The wholesale price is the figure you charge a store buyer for your items. The retail price is the figure for which she sells your items to an individual customer.

The easiest way to figure wholesale prices is to work backwards. From your survey of the retail field (gift shops, etc.) you know what the comparative prices of, say, tin candle sconces are. You begin from that point.

1. Retail price of a tin sconce is $2.

That means, usually, that the store buyer paid the craftsman $12 a dozen, or $1 a piece. That is the wholesale price. The difference between the wholesale price (what the buyer pays you) and the retail price (what the individual customer pays the store) is called "mark-up" or "mark-on". The majority of gift shops mark-up their merchandise 100%, which is double the wholesale price. You know what the materials cost and how much time it would take you to duplicate a similar sconce. Write them down.

2. Cost list of tin sconces wholesaling at $12 a dozen

Cost of materials . 11

Cost of time to make .50

(your time is worth about $ 1 an hour)

Incidental costs (phone, etc.) .15

Total cost for one tin sconce .76

The difference between the cost to you of 76 cents and the wholesale price to the store buyer of $1 is your profit.

Unless the rate of speed with which you work is such that you can complete one sconce in half an hour, the making of those sconces may be impractical. If one of them takes fifty minutes to make, you are paring down your margin of profit so that it is very close to working at a loss. Either speed up your work or select something else to make which doesn't take so much time.

On the other hand, if your workmanship and design are quite superior, thus justifying the longer time it takes to execute them, you can raise your wholesale price so that it includes a fair and reasonable profit. Be careful, however, not to overprice your work.

Arrive at your selling figures (wholesale prices) by careful and accurate figuring. Quote them definitely and clearly. Do not reduce your prices no matter what quantity is under discussion. If you figure the sconce at $1 each, then a dozen of them will cost the buyer $ 12. Be firm about that.

It may seem that when the buyer doubles the wholesale price (marks it up 100%), she is getting too much of a profit. However, all of her running expenses (rent, salaries, telephone, taking a chance on your stuff, etc.) must be paid for by her "mark-ups."

How To Bill The Store

Your bills should be as businesslike and formal as any other part of the merchandising routine. When they are correctly made out, they will receive better attention.

1. Bills should be typewritten in duplicate (carbon copy). The original is included in the package of merchandise when it is delivered to the store. The copy is clipped to the store's order to you and kept on file.

2. Your bill must have on it all of the information . that was on the store order. Use that order-form as a guide in writing out your bill. It includes: your name and address name and address of the store date when merchandise was ordered order number date merchandise was delivered name of person placing the order itemized list of merchandise and their prices total amount of bill

Incidentally, the professional term for bill is "invoice."

Now, you wait for your check. Payment is usually quite automatic. When the first of the month comes and you have received no check, send another bill containing the same information as was on the first one. Mark this second one "Duplicate Invoice." That is accepted practice in the trade and is not mistaken for dunning.

If thirty days go by after date of delivery of merchandise and no check has come in payment for it, you should telephone the store and remind them about it. A reputable store rarely holds back on payments. Many of them pay ahead of time to make their own bookkeeping easier.