Hi- I'm new here and have a pricing question. Here's the situation: 4 years ago, I started a company with a girlfriend. We manufacture dog products, the most innovative item of the line being a series of collars, leads and dog tags with little buttons with epoxy-domed images set into the leather. I am the designer- every item in the line, plus the (admittedly unimpressive, I'm not a web designer) website and logo, is something I designed. Here's a link to the page on our website: luckypupdesigns.com/pictovision.html
There's another company, Winky & Dutch, that's been around for many years that uses similar domes in jewelry, so I didn't come up with this out of the blue- my partner & I liked their stuff and wanted to do something similar, but on leather goods and with different artwork. We actually approached them about doing a line for them, but they dragged their feet for six months, so we decided to go ahead and do it ourselves. But I spent eight months of my life researching suppliers and contractors, getting prototypes made, working with a metal caster to come up with a setting piece that could be attached to leather, research, development , art direction and creation of the images that went on each dome- some were public domain images that I modified or non-pd images that I changed quite a bit, one style was licensed from Shepard Fairey, and some were created by me from scratch. It was a lot of work, and the company was and remains the only job I've had during this period. There's no other company in the pet product world with the same sensibility, and everything you see in the line (including other types of collars, dog coats, tshirts) exists because I did gthe work to create it.
We've grown at an impressive rate, but like all small businesses, any money that has come in has been going to develop new product and place larger orders each time. My partner, who has been working other jobs as well this whole time, decided she was sick of working for free, despite claiming to have been fully aware that a new business typically takes 3-5 years to show a substantial profit- we're right on schedule. She wants to sell the company, and we've been discussing what the business is worth. (I'm not interested in running it myself, too big, so buying her out is not an option) My accountant told me that when a business is sold, the worth is made up of numerous components: the value of the company itself, the designs, logo, URL, inventory, equipment, etc. She feels the company is worth very little, but both my accountant and I believe she is seriously undervaluing it.
However, assuming I own the copyright for all the designs- gotta consult with a lawyer on this- even if the company itself is not worth much, I might be able to sell the designs, logo, and perhaps the URL (since I bought it under my own name, not the company's) separately.
So, my question for those of you out there who have freelance-designed for another company, what do you think this is worth? This is something that the buyer would be able to base their business on for many years to come.
There's another company, Winky & Dutch, that's been around for many years that uses similar domes in jewelry, so I didn't come up with this out of the blue- my partner & I liked their stuff and wanted to do something similar, but on leather goods and with different artwork. We actually approached them about doing a line for them, but they dragged their feet for six months, so we decided to go ahead and do it ourselves. But I spent eight months of my life researching suppliers and contractors, getting prototypes made, working with a metal caster to come up with a setting piece that could be attached to leather, research, development , art direction and creation of the images that went on each dome- some were public domain images that I modified or non-pd images that I changed quite a bit, one style was licensed from Shepard Fairey, and some were created by me from scratch. It was a lot of work, and the company was and remains the only job I've had during this period. There's no other company in the pet product world with the same sensibility, and everything you see in the line (including other types of collars, dog coats, tshirts) exists because I did gthe work to create it.
We've grown at an impressive rate, but like all small businesses, any money that has come in has been going to develop new product and place larger orders each time. My partner, who has been working other jobs as well this whole time, decided she was sick of working for free, despite claiming to have been fully aware that a new business typically takes 3-5 years to show a substantial profit- we're right on schedule. She wants to sell the company, and we've been discussing what the business is worth. (I'm not interested in running it myself, too big, so buying her out is not an option) My accountant told me that when a business is sold, the worth is made up of numerous components: the value of the company itself, the designs, logo, URL, inventory, equipment, etc. She feels the company is worth very little, but both my accountant and I believe she is seriously undervaluing it.
However, assuming I own the copyright for all the designs- gotta consult with a lawyer on this- even if the company itself is not worth much, I might be able to sell the designs, logo, and perhaps the URL (since I bought it under my own name, not the company's) separately.
So, my question for those of you out there who have freelance-designed for another company, what do you think this is worth? This is something that the buyer would be able to base their business on for many years to come.
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Los Angeles
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