How much is a postcard selling for in your location?

June 2, 2016 10:34 AM

I am making postcards for my local museum as a fundraiser and I need to know how much tourist stops are charging for postcards these days.

For example, if you have access to a fancy city museum, I'd like to know how much they are charging for a postcard-souvenir because that's what I want to charge. Not the price my local drugstore charges. That's why I need your help.

Or any kind of tourist stop. What are they getting away with these days as far as postcard prices?

posted by cda to Work & Money (10 answers total)

I've checked some museum webshops and the cards are cheaper than I'd have expected... they are commonly sold at around €1,-
posted by Too-Ticky at 11:00 AM on June 2, 2016

For a regular postcard (no fancy materials or die-cutting) I usually see something like $1-$1.50 each, or some kind of tiered pricing like $1.50 each/4 for $5.
posted by antimony at 11:01 AM on June 2, 2016 [1 favorite]

Anything from 25p to £2.50. But that is honestly a terrible way of going about pricing.

Look at your printing costs and image-licensing costs. Figure out minimum order vs your projected turnover of goods. Take into account the cost of the paper bag you'll invariably need to buy for your tourists. Factor that into your cost (and do you want them printed as well?). Look at your margin.

Don't price yourself in a way that is detrimental to your overhead.
posted by kariebookish at 11:02 AM on June 2, 2016

At museums they are typically somewhere between $1.50-$2.50 depending on the specifics.

My guess is that art related postcards go for more than your typical tourist I <3 NY type stuff because photographing the art is a more painstaking process, and they need to be reproduced at a much higher quality than other postcards. Also each card has to be printed on the reverse with specific information about the piece, whereas on tourist postcards it'll just say the name of the city or at best a neighborhood/landmark name.

In my experience smaller/less popular museums tend to have more expensive postcards, probably because they are running smaller numbers or can't count on turning over a high volume in a short amount of time.

Sorry for the novel; I just really love museum postcards. (And I used to work in a major museum bookshop.)
posted by Sara C. at 11:07 AM on June 2, 2016

The postcards we sell at the bookstore I work at (which would also be considered a tourist destination)range from $1 each to $2.50; most of the $2-2.50 cards are more "artistic" and may be letterpressed or at least printed on higher quality paper. I just bought postcards for $2 each at a local camera shop, because they were actual prints of photographs taken by the staff.
posted by redsparkler at 11:15 AM on June 2, 2016

Here in Canada, 3 bucks for plain photo ones, and about 4 dollars for speciality ones with nicer paper or embossing.

Anything under 2 dollars would be the crappy dollar store ones. Having to charge a little more for nice prints is not a bad thing.
posted by InkDrinker at 11:21 AM on June 2, 2016

Yeah, most museum postcards I've seen have been around $2 or so. Not terribly expensive, but a little more so than non-museum postcards.
posted by kevinbelt at 11:47 AM on June 2, 2016

You can comfortably charge more for art cards - prints of works by a local artist/photographer. Also charge a bit more if it includes mention on the card that the proceeds from the cards go towards a named organization/charity. If you have it printed on high quality cardstock or fiber paper, again adds to the "quality".

I would go to the local museum and scope out what they're already charging for the cards there, and aim to raise the price by $1.50 to $2.50. Just keep it under $5.... if you want to go above $5 you should be offering individual folded blank cards with envelopes.

packs of art cards that are blank inside, on good paper with an envelope, also sell well in our experience. Easily charge $15-$20 per set of 4.
posted by lizbunny at 12:39 PM on June 2, 2016

I buy art postcards. Almost everywhere, IF there's a really good one.

I don't buy them because they're cheap, I buy them because they are pretty in a unique way.

I pay more for something with a lovely piece of art on the front with _no words_. No words. Not the name of the museum, not the name of the artist, not some kind of graffiti thing. I want a purely visual experience on the front that makes me happy, and makes me pleased to give this image to someone as a gift. On the back, I love lots of descriptive text.

For that, I'd be fine with paying $2 - $4. More if it's really really pretty.

Sara C., if you didn't have weird kitten issues taking up your time, I'd suggest we get together and compare postcards. Check out Pomegranate Press if you haven't already.
posted by amtho at 1:17 PM on June 2, 2016 [2 favorites]

I usually pay between $1-$2 for good museum postcards (and I have a lot and am constantly getting more). I was just at the Barnes Foundation and was a little irked because most of what they had for sale were more expensive oversized cards or actual notecards that were closer to $4. But I got a few anyway because I really wanted the image.
posted by PussKillian at 2:11 PM on June 2, 2016