advice sought on setting up a large format print coop.

[kokajko]

Anyone out there with experience with large format printing in context of non profit - that would be a 501 c3 not like my fine art photography business.  My back story is long and may be too much information so I'll leave out the details about my whitewater rafting business (sunk) and my real estate brokerage in Florida (which bankrupted me).
  Reinventing myself (for the nth time) after bankruptcy led me (eventually) to quitting my day job and devoting myself 100% to my photography.  It was the Epson 3880 on sale for $800.00 that had got me going again doing photography.  I was blow away by the results  when printing on Epson hot press natural. When the ink hit the paper the cotton fibers plump up and stand out from the surface creating an incredible fine texture that possessed me.  It was so fine and delicate that the slightest touch would cause irreparable damage.
    I had to develop a work flow that totally respected the print surface allowing no  contact at all.  The prints had to be covered by glazing with an air gap to be  displayed in public.
I didn't trust stacking prints with interleaving sheets so I had to make print holders out of foam core with built in spacers so the holders could be stacked in a box made of gator board. When I went to New Orleans to attend a professional level portfolio review I made a gator board “back pack” with a Plexiglas cover for my portfolio.  I got a kick out of walking around New Orleans with my portfolio on my back showing this print(below) wearing my cross on my back.


My reception at the portfolio review was mixed.  I have never heard the word “beautiful” used as a condemnation so many times.   As one speaker said there is a “tyranny of the new “ in the art world.
To be desirable for art galleries and museums the work has to have solid and fully articulated conceptual underpinnings and must demonstrate a new style.  My work is too conventionally attractive to qualify, Mary Swanson suggested I market to interior designers.  Another reviewer advised me to checkout magcloud.com.   I did checkout mag cloud.com and started using it to print the catalog for my exhibit at the South Florida Museum.  I liked the price and quality better than blurb.com.
I also started researching marketing to interior designers and architects.  I was also researching websites to market my art on(I couldn't find any that I liked).  I also considered finding an artist representative but couldn't find any.  So not finding any preestablished avenues of marketing that hit all the basics as I saw them I thought perhaps I can create the answer for myself and others.  Perhaps a coop approach would enable us to try all these approaches in an affordable way if tackled as a group when we can't do it individually.  So what would the the defining characteristics of such a group?

  Website offering a clean and easy (for consumer and artist) way to display images and offer for sale original prints, and/or limited editions, and/or open editions of 2D artwork.
 A print catalog/coffee table book that would feature the best work by each artist that is of suitable content for interior design professionals. 
Coop gallery space in Sarasota, Miami and Orlando. A rep to make contacts in the interior design professions.
A coop print lab for giclee and large format photograph printing. Cut expenses on art supplies with coop purchases.

A new web site that could effectively offer my prints for sale would have been the logical next step for me to increase sales of my art work but I had received a windfall that would not repeat and I ordered an Epson 9890 instead.  After knocking on doors in Palmetto, Bradenton and Sarasota I found a place where I could set up the printer-as I do not have the resources to rent an appropriate space. 
The Sarasota Science Center is a 501 c3 so we can look for grants to cover start up costs for the printer, web site, etc. I would like to get a DP3 to use in creating giclees and because it sounds like a perfect match for my work.  I do a lot of close up semi macro work, I would like to print large and sharp enough that if my work was in the next room from a Clyde Butcher exhibit people could walk from his exhibit to mine and their gut feeling would be that the quality levels were comparable.   My first museum exhibit was at the South Florida Museum in Bradenton.  My work was up for months on the second floor.  The last few weeks overlapped with an exhibit by Clyde in the main area on the first floor.  My prints were 16x21and were as sharp as you can get shooting with the smallest aperture of the lens.  I do want print much larger and maintain that sharpness.  People are drawn in to big prints; they don't want to stand back at twice the diagonal to view the print; they want to walk right up and see the grain and see the limits of the detail and sharpness.

I would appreciate any suggestions on how to figure depreciation. I have no basis for an estimate of what our printing volume will be.  I spent $3,180. on the printer, $400. for a monitor worth calibrating.  I expect to get the two year extension on the warrentee ($1,305.) and expect that the printer will be fully depreciated at the end of that time.  The first set of ink was about $2,000., the Science center covered most of that but does expect to get it back in user fees.  I'm guessing $2.50 per square foot for ink and media.  I do want to recoup my investment and something for capital costs over the next three years.  Mostly I hope this coop brings a lot of attention and some buyers to my own work.  I  hope to create a legacy by sparking a burst of creativity and in the shape of an ongoing community asset (the coop print lab).

[Landscapes]

To be honest, I'm a little confused.  I don't know anything about this 501 c3, but it sounds like its something for tax purposes to prevent from having to report income or something like this.

At any rate, what has me confused is that I'm not sure if you are trying to promote your work, of if you're trying to offer a not-for-profit printing business, kind of like an internet cafe where customers come in to use the equipment and pay for the time they use.

With large format printing, there is a learning curve, so its not like someone can just come in and use it.  So this means someone, like you, has to do the prints for them... no? Its not like a woodworking shop as an example that people could rent out just so they have access to space and tools that they already know how to use.

So if you're looking to also staff the area with the printer, then this is a huge hit in terms of time.  Charging $2.50 per square foot seems reasonable if you're not looking to make a profit given that outlets I've seen generally chart about $10 or $11 per square foot on the cheapest paper, but these would be the high end places.  Mind you though, at 2.50, this would only be good for the cheapest paper.  Since the ink is roughly $1 per mL which is about per square foot, when you add in your paper, you're not making much.  So on second thought, for this price, you're only covering costs, but not really the depreciation of the printer, and certainly not any man hours.

Anyway, so without knowing exactly who will use this printer, how it will be used, and what involvement you will have, its difficult to see what a minimum price should actually be.  But now that I think about it, this 2.50 price does seem quite small.

[disneytoy]

$3k+ for a printer may seem like a lot of money but with a new camera body costing $2k+ a lens - $1500. $3k is not very expensive.

I have a 44" Epson. To justify it, you have to need prints larger than 24". You need to be printing every day or every couple days to keep it running properly. In you cost per square foot, you really need to include waste. Example, I had to do an automated cleaning which used 36.4ml. That is equal to 13-14 16x20 worth of ink.

Will you be supplying the papers? Ihave $3k worth of roll paper from glossy to canvas up to 44". You kind of need to keep various sizes and types on hand all thje time.

Remember when you switch from photo to matte bleack you use say 6-12 ml of ink each way. So it is best to wait until you have enough matte work to print. You can waste a lot oif erxpensive ink, if each person needs to do a single porint, then the next needs to switch blacks.

Not really sure how this would br a non-profit?

[Wayne Fox]

How could you get 501 c3 exempt status for a printing “co-op”?  Here are the types of organizations that can qualify for that ...

“The exempt purposes set forth in section 501©(3) are charitable, religious, educational, scientific, literary, testing for public safety, fostering national or international amateur sports competition, and preventing cruelty to children or animals."

Perhaps you might be able to create some type of organization where the group of companies that own it simply pay back enough to cover all costs so it doesn’t actually create taxable income and thus“profit” is basically passed on to those that own the co-op.  that would take some careful book keeping.

But I”m with the last poster, if you are selling fine art prints, the cost of making the prints is typically pretty small.  Guess it depends on your price point, but most good fine art large prints go for 4 figures, doesn’t take too many sales to cover the annual amortized cost of a printer.

[kokajko]

The printer is now housed within a facility which is a 501 c3 already on the basis of its educational activity.  They see the printer as a welcome addition to their Fab lab equipment, which includes a 3D printer, and other fabrication equipment controlled by computer such as Co2 laser 2D cuttter, 5 axis CNC milling machine, 2D woodcutter(plywood sheets) and lathe.   Most NC today is computer (or computerized) numerical control (CNC),[1] in which computers play an integral part of the control.  They do a lot of programs for kids, trying to inspire the next generation of inventors and the lab is open for the general public 40 hours per week. The Fab Lab program began as a collaboration between the Grassroots Invention Group and the Center for Bits and Atoms at the Media Lab in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a grant from the National Science Foundation (Washington, D.C.) in 2001. The fab lab concept also grew out of a popular class at MIT (MAS.863) named "How To Make (Almost) Anything". Leadership of this facility see art and science as being two facets of the same activity of creativity.   The large format coop will not make a profit but will hopefully pay its own way.  Its is OK for people to create things in the Fab lab that they will sell for a profit.  While fab labs have yet to compete with mass production and its associated economies of scale in fabricating widely distributed products, they have already shown the potential to empower individuals to create smart devices for themselves. These devices can be tailored to local or personal needs in ways that are not practical or economical using mass production.