affordable pauper

by Art Chantry:

these are books by “the peter pauper press”. they are small (4 1/2″ x 7 1/2″ x 3/8″). they are beautifully designed and letterpress printed, often sporting illustrations by some of the best illustrators of the era. and they were cheap (a round a buck new). the motto of the company was “prices even a pauper could afford.”

—the other thing i learned about charging too little is this: if you charge too little, the clients will rob you. they will even just “not pay” you and laugh at you when you try to sue them. it costs so much to take a complaint through th
e various levels of our court system that they can just appeal decisions and you have to keep forking out money to continue the process. eventually, you go broke. they win. i’ve actually had professional clients just laugh at me when i tried to bill them. it was so little that i couldn’t afford to actually take it through the courts. moral: always charge enough that it’s worthwhile to sue for it. or you are doing it for free.—Read More:https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150993147833873&set=a.313476963872.144857.608898872&type=1&theater

founded in 1928 by peter beilenson and his wife, edna, they published something like 12 or so books a year in their basement. the material they published was shakespeare, rilke, emerson, cook books, riddle books, limericks, pun collections, and (later) beautifully cloth bound illustrated slipcased volumes with hand made paper by authors like oscar wilde and e.a. poe. these are wonderful little objects and stunningly well-crafted items. after the deaths of various founders, the family continues the press operation until this day (i think).

even though edna beilenson became the first woman president of the AIGA (the national graphic arts organization), the work of peter pauper press seems to go ignored by the larger graphic design world at large. there seems to be a real lack of effort to document or preserve the heritage of this amazing little imprint. researching this meant relying completely on company histories compiled by the company itself, crude amateur collector websites and other small university catalogs. basically, this was one great publishing house that has been sort of shunned by history.

why? i dunno. maybe it’s beacuse these have been treated as cheap “gift” books (like hallmark books) by book collector industry? nobody seems to seriously collect them. i still find my copies in thrift stores and goodwill stores for pennies. fine book collector shops rarely stock any at all (i’ve actually been “sniffed” at when i’ve asked about them). i’ve never read any mention of them in any design or book histories i’ve ever encountered. it’s a bit of a mystery to me.

the best i can figure out is that, in amercia, if you price something too low, it’s considered junk. it’s true of products, it’s true of services, too. there’s something about paying too LITTLE for something in this country that brands it as “not worth it” and ‘cheap.’ it’s just like putting too high a price on something makes it instantly better, even though it may be an inferior product or service. the idea that “you get what you pay for” seems to be truly believed in america – even though experience teaches you there is nothing further from the truth.

in my own experience, i realize that i charged too little for my services over the years. the reality is that i became known as the guy to go to for great design work done wicked cheap. i helped a lot of clients make a lot of money with my design work. but, as soon as they started to make real money, they’d jump to a higher priced designer as if it was the correct business decision to make – even though the design work they got after the jump was dismal compared to what i gave them. even the fact that they started to lose money after the switch never seemed to register, either.

i remember one client – an architect – that hired me to do a promotional brochure for their firm. it took me 2 1/2 years to get it done – all of it on instructing the client on what a brochure does and babysitting them step by tiny step through the creative process. in the end, i produced a brilliant piece that really worked for them. it sounds like bragging, but it received a LOT of design awards. that brochure actually turned the firm’s fortunes around.

then, they ran into one of my local competitors (who charged about ten times as much as i do) at a cocktail party and immediately hired them to re-design their logo/brand/identity and create a larger promotional campaign based on the brochure i designed. now, i had only charged them $1000 or so for what amounted to years of labor and a lifetime of professional design knowledge. that was ridiculously low, but that was all they had to offer me back then. as soon as they started to get some big huge commissions based on my brochure, they willingly paid 5 and even 6 figures for the privilege of hiring (what i consider to be) a grossly expensive hack. i was shocked.

but, it wasn’t the fact that they jumped ship so eagerly that shocked me – i’d gotten real accustomed to that behavior during my ‘career’. it was the fact that they called me up personally to excitedly tell me how much they had learned about the process from me and that they were deeply grateful to me for what i had taught them and what great work i had done for them for so little money. they even called me ‘family’. then, in virtually the same breathe, they told me all about their chance meeting at this cocktail party and their hiring of this amazing great expensive designer. they really thought i would compliment them on their astute growth and wise thinking and that i would be happy for them. i think i was so sur

ed that i actually did numbly congratulated them on their decision and wished them luck.

clients are wicked stupid sometimes.

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