Costs
Part of Independent paper makers, explained by collections: no watchlist needed here
Independent paper makers: count cost per kept sheet, not per pull
Independent paper makers should divide each session's cost by kept sheets, then sort mold, press, felts, fiber and packing into one-time and recurring lines.
What to take away
- For independent paper makers, the useful number is your own session cost divided by the sheets you keep. Fiber, felts and molds are priced differently in every market, so the method below works with whatever your receipts say rather than with a printed price list.
- Cost per kept sheet is the only number that matters, and it falls steeply with practice.
- Felts and fiber are the recurring lines. The mold is a one-time line that people treat as recurring.
- Shipping a finished sheet safely costs more than most people budget.
The three cost behaviors
| Line | Behavior | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Mold and deckle | Bought once, lasts decades | Resurfacing is possible |
| Press | Bought once, or improvised | Even pressure is the requirement |
| Felts | Wear out, replaceable | Cheapest quality upgrade available |
| Fiber | Scales with output | Buy one type in quantity |
| Water and heat | Small, constant | Larger for cooked fibers |
| Packing and postage | Per shipment | Underestimated by most people |
Beginners look at the first row and stop. The recurring rows are what a year of papermaking actually costs.
One-time vs recurring costs
Bought once
- Mold and deckle
- Lasts decades
- Press
- Bought or improvised
- Felts
- —
- Fiber
- —
- Water and heat
- —
- Packing and postage
- —
Recurring
- Mold and deckle
- —
- Press
- —
- Felts
- Wear out, replaceable
- Fiber
- Scales with output
- Water and heat
- Small, constant
- Packing and postage
- Per shipment
Count kept sheets, not pulled sheets
A session that produces forty sheets and keeps twenty-four costs the session divided by twenty-four. Each kept sheet then carries the cost of forty divided by twenty-four pulled sheets, about one and two-thirds, because the failures are paid for by the sheets you keep. Record pulled and kept every time. The ratio improves faster than any material saving, which means the cheapest thing you can do is practice more in fewer, longer sessions.
Cost per kept sheet
40 pulled, 24 kept
Session cost divided by 24
Record pulled and kept every time
Longer sessions cut fixed costs
To work out your own figure after each session:
- Add what the session used upfiber or prepared pulp, a share of felt wear, and water and heat.
- If you want the mold, deckle and press to pay for themselves, add a small fixed share for them per session.
- Divide that total by the sheets you kept, not the sheets you pulled.
- For sheets you sell or send, add the packing and postage for that shipment on top.
A worked example with round numbers shows why step 3 matters. Say the fiber, felt wear, water and heat for one session add up to 30 units in whatever money your receipts use. Spread over the forty pulled sheets, that looks like 0.75 a sheet. Spread over the twenty-four kept sheets, it is 1.25 a sheet. Price from the first figure and every sheet you sell loses 0.50 before packing and postage are counted. If practice lifts the session to thirty kept sheets from the same forty pulls, the same 30 units come to 1.00 a kept sheet, a saving no supplier discount will match.
Longer sessions also cut the per-session costs of mixing, heating and cleaning, which are fixed regardless of how many sheets you make.
Felts are the cheap upgrade
Worn felts leave marks and hold water unevenly, which shows up as thickness variation you will blame on your pull. New felts are one of the few purchases that visibly improve output for a modest amount.
Rotate them, wash them, dry them fully between sessions, and replace them before they go hard.
Packing is a recurring line when sheets go to other people
Selling or sending work adds a cost line most makers meet by surprise.
The Park Service note on packing museum objects for shipment records the practice behind a real traveling exhibit at Mesa Verde National Park. Curatorial staff prepared and packed most of two hundred objects for display at five museums after the park.
The transferable point is that packing is planned work with its own materials, not something done at the end with spare cardboard. For flat sheets that means rigid board both sides, interleaving, a moisture barrier and an outer carton, and the total often exceeds the postage.
Size is what makes flat sheets expensive to post. In the US, the Postal Service's Priority Mail prices start at $11.00 at a Post Office and include up to $100 of insurance with most shipments. A package between 22 and 30 inches long adds a $4.50 nonstandard fee, one more than 30 inches long adds $21.00, and one over 2 cubic feet adds $35.00. Flat Rate packaging is exempt from all nonstandard fees, so sheets that fit a Flat Rate box between boards cost one known price, while a large sheet shipped flat in its own carton carries the surcharge on top.
What the finished work is worth doing
Before pricing, see where handmade sheets end up. The University of Louisville's artists' books resources explains how its collection is described.
The collection uses controlled vocabulary adapted from the ARLIS/NA Artists' Books Thesaurus, the University of Utah's Opening Artists' Books, the University of Iowa Center for the Book's Book Arts Research Database, and the Getty Research Institute's thesaurus. Structure is one of its describing categories.
Knowing how work is cataloged tells you what buyers and institutions actually record. The parallel cost frame for decorating is in pricing decorative paper supplies, and where the craft is taught is in where hand papermaking is taught.
