The idea is simple: artists upload high-resolution images of their work. A fulfillment center prints and ships copies directly to consumers in a variety of sizes on materials ranging from wall-mounted canvases and acrylic panels to yoga mats and tank tops. AI-powered statistical analysis tracks your potential buyers; A marketing calendar maps your social media strategy. The bespectacled sales representative showed me a summary of an artist’s annual earnings: over $80,000. If I signed up in the next few hours, they would build my website for me, he said — for $1,699 upfront for the basic Bronze membership level, plus $50 a month for the web store. And I would supposedly start collecting cash.
Art Storefronts was founded in 2013. It now has 14,000 members. Nick Friend, the company’s CEO and founder, graduated from USC’s Marshall School of Business. He came up with the idea for Art Storefronts after starting a company making art papers and canvas.
As the Art Storefronts website says: “Sell art? Marketing is all that matters.”
From the moment I shared my contact information, I was able to support the hard sell: emails and text messages that took up one of the few scarce spots in their latest limited-edition promotion. Other emails promised more viewings with satisfied Art Storefronts customers.
“I’ve noticed so many ads now, these videos, you know: Artists, I can help you make $500,000 and blah, blah, blah. And that’s always the promise,” said Karen Hutton, an accomplished landscape and travel photographer. She sells multiples through a kind of storefronts website, but that’s just one part of a successful career. “I have a vision of what I want my business to look like,” she told me. “Your business training doesn’t fit in. And that’s okay because it suits other people.”
Ideally, according to a testosterone-fueled Art Storefronts podcast episode from 2017 (which was removed from its website in recent weeks), potential members would be encouraged to pass the “Does my art suck?” test, as they call it. Test this by selling your art offline to a stranger.
A friend told me that 20 percent of new members had never sold art before. Art Storefronts also seemed willing to accept my money – a marketing email said that my art had “accidentally” caught the attention of a representative. But I hadn’t shown it to anyone.
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2024-05-28 09:00:17
www.nytimes.com
