Do You Charge What you are Worth?

There's nothing worse than spending hours of time designing, planning and offering a class to your customers, only to discover at the very end of it -  that by the time you factor in all the hours you spent before, during and after -  you were working for an hourly rate of $2 or even worse! How discouraging! 

Early on in my career as a Stampin' Up! Demonstrator I used to set my class prices at between $10 - $15.  In fact I remember one particular class - my Father's Day class - where I offered a decorated "scrapbook" canvas (using DP and ribbons - AND I included scanning and printing a family photo in sepia tones as part of the class), a treat tin and a Father's Day card all for $10. Although I knew the class price was low, I figured that as long as I promoted it as a "special introductory class price", once people came and saw how much fun stamping was they'd sign up for some of the other classes that I was offering at a higher price but with more & even better projects.    I'm sure you can imagine my excitement when I had about 15 people sign up for the class! I was so sure that this was going to generate great sales for me and a whole host of workshop bookings and future class sign ups.

Can you guess what happened?  If you've been there and done that then I'm sure you probably already know.  After spending about 6 hours prepping and a very stressful 3 hours during the class, despite having flyers & samples promoting upcoming events and workshop booking incentives,  I ended up with NO sales, NO workshop bookings and only a couple of future class sign ups. And when all was said and done, I earned less than $10 and hour for my time.  While some may say that's not bad, as a Registered Dietician by profession with a Master's Degree in Community Nutrition where I used to earn $75 an hour in my private nutrition practice, it was VERY discouraging.

In fact, as I look back now to the subsequent chain of events, the customers that I attracted to that event were the same ones that:

•  only purchased SU product from me when Stampin' Up! had a really good promotion or I had a "sale" which involved offering my demo discount.  The rest of the time they purchased at the dollar store or Michael's using their 50% off coupon.
• only signed up for classes if they were $15 or less (yes, it took a few more tries before I finally smartened up)
• had workshops with 15 people where they told there guests to "come on out and have a good time, there's absolutely no need to buy anything" and it ended up costing ME money to do the workshop
• signed up for classes, asked if they could pay at the class instead of pre-paying (I foolishly said yes - but that's a whole other topic) and then never showed up to the class and never paid.
• would be at my classes telling my other customers about the great paper, album, crimpler, accessories etc they got at the dollar store.......

I'm sure you get the drift.  It wasn't until I was introduced to John Sanpietro, my business coach from Stamping is My Business, that he opened my eyes to what the problem was. 

Bargain-basement prices attract bargain-hunting customers.  Yes your classes may fill up, but how much of a benefit is it really to you, if you are working harder for your money, and earning less at the same time.  And bargain-hunting customers are fickle.  As soon as they find someone offering a lower price....it's "see ya later, baby!"

In talking to other SU demonstrators, I have come to believe that one of the biggest issues we collectively struggle with is charging what we are worth.  There seems to be an unspoken perception out there - most often perpetuated by ourselves - that because we are a home-based business, we are somehow less "worthy" than a brick and mortar store. How often do you see your local scrapbook store offering $10-$15 classes to their customers?  Chances probably are that if it is a quality scrapbook store....not often.  We offer so much more than a traditional retail store.... so why are we charging so much less?

I'm happy to say I've finally learned my lesson.  I NEVER charge less than $20-$25 for a class, and sometimes I'll charge up to $40.  You know what happened when I did that? Well, my attendance did go down....after all, I lost my "bargain-hunters".....BUT I made more money working less, and attracted customers that were attracted to quality.  Remember, customers make assumptions about quality based on price. What do you think of when you think of dollar store?  Fun?...maybe....quality?....Definately not! The customers that started signing up for my classes weren't afraid to spend money or put in orders for Stampin’ Up! product because they recognized it’s quality. In the long run, my sales went up and my profit went up. Overall a win/win situation!

So let me ask you...are you charging what you are worth?