Vanilla Beans: I Paid for That
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It was a tippy-tappy week.
I always feel a little antsy when I’m doing nothing but computer work, but computer work I must.
Guidebooks for UP and Wonk, plus the website revamp. Maybe next week I can color something.
See? Full time arting isn’t as much arting as you think.
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*BTW, there’s STILL a paragraph spacing issue here in the newsletter area and I can’t figure out why. If everything today looks like one big paragraph, click here for a more readable option.
Sometimes my topics seem random.
Then there are days where I gather the discombobulated threads and tie them up in a nice bow.
We’re done with being Cash Cows, right?
And you can’t believe anything on the box
We talked about quality pigments and the cheap shortcut
Plus the artfluencers talking you into cheap supplies
Now let’s answer the question every colorist wants to know:
What’s the best cheap brand?
I PAID FOR THAT!
Art supplies are a want, not a need and with the economy in the toilet, your coloring money now keeps the fridge filled.
It’s not a coincidence that everyone went bonkers for Polychromos when the economy was better.
So if you’re on a tight budget, it’s normal to wonder:
“Of all the inexpensive pencils, which brands do you recommend?”
Sorry, but I can’t answer that.
I could.
But I won’t.
I get it. It’s a good question.
But it’s also much cheaper to ask Amy than test 15 brands yourself.
Uhhh, hello? It’s not like I have a big budget and massive amounts of free time to try pencils for you.
Even if I could, I don’t want to.
I won’t buy a bunch of cheap pencils when I know they’ll never do what I need them to do.
Besides, you don’t really need me or my help.
The thing beginners and bargain hunters do not understand:
When it comes to colored pencils, you don’t have to open the box.
The price tag says everything you need to know about the quality inside.
Below a certain price, they’re simply not worth buying.
How cheap is too cheap?
This is why we talked about the Artfluencers— the social media cuties who want to sell you pencils. The cheaper the better.
Meanwhile, I’m the doofus who didn’t listen to her dad when he said “Drawing’s a hard way to make a livin’, sweetie”
Maybe it’s another dumb move, but here I am— selling skills, not pencils.
So no, if you want to get good at this coloring stuff, I can’t recommend anything that stands between you and good results.
There’s a line I will not cross, not because of ethics but pure practicality.
I will not fight with my art supplies.
It’s not that expensive pencils gives me the warm fuzzies.
It’s because using crap pencils feels so incredibly bad! The results are so disheartening and mentally destructive that I won’t do it to myself.
Or you.
Any kind of cheap is too cheap.
And here’s the real kick in the peanuts…
As cheap as those cheap pencils are, you’re still paying too much.
The price of a pencil:
I kinda touched on this when I brain-bombed you about dyed pencils.
Now let’s get nerdy with some cost analysis:
For artist grade colored pencils, there’s no wiggle room in the system.
Artist grade pencil companies have most costs locked-in.
Pigments are expensive. They will always be expensive.
They make pencils in their home town, employing local people with insurance and good wages. This isn’t cheap.
They sell sets and open stock pencils in brick & mortar art stores near you.
They deliver inventory via shipping container, paying the appropriate taxes, port fees, and tariffs.
Ethics have a price.
Before a pencil ever hits the store, high quality pencils are already more expensive than a hobbyist wants to pay.
The only price reduction these companies can do, is minimize marketing and limit profit margins. Ouch!
This keeps the price reasonable(ish) enough to stay in business.
Then we have the cheapies.
They use low quality materials and because they don’t standardize colors, they can switch ingredients. You’ll never notice.
I won’t go into the shameful labor practices again. This should bother you. A lot.
Let’s talk distribution: Want to know why they don’t sell open stock? It’s a logistics nightmare to sell single pencils.
They only sell online which sneakily allows them to sell at retailer’s mark-up price instead of selling wholesale to art stores.
Here’s the dirty part though— By shipping a box of pencils directly to you, they don’t pay taxes, fees, and tariffs. It’s the same loophole Temu uses.
Except here’s the thing, Temu uses cost reduction strategies to price products ridiculously low.
But that’s not what cheap pencil companies do.
As cheap as cheap pencils are, they’re actually overpriced.
What ad are you seeing here? Let me guess…
We blame our browser settings but there’s a deeper reason cheap art supply ads follow you everywhere online.
It’s the same reason you’ve seen 42 YouTubers open free boxes of markers or colored pencils.
When you skimp on materials, manufacturing, and distribution…
You have a <bleep> ton of money to spend on marketing.
Think about it, have you EVER seen a video where someone says “The nice folks at Caran d’Ache just sent me this big box of Luminance…”
Noooooo.
But Ohuhu and Arteza? They offer me free sets of something 3-4 times a month. And I’m a little channel. They shouldn’t know I exist.
How do they know? They hire contractors to find potential artfluencers.
Let that sink in: They pay a team to give me free pencils.
So the next time you watch a YouTuber or TikToker open a package and swatch their “free gift”, here’s what you should be yelling at the screen:
“I PAID FOR THAT!”
Feel free to add a juicy expletive if you want.
Derwent, Caran d’Ache, Faber-Castell, Holbein…
They sell expensive pencils because the ingredients and manufacturing process make it impossible to sell their pencils for less.
How about the other end of the market?
Easy. You can tell by the price tag.
You’ve got a good nose, you can spot a scam. You know $9.99 for a set of 72 won’t get you much. Trust your gut on that one.
And what about the pencils which sit somewhere in-between.
What’s the best mid-priced pencil?
It doesn’t matter.
A medium price on the tag isn’t a reflection of medium quality…
It’s a sign they’re paying a marketing team plus a bunch of artfluencers.
Cheap cheap or medium cheap? There’s no difference. They’re all coming from the same hell hole.
You’re buying better marketing, not a better pencil.
_____
For the record, I don’t trust anything less than $1 per pencil.
Call it a threshold of minimum viability. Anything less and they can’t be using pigments or paying their workers a decent wage.
Next week, we’ll begin learning the characteristics of high quality pencils.
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