Pet Portraits

[BusinessIdeas]

A friend of mine is thinking about starting in the business of painting pet portraits to order from photographs supplied by pet owners. Is there any call for this service, and are there any other forum members with experience in this line of business?
Here is an example of her work:

 

[ethical PR]

Hello

Where I live in South West London there is a guy who runs a business painting pet and family portraits.

I have also heard of quite a few people that just do pet portraits and some specialise in an animal for example horses.

I would suggest it might be useful for your friend to do some research (google etc) to see how many people out there might be offering this type of service, how many are in her area (although some people work from photos).

She can also see whether she feels there is room in the market for her and in what way she can offer a service that is different, better, quicker etc than her would be competitors.

 

[Dawg]

As suggested by Ethical PR do some research. Googling 'pet portraits' comes up with several hundred thousand, and even some agencies handling a whole bunch of artists.
There are always some at reasonable size dog shows, summer shows and the like, but everything is a crowded market now, and if your friend can find a way to stand out that would help.

(Just thinking a bit: I've not seen photos taken at grooming parlours which are then used as a reference for artwork. The groomer wouldn't mind as they could take the pix and use them for their own publicity and you could do a whole sales thing about 'when your best friend looks his best have him painted'...)

 

[Mattonella Tile Studio]

From a personal point of view it would be good if she could 'create' a picture from several photos. I've got 4 puss cats and would love a photo of them all together, but it just ain't going to happen without knocking them out, or photoshopping it.

 

[da8iwr]

We had a little westy who died very quickly of a lung cancer
www.westylungdisease.com
After he passed away i found an artist on eBay who sold many types of original paintings of different breeds, and one he was showing of a westy was uncanily like Scampa, so i bought it for my fiance where it is now framed on her side of the bedroom.

So yes there is a market for this, maybe if you could have many made up of generic pictures, to take to animal shows, and then of course put notes on the pictures that you could have a custom picture from your photographs (at a higher costs )

 

I think you'd need an 'angle' tbh, though have no idea what this could be. There are plenty doing it, and I even remember someone locally who sent your pics to Asia and had some great paintings done quickly & very cheaply, though it was a while ago.

 

[murdoch]

Hi CrewGirl,

yes I have a business which does this already.
Here is a link http://www.portraitxpress.com/pet

I have to say, its a hugely competitive area and there is competition from local amateur painters perhaps like your friends, to huge 'factories' of artists in the US and in China.

We can do combinations of pets, any style, any background, any size etc etc.

The thing which is difficult is getting people to hear about your friend's work-
as a single individual its hard to fund advertising. Online is a nightmare as there is too much competition.

Your friend is welcome to contact me at [email protected], we are sometimes looking for new UK artists to add to our (very small) stable of UK painters we use for some of our projects.

Matt

 

[Fuzzy]

Maybe you (sorry your friend) could offer something a bit different to the competitors - a pet potrait and then have them printed on various items? That way you (sorry friend) would stand out a bit?

We do caricatures, there are hundreds out there, but we offer to have it printed on various items as something a bit different...worth a thought?

Great work btw - lots of luck

 

[serendipitybusiness]

Hani provides pet portraits currently. It may be worth your friend having a chat with her. I think she may be a member of this business forum

http://www.petportraitsbyhani.co.uk/

 

[RBS]

Hi CrewGirl,

yes I have a business which does this already.
Here is a link http://www.portraitxpress.com/pet

I have to say, its a hugely competitive area and there is competition from local amateur painters perhaps like your friends, to huge 'factories' of artists in the US and in China.

Oh yes it is....

www.portraitxpress.com
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]has been registered and is currently parked.[/FONT]

 

[AngelaE]

I have to say, whilst it's great that there are ideas for new business but the fact that this idea already exists astounds me! I appreciate that its a personal preference thing, but I cant believe people want to pay money to have their pet drawn! As you can tell, I'm not a pet person (although I have chickens, but they are practical..) and I never tire of hearing stories of people and their pets!

Having said that - if there is a market for it, go for it! Good luck.

 

[RBS]

I`d love to have my cat drawn! This has led me to present idea for my mate next week. He would give away everything for his dog, so I`m going to get his dog drawn. It will make amazing present!

 

[RBS]

I found an amazing artist and got my mate`s dog draw. Gave it to my mate today as BD present, his family was blown away, cried! I was speechless when I saw quality of work, just wooow!

Photo of the dog:
http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/8252/bingol.jpg

Portrait:
http://img714.imageshack.us/img714/8415/portraitno.jpg

 

[amanda1112]

I really think there is a market for this. My brother is an artist and he's brilliant with oil paintings. He did an oil painting on canvas taken from one photograph for a friend who's dog had died some time before. It was amazing and she loved it. This was about 20 years ago now and it is still hanging on her living room wall. People love things like this and also he could do family paintings taken from photos. I would say yes definitely do it. Maybe send out flyers with examples of work done on them.

 

[iArtist]

I know many pet lovers who spend more on their paintings and caricatures of their dogs than they ever did on their children! So yes...big market for this.

 

[MH1]

Used to help a friend with this same business years ago, we generated leads by door to door calls, strangely enough the higher the price the easier the sale, he eventually ended up selling at double his original target price.

 

[iArtist]

I have recently decided to branch out into the pet cartoon caricature biz so I'll let you know if it's worthwhile or not.