stephani stephenson on wed 19 dec 07
hi folks
A moment to stick my head up above the daily stream of
events. A rainy day here in San Diego. Seeking
solitude in the library , a morning away from the
studio and office to write cards, etc. etc. and try to
relink with CLAYART.
Two things i have noticed, having now logged more
than
a few years full time in clay :
1. Overall, years are more consistent than I would
have ever imagined.
inquiries come in, stuff gets designed and made, stuff
goes out... in a very steady stream.
2. Within that consistency is a HUGE amount of
variation!
This winter i am working on a large project. plunked
right down in the middle of the late fall-early spring
time slot. it is an exciting project, with many
custom pieces and a lot of material involved.
Some years this is a slow time of year, work
wise, income wise. (though there of course is never an
absence of tasks at hand.)
I hired some help with the wet work on this one and
was
fortunate in finding someone who has worked with clay
all his life . As i see the tons of clay we have gone
through I realize that I would have been in deep
doo-doo trying to press all this myself in a timely
manner.
Plus, WOW! It was worth it, knowing I could tend to
some paperwork or run an errand or rebuild the kiln
and know that the pressing continued.
Big orders are wonderful in that they can provide
technical challenges, the opportunity to do something
special, and assure
current and projected income. but they can also
effect the workflow of the studio.
You need to think about how these projects affect your
ongoing production , i.e. when you are working on the
BIG one you think you can still slide in the SMALL
ones
along the way... I often do do this, within
measure..., BUT if it is
a large large project,
it is like the egg that snake
just swallowed.
not much else can occur while the egg is moving
through the alimentary canal!
Carts, kilns, time needed for the big project are not
available for the smaller projects that come along,
especially special orders.
I have this ingrained customer service attitude that
makes me want to say YES! to people who want my
stuff....as in YES i can do it NOW!
in this case you need to be honest with yourself and
your customer and give them the truth.Time to hone in
your
scheduling,estimating and communicating skills...
"here's what is possible
and here's how long it will take".
Sometimes the customeris also on a long lead
time..words like 'oh we are just starting
construction' are music to your ears in this
case.
There can be increased stress with larger orders.
increased expenditures in materials, utilities, and
time are
larger, losses can be greater, estimates and bids need
to be on the mark. Stress can come with having to
divert other projects to tend to the big ones or
increasing production costs and overall work load in
hiring extra help ,
etc. you find your limits as you struggle with
questions of whether to expand or not.
..do you
boost your production or not?how much of your regular
stock is reasonable to have on hand? it is different
for each individual and each studio. Are big custom
projects for you or not?
I'm intererested in hearing peopple's approach on this
one.
For me, the variety has been a good challenge, it is
leading me down a path where i am pretty much a custom
shop, versus someone with a line that could be sold
through showrooms. Very few of my projects come in as
a set order for a certain number of pieces. Most
projects come in the door as an idea, a space to be
filled, ... can i solve the problem and make something
special for it?
This past year has been a good one in that i completed
projects that stretched me and ones which i think came
out alright! I enjoyed working with my customers
and clients and I made some progress in my craft.
Most projects done this year won't be installed or
photographed for awhile, so it is always a bit of a
waiting game.
if i look at things i could do better, they are the
same... i tend to focus on the work itself , so the
PR, the website, the office, ...they don't quite keep
up.
I did better on time set aside to work on new designs
and refine
old one...that is work i usually do in the winter,
and, ok admit it...
that's never quite where i want it to be.
The year has been good to me though. the bills are
paid, there is some to set aside, people are
held dear, there has been much to learn and
appreciate, and there are plenty of building blocks
for next year .
I hope the year has been good to everyone, in some way
.
Stephani Stephenson
http://www.revivaltileworks.com
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Richard Aerni on thu 20 dec 07
Stephani,
It is good to hear your voice again on clayart. Your posting brought me
back over twenty years, to the time when I was a partner in a three person
studio which was working both on a line of designer vessels and pots, as
well as producing large scale architectural installations. You raised some
questions that we addressed in our years in this endeavor, some we handled
well and some not well at all.
You said: Big orders are wonderful in that they can provide
technical challenges, the opportunity to do something
special, and assure
current and projected income. but they can also
effect the workflow of the studio.
Absolutely! The best description we came up with to compare the normal day
to day vessel making with the big architectural projects was to taking a
test or writing a three page paper to writing your doctoral dissertation.
The big project requires so much more planning, and work done far in advance
of the time it is needed, and skillsets needed to be learned for just the
one job, and the project can make or break your studio, since mostly it's
all you are working on for a long, long time. We were fortunate in that the
first big project (fountain and mural 88 feet long, 44 feet wide, five feet
tall, including all pool tiles) did not bankrupt us. Partly it worked out
because we lived cheaply, partly because we worked incredibly hard to get it
out in a nine month time frame (no days off, save one for Christmas and 1/2
day off for Thanksgiving), we were decent estimators and good executors, and
mainly because we got lucky and didn't have to remake parts, and the client
had a heart and gave us more money than the original bid when they saw how
involved the project was and how much they liked it. The first project is
always the hardest to get, and you have to put yourself out there, take
risks, invest without a sure return, and learn as you go. Once you've
developed a track record of success, the jobs just seem to find you.
The big jobs also teach you a huge amount of technical and business stuff.
Without these large jobs, we would never have "lived" how the architectural
terra cotta was made in the late 1800s and early 1900s. We wouldn't have
learned about large-scale press molding and modeling, adjusting clay bodies
to make them weather-proof and water-proof, learned how to slip cast
elements, learned how to use various types of plaster for architectural
models and installed parts, learned how to work at cone 1 oxidation, learned
how to work with plumbers, masons, engineers, architects, bankers, ceramic
suppliers, and CEOs in order to make it all happen.
You said: You need to think about how these projects affect your
ongoing production , i.e. when you are working on the
BIG one you think you can still slide in the SMALL
ones
along the way... I often do do this, within
measure..., BUT if it is
a large large project,
it is like the egg that snake
just swallowed.
not much else can occur while the egg is moving
through the alimentary canal!
We were lucky in that we were a partnership of three very committed
individuals. One had been a sculptor before becoming a potter (Mike
Frasca), one an advertising exec in Europe (Allan Nairn) and myself, a
failed geology student (!)...it gave us a variety of talents and experience
to bring to the table. The first two big projects, we dropped everything
and just worked on the architectural stuff. The next three, we slid into
the mix of our very busy wholesale pottery business. It required no small
amount of give and take, and we didn't always do it very well, but it worked
for a while.
You wrote: There can be increased stress with larger orders.
increased expenditures in materials, utilities, and
time are
larger, losses can be greater, estimates and bids need
to be on the mark. Stress can come with having to
divert other projects to tend to the big ones or
increasing production costs and overall work load in
hiring extra help ,
etc. you find your limits as you struggle with
questions of whether to expand or not.
..do you
boost your production or not?how much of your regular
stock is reasonable to have on hand? it is different
for each individual and each studio. Are big custom
projects for you or not?
I'm interested in hearing people's approach on this
one.
Good things to be thinking about... Ultimately, we didn't have the business
structure to make this happen efficiently over the long haul. We did things
on a consensus basis, which is not a good way for a three person (and we
occasionally hired others) firm to work. You may be doing better as a sole
proprietor. We had rented a second, larger studio space to execute projects
and needed to either buy a building that would house both operations
(pottery and architecture) or else abandon one or the other. We couldn't
come to any agreement. We were unwilling to extend ourselves enough to risk
the big purchase and the big expenditures. In some ways, we were too much
the potters and not enough the business people. But then, potters learn
caution for a very good reason. The pot business ended up being more
consisitent over the long haul, and as hard as we tried to make an
architectural product that would carry us through the lulls in the custom
job market, basically what we found was that people wanted the custom work,
but not our more generic products. Our business split up for other reasons
than this, but all of us are still making pots right now.
I don't know if any of my experiences will give you any pertinent info, but
I wish you good luck in all of your endeavors.
Best,
Richard Aerni
Rochester, NY
gayle bair on fri 21 dec 07
Richard & Stephani,
I don't know how may of us will find ourselves involved in large
projects.
However, I found both of your postings incredible valuable.
I can see how they are pertinent to smaller scale projects.
Thanks,
Gaye Bair
Tucson AZ
On Dec 20, 2007, at 7:40 AM, Richard Aerni wrote:
> Stephani,
> It is good to hear your voice again on clayart. Your posting
> brought me
> back over twenty years, to the time when I was a partner in a three
> person
> studio which was working both on a line of designer vessels and
> pots, as
> well as producing large scale architectural installations. You
> raised some
> questions that we addressed in our years in this endeavor, some we
> handled
> well and some not well at all. snip>
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