I was thinking it might be a win-win if we could trade $1 of earnings to get 1 "Artist card credit."  This would allow us to "buy" a few more of our own cards, at a cost to us of effectively $1, for use in local resale or to use for promotions, as well as allow GCU to keep more of the cash they collect rather than pay it out to us directly.  The "Artist card credit" would have to apply to buying our own cards so that GCU does not have to suffer the cost of paying out a commission to other artists.
 
Just a thought.  Would you take advantage of this if it was an option?

I have a couple of web stores at www.cafepress/essentialimage2 and they offer this option. You can use your cafecash to purchase from this site. It would be nice to see that here also.

I am interested in knowing how many people here have sent their work to a publishing company, and how many companies they have sent their work to. It costs to send samples to publishers. I have sent my work to many publishers. They will call you when they need something like your art, want only one or two of your photos, and you do not make that much from them, or it isn't what they are looking for. I printed my own cards for years and I can tell you that I do not make that much profit... my  time, ink, paper, envelopes and the wear on your printer and computer, cost to repair them. I have my cards in many stores, some are on consignment and some the stores have purchased. I own many card racks that I have in stores and when they purchase my cards I sell the card racks at cost, I do not make any money off of them. So I really appreciate GreetingCardUniverse and the amount that we receive, Someone else is doing all of the work and we make money from it. If a store wants to purchase your cards have them purchase them through GCU and let them mark them up to $3.50 per card retail cost. Purchase some for your samples and make a catalog to show shops, it takes money to make money. It is still cheaper than printing them yourself. Then send the store to GCU to purchase them from your GCU store. I know that Tom wants a bigger discount, but as Mindy said they don't make much from the cards sales either. Our discount is very reasonable and we need to appreciate having a website that is out there helping all of us. Just my opinion and my experiences. At cafepress our cafecash is what our earning are, if we have $6.00 in earnings we can purchase $6.00 of product at our cost, so if we have $6.00 of earnings at GCU we would get $6.00 of credit to purchase cards at our cost. So you could purchase 4 cards at your cost. At $1.00 GCU artist credit, GCU would be losing money. Fair too GCU is still $1.49 per card, everyones a winner then. I have several businesses that I own and several web stores and I think that GCU is doing a great job helping all of us artist. Thanks GCU.

Good responses everyone.  Thanks.  
 
I do know that small businesses don't like to pay out cash if they can avoid it.  I suspect most of the commission money that GCU pays out to artists is not used to buy GCU cards.  The idea I started the thread with would allow GCU to retain much of the cash as well as result in growth in card sales.  Like Karen, I'd like to have my GCU cards stocked in stores as I don't believe, in the near term, that online sales will grow very much.  Most GCU stores sell at most 1 card per week.  I think with several card stands I could sell more than 10 a day.  That is still only $5/day profit if I can actually net 50-cents per card after covering all the costs, but I think that is possible.  It likely isn't workable at the current discount, and so I'd have to seek alternative printers.

POD printing costs also come down with volume.  GCU already has bulk pricing, so POD card printing costs are not fixed.  If GCU can get the volume up, printing costs should come down.
 
Looking at the GCU 30-day report, about 250 cards are printed per day.  If we assume 200 result in commissions, and GCU is able to turn this into 100 artist card credits, the number of cards printed per day would almost instantly jump to 350/day.  This should allow GCU to get better pricing from their POD partner.
 
Also, if just 5% of GCU artists are able to sustain a local card business of 10 cards/day using GCU cards, then GCU would need to print an additional 500 per day (double the online sales of today).  This again should lead to significantly better volume pricing from their POD partner.  That would get GCU to 750 cards per day, a 300% increase over today fairly quickly.
 
Are there better ideas to achieve this level of growth without having to spend on advertising?  
 
Mindy mentioned traditional cards can be printed for as low as 10 cents each, so there is a huge gap between that cost and a single card POD cost.  That gap will be filled by creative POD companies who are able to smartly drive down costs using volume.  Will this be GCU, or one of their competitors?  
 
 
 
 

I have to say, since I have just finished doing research on several POD services for cards, GCU has the best prices thus far.  Yes, our commission is not that high; however the chances of someone purchasing our cards, I feel are much higher.  The company I use for my fine art prints just started offering fine art print cards.  Those are base price of $2.99, so the customer has to pay at least $3.50 if we want a .50 commission and $4.00 if we want a $1 commission, etc.
 
Most of the services offering cards of the quality of GCU do not offer the same service where individuals can write in the cards, stamp, and mail the card off, without ever having to touch the card.  This is a very nice feature for busy business individuals.  They will have their assistants or Virtual Assistants (I'm a Virtual Assistant, which is my main business), send these cards out for them.
 
I just turned on a client to GCU.  He has been using SendOutCards and JackCards.  The only thing he did not like about the GCU is the inability to set up drip campaigns.  He has drip campaigns with SendOutCards going out on 7-day, 30 day, 90 day, 120 day, intervals, etc.  I have set these up for him and some individuals will be getting cards three years from now, with his not having to have done anything.
 
We are about to manually do drip campaigns with GCU cards.  My hope and prayer is that the artists don't take down their cards after we have selected the cards for the campaigns.
 
Anyway, as you can see, I've done a lot of research and GCU is definitely up there as far as quality, service.
 
Things that could be added to the service to make it fantastic for everyone.
 
1.  Artists copyright, contact, logo, bio information on the back of cards.
 
2.  Ability to do drip campaigns (marketers love their drip campaigns).  Allowing a contact management source and setting up a set of cards in each campaign.  For instance, my client has 11 cards in a campaign.  These cards have been sent out to about 50 of his clients thus far.  50 x 11 cards=550 cards paid for in advance.
 
3.  If drip campaigns are a capability in the future, then a way to prevent the artist from removing the cards that are set in a campaign.
 
4.  Ability for the customer to add inside image to card.  That is an image of the customer's business card and image of signature.
 
Okay, like I said, GCU has pretty good prices out there all around for a POD.  I like the fact I have a way to promote my art.  If someone buys my cards, likes the art, there may be a possibility of the individual buying a fine art print.  Also, I can already see I could get hooked on designing cards.  
 
PS: Pardon any typos, I've had a long day at the computer and I really don't feel like proofing right now.  

Yes, too bad I'm not one of the artists on SendOutCards and that he uses.  Though, you can bet I will start designing some cards that he might like to use here on GCU!

Quote from Naomi_132978 on Mar 10^th, 2008, 6:27pm:

 
First, welcome to Naomi and Karen!  You've both added helpful information to the good insights expressed here by others.
 
@ Naomi ... I'm pretty sure drip campaigns can be set up through the affiliated reminder services ... BigDates, BirthdayReminders, DateBoxx, BestReminders, etc.  You or your client could site mail Mindy to find out for sure and see if it could be set up for him.  btw ... I hope you do get "hooked" ... your artwork, especially the "emotions" set, is absolutely brilliant!  
 
Drip campaigns are certain to impact on the future of greeting card marketing ... it may be under the radar right now, but they are already very popular in certain industries, particularly on-line retail and service marketers.  Not sure what GCU's vision or plan for this will be ... it's not really clear to me if GCU will become a virtual greeting card mall/send out service, leaving the other marketing share of subscription services to the affiliate reminder services, or if they will eventually absorb some share of that market as well.  
 
@ Tom ... sorry, my friend, but I have to agree with Karen and Corrie on this one.  I should say that I have no experience whatsoever marketing turn-around-products to retail sellers.  But one of my clients has a pretty successful gifts/collectibles store ... and she does sell some local artists cards.  I'm not gong to quote figures, but I know she'd be thrilled to sell 10 cards per week, let alone 10/day.  That's not to say it can't be done, particularly in a resort or destination marketplace.  But if you don't happen to live near the shore, the mountains, or a mega-amusement park, that's going to be a lot of work for not a lot of money.  
 
In my area (Phila/S. Jersey metro), most greeting cards are purchased at super-store retailers, malls, and specialty gift stores ... sadly,  the few stand-alone card stores in my area are pretty much facing extinction.
 
If you study current demographics and future market predictions, you'll see that GCU is uniquely positioned to make a whopping mark on this industry.  The other "Big Two" consumer providers have already started to try to implement a send out service on their paper greeting cards.  And while they may have the branding clout for the time being, they have an extremely limited catalog to choose from ... nothing close to the 41k+ choices available at GCU and its partnered reminder services.  
 
According to US Government Market Studies* "... the average consumer buys 30 cards per year.  Midle-age buyers (45+) were the largest block of consumers for many years, but not anymore.  Today, consumers 44 years and younger take the leas as the most active buyers of all stationery products.  Since 2005, consumers aged 25-34 spend more on stationery than any other age group.  Woman purchase 85-90% of all greeting cards."  *Source- US Stationery Market Report - July 2003 - March 2006
 
That means the folks of "our" generation are not the buyers who will bring growth to GCU ... it will be the Next Generation, who are more or less totally assimilated to doing every day tasks and purchasing every day items on-line (like "records"--remember those days before iTunes?).  I believe that within 5-8 years, a majority of all stationery goods will be marketed and sold on-line.  
 
I support and encourage any GCU artist who can or wants to market their cards locally.  But be sure to study the demographics and market saturation points in the area where you live before pinning your hopes on selling 300 cards per month that way.  If the numbers and realistic expectations support doing so, by all means, go for it!  
 
Wishing all continued success and many sales!  
 
Teri