I know many pyrographers who had a background in art before we started pyrography, which can help. Most all of those that I know also, are all self taught. There is nothing wrong with not knowing what you are doing; it is what helps you develop your own style, not constrained by anyone’s “rules” as to proper technique. I started doing this in 2004 to finish a few wood carvings I was doing and a fellow woodcarver introduced me to my first wood burner. He had a solid tip burner but I went ahead and purchased a fancy one. It wasn’t long after that I wondered if I could do things on a flat surface and started digging up scraps in my wood shop.

I discovered soon after that I had not invented the idea after all, but people were doing fantastic work with this art. When I saw what was possible I was amazed, I really started to push myself to produce better work. It made a big difference for me. Still I have never had a class or read a book, or even met another wood burner face to face… so much of what I see I am not sure how to do it. That is really why I post tutorials on my web site, because some of my textures and techniques I develop as I experiment, and I hope that I can save others the aggravation of doing that. The downside is that I can’t offer much as to the “right way” of doing things. I use pine, my favorite tip (the skew) and burner are not (supposedly) the best ones.

There are several different roads with this you can take, and I think each is just as fun, rewarding, and respectable as the other. I can try to give you some insight in a few and you can make money how you want.

I started doing booths at craft fairs and town celebrations, trying to hit the ones that really were geared more toward handmade items. I learned a lot as I went. It is always good to be able to demonstrate as you sit there. This will keep a small crowd and generate interest in your booth as well as help people appreciate what goes into it. It also gives you a chance to advertise pyrography, which will only come back to you. It is kind of like “the more successful the business, the more successful the employees.” I put things in craft malls and gift shops and things like that too. You have to keep plugging through a lot of rejection. This kind of thing doesn’t appeal to every taste or consumer, and the wrong setting is a waist of your time and the shops. It seemed like it takes a LONG time to get the snowball rolling but after a few years, the momentum begins to carry itself.

 

Do not get discouraged if you do a show and it is not as productive as you would like it to be. Selling a lot or a little can change a great deal from one show to another, and even in the same show it can change from one year to the next. The exposure and advertising you are getting even to those who do not buy anything is also doing a lot for your business as well and demonstrating gives people a real appreciation for what goes into this. You will want a variety. If you have a variety of things for different tastes like chickens, flowers, wildlife, landscape, etc. But more importantly a variety of items… big items and then things like Christmas ornaments, wooden spoons, key chains, etc.

The wood carving shows and conventions are like the “high end” craft fair for this kind of thing. They are the same as the craft fairs in your approach. sometimes you can eliminate your small ticket items and do more of the larger stuff. 

 

I know a very successful artist; he does mostly oil paintings and has work all across the country, and he has won more awards than I can remember. He has sold original work from $2,500 to $10,000. He has been partnered in a gallery for some time and belongs to several art orginizations. He finally retired from his “day job” a few years ago, which job by the way had nothing to do with art. My point is just that not many people can truely make a living with art unless they get into partnering in a gallery, teaching, writing books, or things like that which are above and beyond just the pictures thay are making. There are few that can or do make a living just selling the art. I don't want to discourage anyone of course, I love art and all that it involves, I just don't want anyone to have unrealistic expectations and get discouraged as a result. In any end of this as to making money with it, you must ignore 100 rejections for every success. I couldn't possably tell you how many shops and galleries have turned me down... and most of them without even looking at my work... and now I keep plenty busy and what shops I used to have things in I have had to pull out of because I make more money in other ways.

The down side to crafting can be a few things. First it is a lot of time, money, and work to set up for a booth and you will still come home with a lot of stock. I still have boxes of things in my garage that I may never sell because I don’t do the booths any more.

The craft fairs and malls will be the ones making more money than you because you pay for the space and/or they get a commission off of your work. By the time you price it high enough to make a good profit, it becomes too expensive and does not sell. Most of them don’t let you put your contact information on the items so it becomes useless to try to promote yourself that way. All of the exposure that you can get however, even if the profit margin is small at first will come back to you.

If your interest is in fine art, it is the same in some ways, but very different in most. Most any gallery (not gift shops that call themselves galleries or galleries that sell prints, but “fine art” galleries.) require you to have a resume and some credentials. I had to read up on a lot of artists to even know what that meant. Basically you have to start winning art competitions and donate things to the community and build yourself up a history for a few years as an artist. Many of the entry fees are steep and they can require a bit of traveling too. You have to become much more conscious of balance, composition, meaning, and originality with the pieces too. You will spend more time on the development of your piece than you may actually creating it, but it can be worth the effort because you can make reproductions of the piece and sell them. Anything you make for a gallery, for printing, or for competition must be your own original work (NOT a copy or pattern). There are also Art Councils in every state that is a federal program that has grants and fellowships to apply for. They have grants for “emerging” artists, “established” artist, and finally an Art Fellowship Award. For those you have to be represented by a gallery first and a list of other qualifications that can take years to meet, and for any of them you can not be a student or have another job, you have to be an artist full time. (Being retired counts as well.) It is quite the application process that is hard to explain. It is free to apply, and you can find information on it online for your states art council. Look up funding and grants for artists. There are juried art festivals too, for your state as well as the larger cities. The booths are a lot more expensive than a craft show, but the clients are normally willing to spend more.

 

I mentioned reproductions of your work. If you can find a printer that can scan the image for you you will get the best image for printing, but if your piece is too large you can have someone photograph ut for you. You will want a professional photographer who knows how to photograph art... it is very different than portraits. You don't want any glare or uneven lighting, and you want a high resolution picture. The resolution is to eliminate any pixilation that could make the reproduction loose clarity and be much less quality than the original. In several cases I think the print actually looked better than the original. You will be able to proof your image before it is printed. Your first print is expensive, and you can find printers that will print them one at a time for you. You may have to sell several prints before you have recovered the cost of the first. Once you have paid for the scan, and have a digital "negative" saved on disk, then it is much less to have each print made after that. I can sell a print for a fraction of the cost of an original, and that gives you a broader range of consumers. You will have your choice of papers you can use, but in my experience if you print on canvas you loose a lot of the fine detail, and the texture of the wood will disapear. If you print on watercolor paper the color and tone will not look like the original piece. A good "plain" paper really seems to render better for pyrography. You will want to number and sign each piece individually, most likely by the signiture you put on the original piece. This is what is meant by "limited" or "limited edittion" prints. Normally you would do a series of 1500 and number them 1/1500, 2/1500, 3/1500... until 1500/1500. Normally if you sell that many, you end that piece, but some artists will do a "second edition" and label them as such by the print number. I have never had that problem. I keep a log in a binder of who the client was, even if it is a shop, and the number or numbers next to the name, so that I can be sure I never put the same number on any two pieces. It is much easier to keep up with demand, especially for pieces that are popular once you have a print made. when I have had the same thing requested several times, I normally know it will do well and then I invest the time to do it large and very detailed... putting my all into just one piece. It may not be worth it if that was all I did, as I could only do a few of those a year, but then I can use that piece for making the reproductions and the initial investment becomes worth it.

Galleries, operate much like a craft mall, even if they think they are better. (You will find the art community an odd collection of people, and they do look down on the “crafters”.) If you sell work in a gallery, you will still pay for space and share a commission for anything that sells. If you can find any that do commission only, then you are lucky, and that saves you the risk of paying more than you are making if things don’t move. Unlike the craft shows, you are normally spending a lot of time on one piece, and doing only “big ticket” items. You won’t need a variety of sizes and prices, and you can get a lot of money for one piece instead of selling many small items. The turnover however is much slower, so it may take 6 months for a piece to sell. You also have the same problem you do with the shops and craft malls, you have to stock up the space you are trying to sell in, and that requires a lot of time and investment on your part. It is much easier however to keep space filled than fill it the first time.

What I have found is that even a combination of all these can be fun, art... craft... somewhere in the middle... it is all fun, and as you get exposure and become better known people will start coming to you. Most of the business I do now has been as people have seen my work in other places and homes and have come to me to ask if I could do something for them. That is a slow process to reach that point, but once it begins to move forward, you will be amazed at how business can increase dramatically from one year to the next. You may then start pulling things out of shops and galleries and sell pieces for less money, but keep all the profit yourself. I still try to keep my prices reasonable, and even though they can still be expensive, I make a very modest hourly rate. If you are motivated by the income, then you will not travel the road for long before you get sour of the whole proccess. If you can appreciate a hobby, craft, or art that pays for itself and perhaps gives you some extra money now and then, and if you like to share it with other people, then you will enjoy the journey and eventually the success will come. Success in this case is not likely great wealth at least it hasn't been for me, but you will know it when you reach it... mostly because you are enjoying it.

After all that, the final way to sell is commissioned work. No real secret there, I had to do a lot of the other things first, and then I found that I got busy enough that I didn't have to use a shop, gallery, or give my profit to anyone else. I still have times I am slow, but it is good to recharge. I also have times I have to have a waiting list, and stress about getting it all done. I know others that still prefer to do shows, mostly because they like designing there own pieces and would rather do that than have clients telling them all the time what they wanted or how to do it. I do get people that are hard to please once in a while and I try to acomidate them, but they are few and far between.

One thing not to overlook is giving things away, family, friends, etc. Many of my orders have come from people who see something in a relatives home I have done for them. I have donated plaques to police and fire departments that have then later purchased other plaques from me. Look for nonprofit organizations especially wildlife sanctuaries and things like that that can really fit with a theme that can look great as a pyrograph. For every business, office, and home you are in, you are advertising and getting your name out. Put your contact information on the back, you can even have a sticker made which is what I do.