clennell on sun 24 jul 05
All this talk of one of America's top potters asking $40 for a mug. In
Japan last year Ryogi talked of a living? potter getting $800,000 US for a
chawan cha- tea wan-bowl.
There seems to be two kisses of death that I know of. One is to pull a lip
on a vase and call it a jug and the other is to put a handle on a teabowl
and call it a mug. Mug/jug the two most undervalued words in the English
language.
There seems to be a trend with us North American potters to put a high
value on teabowls and undervalue our beloved mug.
Chuck Hindes teabowl $200 no problem! A Chuck Hindes mug I doubt he makes
since it will fetch him $40 and there will be a bitchfest.
Some of you that make $10 mugs ought to have a long look at them. Maybe it's
all they're worth.
Mugs will never be important priced as the lowest item in your showroom.
Cheers,
Tony
Tony and Sheila Clennell
Sour Cherry Pottery
4545 King Street
Beamsville, Ontario
CANADA L0R 1B1
http://www.sourcherrypottery.com
http://www.sourcherrypottery.com/current_news/news_letter.html
Jim Willett on mon 25 jul 05
Wow Tony, you really got us doing some math out here in Alberta. We
wholesale mugs for $9.00 to our retailers who then sell them for $18 to $20.
Now while they may not be up to the standard of your treadle wheel thrown,
pulled handled, wood fired mugs, they are a damn fine $20 mug. In the last
two months we produced 720 of them. Cindy wheel throws them, we extrude the
handles, I handle, sponge trim, stamp and mark them (we don't sign mugs),
then load the bisque load, we glaze together, and then I load the glaze
load. You and Mel are right. A mug takes more time than a bowl to produce,
and they are undervalued. However the idea of mug as business card is very
real. From our mug sales we have obtained a whole glaze treatment which is
rapidly becoming one of our most popular. We recently sold 3 dozen mugs on
commission to the Legislative Assembly gift shop. Special glaze we weren't
even sure would turn out. "Aqua"...who does aqua? But each mug that leaves
the studio is stamped with Out of the Fire Studio and Made in Canada and
labeled with our label. Web hits increase daily, retail sales from our
various representative retailers continue to climb, people order a mug or
two and then order multiple dinner sets, and we receive direct hits from
around the world. Maybe it was that mug someone picked up in Lake Louise .
Now we will never compare one of our $9.00 mugs to your $25 (Should add a
zero or two from what I've seen) mugs, but they are a really good $20 mug.
Anyway what we're wondering is if we can take the handle off, come up with a
glaze that crawls a bit, and throw a wonky mug and get say $400,000 each for
it (hey we don't want to be greedy) If we can push 350 of those out the door
in a month ............oh wait, I think it's snowing here too!)
Jim and Cindy
Out of the Fire Studio
Edmonton
Tony wrote............" All this talk of one of America's top potters asking
$40 for a mug. In Japan last year Ryogi talked of a living? potter getting
$800,000 US for a chawan cha- tea wan-bowl.
There seems to be two kisses of death that I know of. One is to pull a lip
on a vase and call it a jug and the other is to put a handle on a teabowl
and call it a mug. Mug/jug the two most undervalued words in the English
language.
There seems to be a trend with us North American potters to put a high value
on teabowls and undervalue our beloved mug.
Chuck Hindes teabowl $200 no problem! A Chuck Hindes mug I doubt he makes
since it will fetch him $40 and there will be a bitchfest.
Some of you that make $10 mugs ought to have a long look at them. Maybe it's
all they're worth.
Mugs will never be important priced as the lowest item in your showroom."
| |
|
