Christmas ornaments - can I sell them?

I am counting on everyone in rctn to be "in the know" on this, as you've
never let me down before!

A new business opened in town. Besides selling the company's own
products (salsa and pickles is what they're known for), they are also
interested in promoting local arts and crafts. For example, there is a
shop in town that makes homemade paper, which they are selling in the
store for the paper company, and the owner also has photography by local
artists for sale.

I saw some x-stitch pieces there for sale, and asked who'd done the
stitching. The owner replied they were pieces her mother had picked up
at flea markets/antique stores. Long story short, she told me that she
was looking for Christmas ornaments to sell later in the year, and
wondered if I could make some x-stitch Christmas ornaments, which she
would sell them for me.

My question to all of you is, can I sell stitched designs that I did not
sell? I have a lot of charts in old magazines, but they are long out of
publication, and I have no idea how I'd ever get in touch with the
designer, much less anyone from the magazine. If I put a sticker on the
back of the frame with the publication's info, would that be sufficient?
Or do I need to come up with my own designs to safely sell ornaments?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

I may sell greeting cards there as well, but most of the rubber stamp
companies have Angel policies that clearly state their requirements when
using their stamps to create artistic works for sale, so I'm OK there.

Barbara HJ

PS - no need to get into the pricing. I am fully aware that I will not
make money on my time, I'd just look at it as a way to fund the supplies
for my hobby!

Read the fine print on charts or in the magazines to see if they mention
the selling of finished items. If they don't, the safest thing to do is
to contact the designer or publisher of each chart and ask permission.
That goes for freebie charts too! Of course designing your own will
work just as well since it is easy to give yourself permission. ;-)

Barbara Hass wrote:
I am counting on everyone in rctn to be "in the know" on this, as you've
never let me down before!

A new business opened in town. Besides selling the company's own
products (salsa and pickles is what they're known for), they are also
interested in promoting local arts and crafts. For example, there is a
shop in town that makes homemade paper, which they are selling in the
store for the paper company, and the owner also has photography by local
artists for sale.

I saw some x-stitch pieces there for sale, and asked who'd done the
stitching. The owner replied they were pieces her mother had picked up
at flea markets/antique stores. Long story short, she told me that she
was looking for Christmas ornaments to sell later in the year, and
wondered if I could make some x-stitch Christmas ornaments, which she
would sell them for me.

My question to all of you is, can I sell stitched designs that I did not
sell? I have a lot of charts in old magazines, but they are long out of
publication, and I have no idea how I'd ever get in touch with the
designer, much less anyone from the magazine. If I put a sticker on the
back of the frame with the publication's info, would that be sufficient?
Or do I need to come up with my own designs to safely sell ornaments?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

I may sell greeting cards there as well, but most of the rubber stamp
companies have Angel policies that clearly state their requirements when
using their stamps to create artistic works for sale, so I'm OK there.

Barbara HJ

PS - no need to get into the pricing. I am fully aware that I will not
make money on my time, I'd just look at it as a way to fund the supplies
for my hobby!


--
Brenda
NEW to Styx, classic to the world: Big Bang Theory

Brenda Lewis wrote:

Read the fine print on charts or in the magazines to see if they mention
the selling of finished items. If they don't, the safest thing to do is
to contact the designer or publisher of each chart and ask permission.
That goes for freebie charts too! Of course designing your own will
work just as well since it is easy to give yourself permission. ;-)

Not being extremely artistic, or having a lot of extra time, I'd rather
avoid designing my own charts for the most part. None of the magazines
mention the sale of the finished items. I did manage to reach one
publisher. She told me that most companies are fine with selling things
like ornaments as long as (a) they aren't being mass produced - one
individual can't stitch up enough to matter in terms of royalties on the
pattern, and (b) the chart itself is not being duplicated and sold in
any way, other than in the form of the finished stitched piece of
course. She said if there's a place to acknowledge the publisher, it's
nice to include that info, but otherwise if I'm an individual selling a
few craft pieces made from their charts, I should be fine.

Barbara

Sounds like you got a good response. In digging, the only charts I
found that language indicating the sale of finished items would cause a
problem were Precious Moments (Gloria & Pat) since that is part of their
licensing agreement with Sam Butcher (PM creator). Have fun!

Barbara Hass wrote:
Not being extremely artistic, or having a lot of extra time, I'd rather
avoid designing my own charts for the most part. None of the magazines
mention the sale of the finished items. I did manage to reach one
publisher. She told me that most companies are fine with selling things
like ornaments as long as (a) they aren't being mass produced - one
individual can't stitch up enough to matter in terms of royalties on the
pattern, and (b) the chart itself is not being duplicated and sold in
any way, other than in the form of the finished stitched piece of
course. She said if there's a place to acknowledge the publisher, it's
nice to include that info, but otherwise if I'm an individual selling a
few craft pieces made from their charts, I should be fine.

Barbara


--
Brenda
NEW to Styx, classic to the world: Big Bang Theory

Brenda Lewis wrote:
Sounds like you got a good response. In digging, the only charts I
found that language indicating the sale of finished items would cause a
problem were Precious Moments (Gloria & Pat) since that is part of their
licensing agreement with Sam Butcher (PM creator). Have fun!

Doesn't surprise me. I have a PM Christmas leaflet, but had already
nixed those from my list of potentials, since I knew trademark items
like that are almost always problematic, even on a small scale. For
example, all of the stamp companies usually say "no problem" in their
Angel policies (no mass production, under certain quantity), but
*always* with the exception for licensed images like comic characters
and Disney, etc.

Thanks for looking for me!

Barbara