In the past decade, the art and framing industry has faced a number of significant challenges. It has experienced the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, the crash of the housing market, and the proliferation of big-box craft stores.

All of these factors have affected the sales and profitability of small independent frame shops and galleries. Yet, through ingenuity and perseverance, they’ve managed to survive, and art and framing sales are now experiencing a resurgence in sales. This situation is especially true for independent framers, who are starting to gain market share as more and more consumers recognize that 70 percent off a grossly inflated price is not such a great deal for a frame design showing a lack of professional design skills.

Just as handing someone a paint set doesn’t make them an artist, giving someone a title and showing them how to use a cash register doesn’t suddenly endow them with the skills they need to be a professional frame designer. It’s taken years, but consumers have finally begun to recognize that the real value of custom framing is in the enduring beauty of the results, not in the inexpensive frames they see in newspaper ads. The industry today is smarter, bolder, and more profitable than it has been at any other time in the past decade. However, despite this increase in prosperity, framers have yet to overcome one obstacle: the widespread, misguided, and illogical placement of flat-screen televisions on walls, instead of in entertainment centers or on furniture. This trend in consumer behavior has caused the framing market to shrink, robbed it of millions of sales opportunities, and generated a tremendous amount of human pain and suffering.

Despite its widespread and devastating consequences to art and framing merchants and to consumers, the problem has gone mostly unnoticed and almost completely ignored, and it has grown to pandemic proportions. And it’s got me hoppin’ mad.

Flat screens have taken over valuable vertical real estate that was once the domain of artists, photographers, and framers. Paintings, prints, photographs, needlework, and lots of frames—your frames and my frames—belong on walls. What does not belong on walls are rectangular black holes of nothingness.

And it’s all the Jetsons’ fault—George, Jane, Judy, and even little Elroy. They started it. They were the first perpetrators of this mess. They’re the ones who made us yearn for the advent of wall-mounted TVs. And now we’ve got ’em. But the Jetsons were wrong.

TVs do not belong on walls. They surely don’t belong in the corner near a ceiling. And they have absolutely no business being mounted above a fireplace. Just because your customers can mount their Samsungs and Vizios on their walls doesn’t mean they should. In fact, mounting a TV on a wall isn’t just a bad idea from the perspective of a custom framer, it’s also a bad idea for your health.

Historically, as you may recall, people placed TVs at eye level. Because most people watch television from a seated position, TVs were once much closer to the floor. This placement provided a viewing experience similar to what one enjoys when sitting in the center of a movie theater.

Earlier generations of TVs were in their own cabinets or consoles; placed on stands; or tucked into entertainment centers, which have doors to hide the rectangular black hole when it is not in use. Today’s TVs are much lighter and flatter than those of yesteryear. They rarely exceed a thickness of more than 5 to 6 inches, making wall mounting possible.

But almost every wall-mounted TV is positioned much higher on the wall than is optimal for comfortable viewing from a sofa or an easy chair. These viewing angles can produce stiff necks, sore shoulders, and aching backs. If you don’t believe it, ask a chiropractor. Most will tell you that wallmounted TVs are great for their business.

Any adult who has ever had the unfortunate experience of sitting in the first few rows of a movie theater should know better than to mount a TV so high up on a wall. Sure, it was cool to sit in the front row of the theater when you were 10 years old, but no adult ever willingly sits that close to the screen. Long before the movie is over, your neck is certain to feel like a PEZ dispenser locked in the tilted-back position.

Wall-mounted TVs rob custom framers of potential sales, and they need to do something about it. They need to take back what belongs to them.

Unfortunately, this trend is not likely to go away anytime soon, and there’s little framers can do about it. However, you might consider educating your customers by providing literature about the potential health problems—and letting them know why they don’t want to emulate the Jetsons.

The post Why I Hate George Jetson | The Guerrilla Framer appeared first on Art Business News.

During interactions with framers in the past several years, speaker, trade writer and tri-location frameshop owner Ken Baur has noticed a growing need in the picture-framing industry.

“The amount of questions and uncertainty expressed by shop owners around the country is very high right now,” Baur says. “The economy is the major aspect, but framers also realize that the industry is evolving very rapidly into something different.”

Baur says he’s faced and overcome his fair share of challenges since he entered the framing industry 18 years ago as a custom framer at a Ben Franklin store and then later branched out on his own to found Framing Concepts Gallery in 2001. Now that he’s got a strong footing in running three locations of the business in northwest Indiana, Baur is working to help custom picture framers compete in a changing market through a full-service firm he recently launched—KB Consulting.

“KB Consulting is a new company dedicated to working with custom picture framing businesses to help them compete in this changing market,” Baur says. “KB Consulting concentrates on helping frame shops develop inexpensive, client-based programs that increase repeat business and referrals for new business.”

KB Consulting offers a full range of services, including marketing, designs for gallery layouts, pricing strategies for increasing profit, programs for improving customer service and advice on expanding framing services such as delivery, installation, off-site sales and corporate sales programs.

The company specializes in e-mail marketing programs that tie directly to company websites. These programs are based on promoting relationships with clients while offering incentives for referrals and repeat business, Baur says.

KB Consulting also will soon have the capability of providing websites specifically designed for custom framers that can easily be updated to reflect gallery activity.

“These sites also will offer versatile e-mail programs designed to bring activity to the sites,” Baur says. “The result is an increased ability to market directly to clients without the cost of direct mail.”

KB Consulting will offer full support and guidance for developing these Web sites into interactive marketing tools that build client relationships.

As far as Baur’s experience in this area, Framing Concepts Gallery recently won the Best Web Site Award category in DECOR’s 2009 Top Art & Framing Retailers Awards competition for the company’s exceptional online presence and ability to connect with customers digitally.

A portion of all KB Consulting proceeds will be donated to American Forests, a non-profit organization that works to protect, restore and enhance the natural capital of trees and forests.

For more information on 
KB Consulting, visit 
www.framingbusinessconsulting.com, 
or e-mail 
ken@framingbusinessconsulting.com.

The post From One Framer to Another: A Successful Store Owner Offers Assistance appeared first on Art Business News.