggy etc didn't start out looking like they do now. Each time you build something, work at learning a new technique. You'll improve upon you character each time. Even wll known mascot upgrade that's what keeps them fresh.

Study, experiment, study, experiment......

Julie

Yeah, it occurred to me today that I am trying to sell a brand to raise funds to create said brand.  Thanks Julie, that is most likely the route I will be taking.