Chewing Pencils

I was reminded today of how hard it is to make a living in this game…

Last week a potential client contacted me and asked me to quote on a job they had in mind. On the basis of the information they had given me, I sent in the quote and waited to hear back from them. They were prompt, and gave me the go ahead for completeing the project and gave me the details for the first image they required.

I still needed a little more information, more specifically the dimensions they were after. So I shot off an email over the weekend and scheduled my week so I could complete their job.

Monday morning arrives and I’m greeted with:

“Thanks for your interest in creating some cartoons for us. However, we have just commissioned someone to complete this initial batch for us …”

WHAT?!

I have enough in the way of email correspondence from them to kick up a big stink about breach of contract blah, blah, blah. But the reality is that this is how the game works. Fortunately for me I hadn’t started any of the drafts and so haven’t really wasted any time on the project at all.

I’m guessing that this is the sort of client that would be difficult to work with anyway. If they’re prepared to play hard ball like this at the start, then getting money out of them for anything is going to be an uphill battle. While I’m really angry, I’m also a bit glad that I found out what they were like at this point rather than farther down the track.

I enquired as to why the sudden change in direction, and to their credit, the now ex-client was quite honest. They were in a hurry and another cartoonist had actually completed the job as his/her quote. Basically this other artist had said, “Here’s what I can do - give me $xxx and you can have it.” A risky move, but one that has paid off this time.

I rarely do samples as part of quoting jobs unless I approach a potential client first. If a client approaches me and asks for a sample, then I’ll do it, but send an invoice for the cartoon I produce. And as for completing a project for a client without and agreement for payment - not a chance! Given that most of us are only successful for about 1 in 10 quotes, I’d be drawing an awful lot for nothing if I used this method.

Anyway, a learning experience if nothing else. I probably should use more samples in my quotes, but will still avoid sending a finished product as a quote.

What about you?