Proposal To Provide You With Low Cost Paint and Sip Picture Frames.
Updated 16/06/2023
1. Introduction.
2. What I Can Provide You With?
3. Pricing.
4. Fixing Canvas, Boards and Paper To The Frame.
5. Selling To Your Artists.
6. My Canvases and Boards Supplier.
7. What I Would Need From You.
Russell Collins.
+44 (0)7976 912550
Russell@RussellCollinsArt.com
1. Introduction.
This is the full proposal that you can also download as a .PDF File Paint and Sip Frame Proposal 23-06-16
I think I can help you make more profit for little effort on your part by providing you with high quality, but low cost picture frames, made to your required size, that you can offer to your artists. As well as running Paint and Sip and Bob Ross (I’m a certified instructor) events in and around Milton Keynes, I also own a professional frame making system. This means that I can probably sell picture frames to you for a quarter to a third of the price you would have to pay a high street framer. I can do this because I have the equipment that is under-utilised, I do it from my shed at home and I also have a very flexible day job so would not be relying on the framing for a living.
It’s generally accepted that one of the best ways to make more profit is to sell new products to existing customers, especially products that enhance your existing product or service. Offering to sell picture frames to your customers should add value to your events, help you be more profitable and if I have got it right almost risk-free.
A couple of years before Covid I bought the framing equipment from a couple who ran their own framing business and were retiring. What I bought was a vicious looking Morso guillotine to cut moulding properly, an underpinner to fix moulding together, lots of other associated bits, and about 6 miles of moulding – the strips that are cut, and fixed together to make what we call a picture frame. A lot of the moulding was no use to me because of its style or size, but a fair amount 
was good and I made frames that I sold in my sessions. I think I sold frames to between 20% – 25% of my customers in my evening events and to about 80% of my Bob Ross painting day customers. The best sellers were the plain black or white frames and close behind them were plain wood ones. The few coloured frames I made, that went with the colours of the artwork, sold well.
2. What I Can Provide You With?
At the basic level I would provide simple but attractive Black or White picture frames made from the Polcore Basics range, which is a form of extruded polystyrene and it would bought from Mainline Mouldings. It would be cut on a Morso guillotine, the corners would be glued and double under-pinned.
Lahrsun-Juhl call their product Artcore, but I don’t think it is as good a quality, and it has a smaller range of designs.
Polecore is a hard wearing material, cheaper alternative to wood. Initially I would be providing just a black or white simple profile frame made to the size of your canvases or canvas boards (if you use them). By just having a standard profile moulding and 2 colours I can order materials in bulk to get the cheapest prices.
I am looking at 30mm wide x 21mm deep with a rebate of 13mm from the bottom in both Black and White with a brushed finish, a plain matt finish would require a different profile. A wood frame would have a similar cross section. See the images to the right. The Mainline Mouldings reference for the White product is POL 1072 and the Black product is POL 2110.
3. Pricing
I believe that if I can buy Polecore moulding by the box (121.80 Metres) then I can make 20cm x 30cm (A4) frames for £6.75, 30cm x 40cm (A3) frames for £9.15, 40cm x 50cm frames for £11.74 and 40cm x 60cm frames for £13.04. As a rough guide for packing and delivery; 30 of the 40cm x 50cm frames sent to Edinburgh (I needed to pick somewhere far from me) would cost about £32.00, and this cost is sized based not weight based. I could ameliorate this by adding a free frame or two depending on quantity bought. I can make any size of frame. There is no minimum order which means that you could initially just buy 3 or 4 as a trial, which will be bought by your customers.
Regarding payment terms, I would initially be asking for full payment with order.
I would hope after a while that I could go to 50% with order on the 1st invoice, and 2nd invoice for the remaining 50% + delivery and packaging with 15 days to pay on the 2nd invoice.
The plain unfinished wood picture frames, as mentioned above would cost about 30% more if the demand was such that I could buy moulding quantities in boxes.
The moulding would be cut to an accurate size, the corners would be glued and double (maybe triple) under pinned, unlike some shop bought low priced frames that are single underpinned
If you want picture frames in a corporate colour for yourself or an events customer, and/or a different profile, then I can look into providing those as well. I would need to quote you a price and minimum number of picture frames though as I would need to get a minimum amount of moulding in. I can get small lengths of moulding in, but the smaller the amount of material I buy in, then the higher the unit costs.
When I buy moulding strips, I can buy as a Length (2.9m), a Pack (58m), or a Box (121.8m). The price per Length when bought in Box quantities is about 75% of the price of a single Length bought as a single Length.
4. Fixing Canvases, Boards And Paper To The Frame.
Regarding fixing the canvas to the frame and the frame to the wall then there are a few options. I want to keep the time of making the frames, and thus the cost to a minimum though.
The cheapest way to attach the canvas to the frame by gluing it, just in the corners, with a glue gun, I have tested this and it works. This method could make it a little difficult to remove a canvas from a frame, but a sharp knife should do it providing it isn’t glued too heavily.
The other way is by using spring clips – see picture.
The end with the hole is screwed to the frame, the canvas is placed in the frame and the spring clip swung over to hold it in position, the clip can be tightened by tightening the screw. This method makes the canvas easy to replace.
There would be an extra charge for spring clips and the spring clips and screws would be supplied in sets of 2, in a plastic bag, per frame. I would not attach the spring clips as this would make the frames deeper for the purposes of shipping, and I want to avoid the possibility of damage due to the spring clip rubbing against the finished frames.
Regarding canvas boards, a glue gun glue would work, or I would fire bendable metal clips into the inside edges of the frame for a small fee.
Regarding the fixing of paper (watercolours maybe), then I can cut the frames so that people could use the insides of a very low priced Ikea (or similar) bought box frame to mount a paper based artwork.
I wouldn’t supply wall hanging items as the frames could be attached to a wall by removable adhesive fixings such as the 3M Command strips.
5. Selling To Your Artists.
A number of points were raised concerning sales, when I rang the owners of other organisations to see what they thought of the idea – I will cover those here.
Some said that their artists have never asked for frames. My answer to that is that the artists were not offered them because you didn’t have them, a customer cannot make a decision about buying a product that they don’t know is available. If they know a product is available then that they can evaluate it and make a decision. If you made it clear that they were available then that will help you sell them.
Some mentioned concerns about the extra bulk and weight they would have to carry. I don’t think that you need to take the same number of frames to an event that you have artists. I would suggest that no more than 30% of your artists would buy a frame, so take enough frames to cover those 30%. Put some canvases into the frames rather than have a separate box for canvases, and frames – this adds about 4mm to the depth of a canvas.
You need to say that frames are available, and show them off. Showing the frames could be a problem for some people due to the small size of a room. You could temporarily attach them to a wall with removable 3M Command strips, or some sort of sticky dot. There could be somewhere where you could hang a frame – maybe a wall fixing.
You could put your reference artwork into a frame so that it can be seen clearly. You could also have a couple of your previous event art works displayed in a frame, maybe with the part of the painting “spilling over” onto the frame.
I would suggest that you buy 2 or 3 frames of white and black from me that you could show to, and sell to, your artists. In my opinion, you will sell them, the worst case is that it might take a few weeks to sell them, but you will sell them. On the other hand they might be snapped up in the first event that you show them, with some of you repeat customers wanting to buy a few so that all the art they have painted with you can be framed in the same way.
It really is a suck it and see job, and with my plan being that there is no minimum order and the cost of a frame remains the same regardless of how few frames you buy, delivery costs though will vary. Overall though, the risk to you is minimal.
6. Some Canvases And Boards Supplier.
As with everything else, you get what you pay for, and in my phone discussions it appears people use canvases from a wide range of suppliers. A common supplier being “The Works”. I have never liked The Works, the canvas always seems to soak up the paint before you can spread it, and the manufacturing quality seems quite low with canvases twisted, and distorted with the diagonals being of different length.
I used to use canvases from a company called DIYDistribution, or from their associated company Quantum Art. They do numerous sizes as either a Student grade canvas or a Professional grade canvas, and can make special sizes for you. The canvases are well made and well finished and I used to use the Student canvases for my paint nights. I have now switched to the canvases supplied by the Flying Tiger Company for my paint nights, but I still use the Professional grade of canvas for my Bob Ross painting days. If you are interested in knowing more about their canvases then please call Daniel on 07399 298320 and mention my name. They have been very good suppliers to me and I would be grateful if you told him that I passed on his phone number to you. They also supply some pretty good canvas covered boards.
I now buy my paint night canvases from the Flying Tiger Company who make canvases in a number of sizes up to 40cm x 50cm if bought over the internet, they do bigger sizes in the shops. I switched to Flying Tiger because the canvases are a bit cheaper, not quite as good a finish as Quantum Art Student canvases, but still good. Furthermore there is a Flying Tiger shop in Milton Keynes and I could just go in and pick them up, thus saving on delivery costs of about £30.00 an event for me.
7. What I Would Need From You.
If you are interested in buying some picture frames, then I would need to do some preparatory work. Frame making is a precision process. If the frame is too large, the canvas will have gaps around it, or even fall out of the frame. If too small you will have to trim the inside of the frame to get the canvas in.
You would need you to send me 3 or 4 of your canvases so that I can measure them to see how well they are made and how regular they are with their dimensions, especially the diagonals. I can send them back to you at my cost, or maybe buy them off you.
I would measure the canvases – the sides and the diagonals. With a reasonably made canvas I would add 3mm to the length dimensions and width dimensions and use the longest of each of the dimensions as my cut length, and the canvass would fit perfectly in the frames. I might have to add a little more to the cut length if the diagonals are skewed. Skewed diagonals could mean a frame that is a bit on the large side. This means that daylight might be seen between part of the edge of the canvas and part of the lip of the frame. If this occurs then I find that Costa or McDonalds wooden stirring strips makes good packing, but it does mean though that the frames should fit all of your canvases.
By sending me the canvases for measuring, mistakes in measuring for the picture frames become my problem.
I would love to hear your thoughts and have your question on this proposal. You can email me at Russell@russellcollinsart.com or call me on +44 (0)7976 912550 if you want. If you want to see what I am doing regarding my Paint Nights then please Click Paint Night Party.
