It's 10am. Do you know where your art is?
It's 10am. You are settling into your studio for a nice long day of dedicated creating when a potential client calls. They are interested in a piece of artwork they saw on your website.
"Can I come to your studio and look at it?"
"It's not here, I have it on display."
"Oh, well, where is that? I am happy to go there to see it-but I am only in town for today."
"Um, sure, let me call you back."
The problem is that you don't know where this particular piece actually is. And unfortunately in this instance, that sale will likely be lost since the client won't be around to wait for you to find your missing piece. This scenario may sound absurd to most people, but you would be surprised! We have had many conversations with artists who are trying to track down their work at various locations.
Keeping an up to date inventory of your art in one document is a crucial aspect to managing your art business. Even more so if your work travels a lot from venue to venue. You want to be able to see, at a glance, where your art is located at any given time. Don't count on the gallery or other venue to keep track of your art. Some places will be more organized than others. Take it upon yourself to be on top of it-after all, this is your livelihood!
One of our member artists keeps organized with a simple Excel spreadsheet.
The top row can contain information such as this:
Title, Size, Price, year created, Framed/Unframed, Sold/Unsold, To Whom, % of sale you retained, Location, Exhibition.
The row on the left can list the works by series or alphabetically by title.
I went ahead and created a sample for you to use! Click here to download.
Other important reasons to keep an up to date inventory list:
Sales History. Not only do you want a record of where your art is located, an inventory is also helpful to show a record of your sales and pricing so you have a history for yourself and for potential buyers. We often have buyers wanting to know what the artist's work has sold for in the past. If this information is not readily available, a buyer will likely move on to something else rather than wait for you to find the information.
Client History. Your inventory list can also indicate who purchased a specific piece so you can market new work to them in the future. This is a captive audience who should be the first notified if you have new work they may like.
Website Creation. When you create a website, you will have to provide much of this information to the person putting it together. If you already have the information in one place, all you have to do is email it over!
Insurance Purposes. Providing your insurance company with your inventory list including photographs of each piece is essential.
Other helpful tips:
Name your piece and stick with that name. Don't have one name on your website, another written on the back, and another on a tag. It can become very confusing for others handling/selling your art if the name does not stay consistent. If you must name a piece 'Untitled', we would recommend putting a number behind. 'Untitled123' for example. Again this is to avoid confusion for yourself and others!
Keep your inventory up to date! Creating a system is one thing. Using it is another. If you are not computer savvy, download and print the sample spreadsheet we have created. You may manually enter the information in the boxes, then have a friend help you keep it up to date on the computer.
Do have other ingeniously simple ways of tracking inventory? Please share them in comments!
Labels: diy, helpful tips
