I just want to talk to you about what it is we, as a group, are trying to do here, and that I do not think has ever been done before. Basically, we are trying to create an iTunes or an AppStore, but for artists, photographers, or any digital graphic artists. So what do I mean by that?
Well, here are my thoughts on what I see. When I think about iTunes, of course I think about music, but I also think about all those musicians who are not necessarily famous but are doing well by selling their music through iTunes. It's a rather complicated process to submit your songs/albums, and in the end the musicians will keep about 50% of the retail price. Keep in mind music is stored and delivered as a digital file.
I also think about the developers/programmers who are submitting their apps to the AppStore and some have already made millions. I have heard Apple splits the revenue 30/70 with the developers, so if an app sells for $0.99, the developer keeps about 70 cents from that. It doesn't cost Apple much to host the digital files for the apps. Plus, Apple does not go out and recruit developers and pay them for making apps.
Most recently, I've heard book writers are making money through some online bookstores, whether its Amazon or iBooks. I haven't looked much into this, but the fact of the matter is that profits are maximized whenever the goods remain digital throughout, meaning the goods are stored and sold as digital goods.
In our case the goods are stored digitally at an online gallery, but the goods are delivered as a physical product. When you consider the cost of physically manufacturing, warehousing, and distribution, the profit margins for a 99 cent product are extremely slim to be worth anything to a business venture (unless the goods come from cheap labor in China, but that's a different story!).
So here we are trying to introduce a $0.99 product that is highly customizable and has a reasonably high margin to be shared with the individual artists. What do you think of that? I mean, as an artist, where else could you sell your art, possibly even by the millions of orders, and be able to keep a decent percentage of that?
And so I ask for your trust and patience as well go through this endeavor together. For those of you who absolutely need to see a real physical product and are highly skeptical, well if you live in San Antonio, I may be able to meet with you. Otherwise, you will soon be able to order the product and handle it yourself. You will be amazed at the quality of the product.
In conclusion, the question is not whether you will get paid for participating. The question I have right now is how much do you want to make per sale? Again, this is a real product and there are real production costs so you won't be able to split the revenue 70/30, but there are some real possibilities you will be able to split it 50/50 from each $0.99.
As with any new venture, there will be unexpected costs to be prepared to pay, so in the beginning I am leaning more towards being conservative on what everyone makes, but believe me, if this thing really takes off and we all help to keep costs down, I don't see why the split cannot be 50/50. I will have much more to say about all this so stay tuned.
Thanks! (-:
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