asgrimm Registered User
Posts: 74
(4/28/03 4:32 pm) Reply
How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
I am sort of dumbfound upon this, I don't know how much to charge for my services. I help guildfriends and very rarely help others with crafting orders. But how shall i charge you? For those who seek armor for younger kin, i do that for free. Those who just seeks armor of higher levels i do for material cost, but those who seek armor of a certain quality i dont know how to charge. I did help Kajh a friend of mine doing a leather armor for his lvl24 shadowblade. All pieces were of 99+% quality, embossed starkalaeder. It took me 2+ hours to do this. I got a small tip for helping, but i only tell my customers what the cost of the material is and then i let them decide how much my work is worth. But after spending 5-6 hours just to make one piece of armor for a customer and after that only getting paid exactly what the material costed, + my tip to the leather crafter i had asked to help me, i felt dumbfound. Here I am spending almost 6 hours just to make one piece of armor to a customer. I am quite tired of crafting nowadays, please help me and let me know how i shall charge my services hereafter.
-Asgrimm LGM armorer
- Byrhthelm LGM tailor
Lothlion Registered User
Posts: 27
(4/28/03 6:19 pm) Reply
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
Asgrimm my friend and brother it is hard to charge folks but I do. Outside the guild I charge a simple 20% above cost since it is so time consuming as ya know. I don't apologize ta folks for it, I spent far more than I make learning and if they wish to seek elsewhere for a better price they are welcome to with my blessings. But in family its different, I jest ask fer da tings ta salvage and hinge so i can afford ta make arma fer all me brudders and sisters.
Lothlion Thursmior
Hand of Thor
Jarl of Northguard Alliance
Ozandn Registered User
Posts: 38
(4/29/03 12:07 am) Reply
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
I have the same questions Asgrimm. Lothlion's solution looks sound.
I haven't put 6 hours into an order yet but I did do an order for a certain quality. Was my first time and was able to pretty much cover it. Was an eye opener.
20% to outsiders sounds fairly reasonable and standard by what little I can find written about it.
To those in our family, everything FA and below is cost or free depending if I have the materials in the vault. The rest is usually just cost. Not sure how to handle the quality orders yet.
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
Asgrimm and the rest of our fine crafters,
Perhaps it is a case of ignorance. Many people have not really crafted significantly. I am a good example. I have a fletcher to 500 and that is all. Honestly I don't have any idea how long it takes to make a 99+ quality high level item. While it may sound boastful to you, I think it might be helpful for you to tell people exactly how long it did take to craft something as they probably don't have the faintest idea.
Frankly, I am uncomfortable about the idea of taking crafted goods from anyone without paying them. I would guess many of us feel the same way. Certainly no one expects to receive something for free.
I guess what would be most helpful for me would be for our guild crafters to give their expectations up front and be completely honest about it.
"A 99% quality arcanium hand axe is probably going to take me three hours to craft. Materials cost 120 gp per try but I expect ten tries. So I am asking 280 gp to do that. (materials+retries+profit)"
Krylen Bjornsson, Hand of Modi
Brelik Bjornsson, Disciple of Hel
... and others
<Fimbulvetr> Nimue
Afalyn Registered User
Posts: 14
(4/29/03 2:14 pm) Reply
This may help you get an idea of what to charge. You may have this already but seems like a good site to use.
Afalyn Grumbelly
House of Ymir
Forn Huscarl
'Sprint or ...'
asgrimm Registered User
Posts: 76
(4/29/03 4:36 pm) Reply
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
"A 99% quality arcanium hand axe is probably going to take me three hours to craft. Materials cost 120 gp per try but I expect ten tries. So I am asking 280 gp to do that. (materials+retries+profit)"
This is what i feel is difficult, since i dont know how many tries i will need for making that item. I have estimated 10 tries for a customer ending up doing 15 instead, and increasing the cost for him and the time to make it as well. With luck i can do the item on my first try. With bad luck you can have a streak of 25+ before doing that item. Which means i cannot ask for a certain payment before i have actually crafted the item, in such a case i would loose money and i dont want to do that, not if i have spent 2-3 hours to make this item.
I am leaning towards an hourly fee, where i charge customers for my time. The customer will pay for materials plus my time spent crafting. Thinking of 100g per hour i spend crafting, and maybe a 10% profit on material cost.
Chain orders are a history for themselves, since you need leather armor from a tailor to place the metalwire upon. First you need a tailor that is able to make these leather pieces (as of today Byrhthelm can do these pieces, i needed to train him up to this, and now he is able to), then I buy 5 pieces of leather from the tailor, ( because it is not very convenient to order one item, then craft it, then order another one, i as well as many other armorers order these leather pieces in patches of 5), we also charge the customer for all 5 tries, so if i am succesful in my 11th try i will still charge the customer for 15 chain pieces since i had to get material for all 15. And even if i am succesful in my 11th attempt i will do all 15 pieces.
I can give you a few examples of how long time high quality orders can take
Full set of embossed starkalaeder armor 99%+
(this was for a thid shadowblade, with embossed being the 6th material)
To craft all items at 99%+ quality it took me 2+ hours and 60+ attempts, one piece i made in second attempt, another in my 21st attempt. The customer who is a friend of mine was told the cost i had put in on his order (ie material cost only), he gave me some tip though.
3 Chain pieces 99%+
For this I had to ask Kryviel and Aliabeth on 4 occasions to make me leather pieces for this order. I gave them 20% tip on their job, since they both only charged me for material cost. This order i got from a private message on the alliance runestone. Since i had a hard time finding tailors available when i was awake it took me several weeks to finish this order. And to craft it, it took 5-6 hours early mornings before i could complete it. And in the end the customer never came back. I sold it to another alliance member who only paid for the material cost though. This one i pretty much screwed up myself by taking such a long time. But having crafting orders that will take several hours to complete, and not knowing when you can find that tailor, and when you do, maybe you are not planning on sitting by the forge for several hours, but instead want to help defend the relics, or hunt with the guild, or whatever.
Ah well i am ranting. Actually it ends up in i dont feel that my customers appreciate the job and time i put in for them.
Ulfbjorn Registered User
Posts: 22
(4/29/03 5:08 pm) Reply
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
OOC: Umathiel was nearly an LGM armorcrafter (only 40 points away) before I deleted him, and we had several LGMs in our guild. I have no idea if these ideas will help you or not, but here is how we handled things in my old guild.
Below fine alloy, we pretty much performed the service for free, as long as quality was not a concern--which it shouldn't be at that level, since you grow out of it too quickly.
Above fine alloy until netherium, things were crafted for the guild at cost, where the crafter would make the item, and the player would pay for the item when he picked it up. Alliance crafting was at cost +10%, and everyone else was at cost +20%. Again, these took into account that quality was not really an issue.
For netherium and arcanium, the game changes a bit. We would frequently have someone purchase the supplies up front, hand them to us, then we would assemble the goods from the already purchased supplies. (I remember having to run to Castle Excalibur, pre-SI, to pick up all the supplies for someone to craft my arcanium plate.) That way, if that person wanted a particular quality, they would have to be involved in the time factor as well. I know that I had nearly 1000 arcanium bars stashed in my vault in preparation for the MP sabre that I wanted crafted for me. (Heheh, it all got deleted when I deleted Umathiel. )
A word to non-crafters within our guilds should be sufficient as well: When receiving crafted items at cost, it is generally polite to include a 10% tip, so that the crafter may continue learning in their craft. As someone who has been on the other end of that, I can attest that it is quite appreciated.
Like I said, I have no idea if this helps or not, it is just what we used to do in my old guild.
Edited by: Ulfbjorn at: 4/29/03 5:10:57 pm
Gimgi Registered User
Posts: 24
(5/11/03 1:48 pm) Reply
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
We had a lengthy discussion online on this Asgrimm, and I 'ope I 'elped ye come to a conclusion on it. I think yer hourly fee could work, but think that ye should charge by the number of tries. It sounds like ye haf a gud handle on the chances of craftin. Jus be up front with the buyer and, my suggestion, ask for a deposit up front. That way you can use their gold to acquire the pieces.
If you craft items typically in the 15-20th try. You could set the price around that mark and make money if you are lucky and get it sooner, or lose money if you have a bad streak. Hopefully you have better luck than not.
Be up front with the buyer about the possible cost and ask for a deposit. That will commit them to the purchase.
Jus me suggestions. As I am a young armor crafter meself, I appreciate all your 'elp in me skills.
Gimgi Redwater
House of Modi
“Ye got ale?”
Tengil es Registered User
Posts: 5
(5/12/03 11:22 am) Reply
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
How about you charge with +20%+10 retries and detuct costs of remaning retrys if you got correct quality before 10 tries?
If you didn't succeed in 10 tries, don't make another until you have contacted the customer if he/she is willing to pay for another round?
Sounds fair to me.
Some get lucky, some don't.
Grugni Keeper of the crafts
50th level Runecarver/Suppressor
Nimue(RP)
Re: How shall i charge customers for my crafting services?
Many people charge per retry.. can end up being costly to the buyer if you get a bad streak.. but i have seen crafters who try to charge a flat rate lose out big time on high quality orders.
My advice is to charge cost+markup for the first try and retry cost+markup for each retry .. most buyers understand that this is how it must be done with quality being of such importance .. on lower items its not as much of a factor ... but on those higher quality higher material items.. you can lose a lot of money on a bad streak any other way
Ponga Shadowslayer
Warlord, Fimbulvetr
Hand of Loki
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