Why The Assembly Line Method Works When Selling Your Art
October 8, 2009 Art Business Plan, How to Sell Your Art
Why The Assembly Line Method Works When Selling Your Art
Ford Motors dominated the car industry by using the assembly line method to produce cars for the common man at a faster rate. The same way Ford was able to produce the T-Model at a quicker pace artists today can get the similar results when creating their work. With more work produced at a quicker rate you have a greater chance of getting your work out to public and have more chances at making sales. For instance, when you use the assembly line method you can create a series of work in one color another with a different background and another with or without people.
There are three reasons why you as an artist should create work using the assembly line method.
1. Business Mindset: When Henry Ford used this method he was considered a genius because no one thought of having an easy way to produce cars in such an efficient way. I can image, having one group work on engines, another on the body and another on testing. Similar to Ford models, when artists are creating artwork using the assembly line method you are constantly thinking with a business mindset while keeping the finished product in mind. You are more conscious about inventory, colors, sizes and prices. Once you figure out your sales trends you can cater your production line accordingly. For me I sell a lot of small paintings that have bright colors and a lot of larger paintings with earth tone colors. Thus leaving me to set a production line where my palette will consist of red, yellow, and orange when painting small paintings and brown, earth green and yellow oxide when painting larger paintings. For more about artists having a business mindset, download “The Three Deadly Mistakes Artists Make When Selling Their Artwork” to your right.
2. Speed: Henry Ford was able to make a lot of money because he eliminated the one product at a time method of making cars to produce several cars at a time and positioned more of his product to be available for more people. Creating more artwork at a faster pace allows you to have more work to put in front of people whether at a gallery, festival or gift shop. For example, when I paint, I may have several paintings that I will do in blue and white so I will draw the objects first on about five or more canvases and then add white to the areas where I want it to go and then add blue to all the areas where I am going to add blue, repeating this on each canvas. As an artist, sometimes you have to work with the mind of a craft person instead of a fine artist because they understand that it’s not so much about the process but the product.
3. Focus: I believe in order for an assembly line to be successful Henry Ford had to stay focused. The assembly line couldn’t create other products other than the T Model because if it did it would have been a distraction from Henry’s main objective which was to create cars for more people at a faster rate. Same as Henry Ford the assembly line can help artists create more artwork at a faster pace thus allowing more potential sales. A lot of artists fail because they loose focus and try different niches thus wasting time on one niche.
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