Angelo Sotira, a co-founder of the online art community deviantART, recently offered some thoughts about print on demand services during a little debate I had on Facebook. DeviantART has offered print on demand services to artists since 2002. It was the first online art community of its size -- member-wise -- to offer print on demand... and to receive recognition for doing so. Thus, it is clear that Angelo knows what he is talking about. (Note: the debate focused on some of the claims that Fine Art America has made about print on demand and their business model -- compared to other companies -- in recent months... I may explore that further in a FAV article at some point.) Concerning print on demand, Angelo stated, "Printing businesses are not very good businesses relevant to digital goods marketplaces or our new commissions marketplaces. This is because too high a % goes to the actual print, frame, shipping, etc. Artists are better off selling digital print files for a fee and offering commission services or selling subscriptions or tolls for art projects online and for mobile.". He added, "With these, a much higher % goes to artists. Most of the money in printing is spent on frames!". Angelo Sotira noted that offering print on demand service is a "labor of love" for his company. Point-blank, POD services are not exactly profitable company-wise compared to other services a company like deviantART offers. I know of other art community founders who have noted that POD is not as popular with customers as it was a few years ago -- according to those sources, not as many people are ordering prints... and fewer artists are using those services. Furthermore, artists are more apt to earn profit by offering their images in other ways online. With the above in mind, should artists rethink the value of print on demand services in general? Have you used print on demand services? If so, have you noticed a decline in interest? Have orders been on the decrease compared to the past? Share your insight.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Jun 2013 13:30:01 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015