Commissions prices raised & split into categories - more info below

Hey guys! After a lot of thinking the past few months I decided to raise my commission prices. I really, really hate raising prices (it gave me anxiety editing the pricing page haha), but I've backed myself into a corner and it's a necessary change. As you all know, commissions go through Patreon first so I wanted to share my thought process behind it. Here are my new prices (subject to change): https://www.stuffedpandastudios.com/blank-page

The first thing you'll notice is that I've split commissions into those needing custom molds and those using an existing mold. Three things have happened in the past year and a half that have caused this split to be necessary: 

• I've learned a lot of new mold making and printing skills and have drastically improved the fit and quality of my parts 
• covid cut my part sales in half
• an epiphany about prototyping

The past year and a half I've spent a lot of money and time learning an entirely new skill set. Parts, especially bases, are higher quality. I can scale parts to fit customers better, they have near perfect symmetry, and they are lighter and more streamlined. One of the misconceptions of 3D printing is that it's easier or faster. Once you do get a 3D model done that is true! You can print a bunch of bases and make as many molds as you need fairly quickly. But the initial creation of the model is much more time consuming than when I was doing everything in clay. So much time is spent printing miniature prototypes, adjusting the look of the base, and perfecting the fit of accessories such as teeth and ears.

3D printers are not cooperative either and a lot of time is spent fixing them or making adjustments. Just this year I've had to replace three parts (extruder, thermistor, and heating plate with attached cable) trying to print two versions of the fox base. I try not to think about the filament and SLA resin wasted on failed prints either, but that adds up to a lot of money as well. :'D

Second, covid cut my part sales in half. I've talked about this in the vlog multiple times, but I've never charged for custom molds before. Etsy and Patreon always balanced out the loss of time & money I spent working on those molds, but with part sales falling it's become obvious that I can't keep banking on Etsy to have my back. Sometimes a mold I make, like the realistic wolf, is popular and I can make my time back over the course of a year. Other bases, like the realistic rat, are not very popular and I've never really ever made my money back on. Random fun fact: I made toony round paws for a commission in 2013 thinking they'd be super popular. I sand blasted the mold for a nice texture and spent a lot of time making it symmetrical and clean (I still consider it up to my standards today). Between 2013 and 2021 I have sold exactly *eight* pairs. I never did make my time or money back on that one, haha!

Third is prototyping. I'm not the type of maker who gets to make the same style of suit over and over. I wish I was, I admire anyone who produces work that fast and consistently! XD Every time I make a suit the digi padding gets adjusted or completely made from scratch to fit the character or build of the wearer. Getting a chance to reuse an existing base or parts I have are very rare - I think it's happened with the kemono base and tiger base so far?

I'd beat myself up over being slow and running into so many setbacks and errors, but that's just how it is when you're making something completely new every time. After watching Kamui cosplay's video it finally hit me that I'm straight up making prototypes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP6xvixbrSg I couldn't figure out why with all my time tracking and discipline I just couldn't be "faster" or "more efficient next time" and why I was always off on my quotes and falling short. This is the answer; I just never truly reuse things and everything is custom.

Throughout the years I've thought about moving to a system where I do reuse everything over and over and just turn down any major customizations. Maybe simplifying the way I do finishing touches so I'm not spending so much time on edges or picking seams. Maybe not spending so much time going back and forth with customers. Maybe stopping commissions all together and just doing premades. But I *love* doing completely custom suits, and I just don't think I could go backwards at this point and be happy with what I make. I really enjoy making a completely custom suit to fit someone! :)

I know the price changes suck because some of it is reliant on luck. If you want a realistic fox for example, I already have the parts so it'll be significantly cheaper for you. Because of that I would be willing to take on commissions for molds first to help break up the cost. Example: You want a bear but I don't have any bear molds. You can commission me to make the molds first then come back later for the actual suit construction. Maybe there's someone you know who also wants a bear base from me and would be willing to split the cost with you to get it made (though I would only count one of you as the commissioner and communicate with you alone).  

And that's my thought process! Maybe I'll never be able to make money on commissions and I'll have to stop them entirely at some point, but I want to try a price change first. Honestly this year is the first time in a long time I've been genuinely worried about cash flow and how everything is going to play out. I started to envision the business going under after ten years of work and that's really scary. :'D It's normal for sales to bob up and down but a 50% cut has been one heck of a lot. You are all awesome and I seriously appreciate all of you! <3

~Panda

P.S. Not 100% sure when my next commission opening is yet, but I'm about 70% (?) done with Yukiko and I have a bodysuit after that. I don't want to open until I've at least started on the bodysuit and depending on my financial situation I might wait to open until I'm back from MFF. I want to make sure I'm ready to start or close to it after taking someone's money to keep the turnaround time reasonable.