question on pricing

[roo4u]

hi all

i know quite a few of you braid custom orders for clients. my question is how do you decide how much to charge for your work? i sell my dog leashes and collars by the inch but didnt really think that would work for bosals and stuff like that. ive looked online and the only stuff i see is from folks like gail hought who have worked years to build their reputations and so can charge what they like. while my dog stuff is well known and can pull a good price i havent done much horse stuff except for my own use. i want to put up a display of my work at a reining futurity in a couple of months and would like a ballpark estimate of what i should charge. this will be braided in rawhide, roo or a combination of the two.

any input will be appreciated.

tracy

Edited May 30, 2008 by roo4u

[Alan Bell]

Hi Tracy, I guess I'll jump in. Basically with braiding very few get what the gear is actually worth considering the time and effort involved. I make my own rawhide as do quite a few others and that time and the time to turn the rawhide into lace are seldom compensated BUT it is reflected in the quality of work I am capable of producing. I get to control the quality from start to finish on each piece of gear I let out. What I did is look at what is being sold in my area; the cheap, the moderate, and the expensive then I compared that to what folks could get if they went online and did a little surfing/shopping and I looked HONESTLY at my work and set my prices accordingly. I want the price of my gear to be reflective of the quality that i thing it holds not forgetting that just because I made the rawhide lace I can still mess up the braiding or just because the braiding is perfect if I put a weak string in there over time the flaw will show. You can't know that about production pieces. I have a plastic mixing bowl full of knots that did not come out perfect so I cut them off and started over. Every good braider will have a bunch of these. I keep mine to show to anyone interested in learning how to braid just to let them know that it truly is as hard as it looks! You can't charge for them but they are part of the price! Also, with rawhide horse gear it is a VERY regional thing and the pricing is affected by this so you have to price for your area when going to show and things of that nature.

Vaya Con Dios, Alan Bell

[entiendo]

I'm having the exact same problem! I'm not known at all. I was told $2 an inch for 8 plait, $1 inch for 4 plait and $5 for buttons. But that makes a 6 foot leash with a few buttons extremetly expensive, and I'm completely unknown. I still think most my stuff is very pretty and I love it, but I'm having a hard time charging that kind of money, and I do make small mistakes. Of course I just love doing all of it, from cutting the roo into strings till the final button, but honestly I'd at least like to pay for the hides What I've been doing is giving a few pieces away locally.

I just got an order for a 6 foot leash. An 8 plait 6 foot leash takes a good bit of a hide so I would like to charge for it but how much is truely the question. Typically I'd rather give anything away to a friend that needs it than sell something to someone for much less than it's worth. She's a good friend with good dog contacts so I will probably just estimate the cost of the leather and ask her to show it off.

Hope I didn't change the subject to much.

And I think charging by the inch can still come into play. If your braiding is as nice as Gail's I think you can charge close to what she charges. Displaying it at a faturity will really help and typically money isn't to much of a problem at a place like that. They pay what it cost if they want it.

Good luck and I'd love to see pictures!! I'd like to try a soft, flexible bosel in the future.

[roo4u]

thanks for the replies...yes i too have alot of knots ive cut off, though i usually just chuck them my biggest problem is getting the string size right for the size of the knot and the area i need to cover.

entiendo-we have been doing braided leashes for 8 or 9 years and some of the top handlers in the us have our leashes...its kinda cool because when i watch dog shows on tv i can pick out our leashes due to the unique way that i finish my leads and collars. the current retail on my stuff at dog shows is about 1.25/inch for 4 strand...i recently raised my prices due to the ever increasing cost of roo. when i started braiding roo was less than $6.00 a sqft. my braiding is pretty good though im sure its not as good as gail...im going to enter a piece in a show this fall and see how it goes.

[entiendo]

entiendo-we have been doing braided leashes for 8 or 9 years and some of the top handlers in the us have our leashes...its kinda cool because when i watch dog shows on tv i can pick out our leashes due to the unique way that i finish my leads and collars. the current retail on my stuff at dog shows is about 1.25/inch for 4 strand...i recently raised my prices due to the ever increasing cost of roo. when i started braiding roo was less than $6.00 a sqft. my braiding is pretty good though im sure its not as good as gail...im going to enter a piece in a show this fall and see how it goes.

Will you allow me to pick your brain a bit roo? I haven't done a leash in 4 plait before, what is the width of your strings, or is that top secret? I only ask because I do all mine in 8 plait 3/32 with 1/8 core. Maybe show leashes need to be smaller round than that? I did a 4 plait 3/16 hat band recently and it was pretty darn small. I kind of feel if I'm going to go much wider than that I might as well use cow hide.

It would be really cool to be able to pick our your own leads at dog shows! I would be so proud, I hope something like that happens to me some day!

Gail's pieces are so beautiful but she doesn't use much color. I like pink, purple, red, blue...etc...I've only been braiding since January but I can't wait to get a good stock of roo colors! LOL.

Edited May 31, 2008 by entiendo

[roo4u]

i cut all my lace 3/16" and for the 4 strand core i use a hand sewing harness thread, i use it doubled. i use the same lace width when i do a toy dog lead without a core. most show dog people do want the fine leads that is why roo became so popular because it becomes so soft and yet is still strong even in the show lead sizes. you should try to go to a show and look at what the vendors are selling in your area to get an idea of what to offer.

yes i love the colors as well. besides the standard colors we do purple, green, yellow, red, blue, teal, orange, and white. i dye all those colors myself except the white, which i buy from hardtke it is called italian white and has a crust applied to it sorts like the metallic chap leathers have...but it stays white the regular white roo i tried did not stay white. some of the most popular combinations are brandy/purple, natural/red/blue, and whiskey/black or saddletan/black.

i have only gotten to see gails work on her website but it looks awesome...and yes i think the only color ive seen her use besides one of the traditional colors was turqoise interweaves on a bosal/headstall set which used to be pictured on her website. i am going to do a roo bosal similar to the paracord one i did for my mom...black/purple/teal.

seeing your leashes on tv and being able to say i made that is very cool. and the reason we can recognize our leashes is because i came up with a way to finish them that didnt require glue and wouldnt come undone when the leash started to stretch. that is my only secret.

[entiendo]

and the reason we can recognize our leashes is because i came up with a way to finish them that didnt require glue and wouldnt come undone when the leash started to stretch. that is my only secret.

Don't blame you a bit, I would hide great secrets too. I don't want to make to much dog stuff, I was just interested in what you did. I'd make one if I was asked but I think I'd really like to do horse stuff, well with the exception of a bosel. My favorite thing is the buttons and I doubt show leads contain buttons. Course I reserve the right to change my mind because I haven't made any horse stuff yet. But I'd like to come up with a simple design that wouldn't be to costly.

I love your name by the way.

I've tried the white roo but I didn't like it, so the coating eventually came off? I found out the hard way that I couldn't make mistakes with it because the coating would come off when I tried to rebraid.

Thanks roo, sorry I couldn't help you with the pricing, but thanks for sharing some of your secrets.