A price you can say out loud

The first time I charged what the bowl actually cost me, I said the number to an empty room before I typed it. It sounded high. Then I counted the two bowls that cracked, the glaze I mixed wrong, the afternoon the wheel ate, and the fact that I cannot make forty of them before lunch. The number got quieter. It was still the right one.

Underpricing feels generous and works like a slow leak. You stay busy. You get tired. You start to resent the inbox, which is a strange way to treat people who liked your work enough to pay for it. A fair price is not a speech about your passion. It is materials, failed attempts, tools that wear out, and the years it took before your hands knew what they were doing.

Buyers can tell when a price is a guess. They can also tell when you believe it. You do not need a paragraph of justification under every listing. You need a number you would repeat if a neighbor asked, and a description that shows what the money is for: the weight, the time, the thing you will not rush.

When the cost of clay or silver moves, the price can move with it. Tell the people who already buy from you. Most of them would rather you stay in the studio than watch you discount your way out of it.

I still hesitate at the keyboard. Then I remember the empty room, and the cracked bowls, and I type the number I already said.