What is "Pay-What-You-Want" pricing and why do you use it?

Why We Have Pay-What-You-Want Pricing

Why We Do Pay What You Want As of January 2016, many of the digital download products on this site can be purchased under a “pay-what-you-want” or “name your own price” payment structure. This allows you, the customer, to decide how much to pay based on what the value of the product is to you.

Ultimately, it is your contributions that keep this web site going and motivates our artists to keep creating and posting cool stuff for you to enjoy!

Most pay-what-you-want offers on the site will have a base price or minimum payment amount. This is to ensure we recover at least some of the time and expense of bringing these products to you. We realize many customers may not be sure what value to put on an item, so the suggested value is also posted. You may donate any amount above the base price according to how you value you the item.

For instance, if you are considering a bundle of six coloring pages, but you only think you will color five of the designs one time each, you may feel that the value to you is around $8, a bit less than the suggested value. Someone else may be considering the same bundle of six coloring designs, but they plan to print multiple copies and share them with the entire family for an evening of coloring fun. The value to this customer may be $35–well above the suggested value, but still considerably less than the cost of taking the whole family out to a movie, and a much more enriching family entertainment experience!

Using the design resources as an example, one customer may be using a set of custom shapes or layer styles in a design for a t-shirt that will sell hundreds of copies at a profit. For this customer, the value potential could be $100 or more. Another customer may be using the same resources just in a few personal projects such as embellishing greeting cards. This customer may wish to donate only $5-10 for the resources.

And all of this is perfectly fine! No guilt. If you have no idea of the value to you yet–go with the suggested value we suggest. Or start with a small donation, and come back to add another donation if you find the value to be more than what you initially anticipated. You can find a donation box at the bottom of this page or on the sidebar of any page on the site.

Learn more about why this change was made in this message by SuziQCreations.com founder Sue Chastain:

This site was originally conceived as a place to continue offering much of the free content I had been giving away on graphicssoft.about.com when I was maintaining the Graphics Software topic there. The difference between that site and this one is that it was ad supported. So, as “payment” for the free goodies, you had to put up with ads on the pages. This site has very little advertising–and that is by choice–but there is expense involved with maintaining the site. My idea was to create premium versions of the formerly free content–expanding on those resources and adding value to this. These are the Designer Pack upgrades you see on many products here.

For a while that was working well enough, but as time went on, more of my visitors were taking the free content without contributing a donation or upgrading to the premium Designer Packs. In addition, for me as the primary contributor to the site, it became rather unfulfilling to simply take existing products and re-package them. I began experimenting and creating more and more original content of my own to offer here.

Then in mid-2015, through the suggestion of a friend, I hit on the adult coloring pages idea and it was a fit! I felt like I had really found my niche. The OrnaMENTALs™ brand was born and I began offering them for sale on this site. Later that year, I developed shingles (yuck!) and got to experience the real therapeutic benefits of coloring for myself.

At the time I was also struggling with the issues of art theft and trying to determine and define my values surrounding the selling of my art and designs–how much to give way and how much to sell. I knew I wanted more people to experience the benefits of coloring, but I simply couldn’t give everything away after working so hard and putting myself into it. That was when another friend introduced me to the concept of pay-what-you-want pricing. After some research and consideration, it felt right, and I decided to go with it, announcing the change in the first issue of Sue’s News of 2016.

I’m starting with converting the coloring pages and coloring bundles to pay-what-you-want. If it works, I may follow suit with other resources sold here. This site has very little advertising aside from our own products. You won’t see popups, obnoxious flashy ads, or pushy sign-up forms. I will still continue to give free products away.

I am trusting that these values intersect with yours and that all this has value to you. If not, in time I will know that I’m on the wrong path.

My hope is that you will prove the value of my art and designs through your donations.

Thank you for reading. And thank you for your contributions if you choose to buy here.

Blessings,

Sue Chastain

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Why aren’t your print books pay-what-you-want?

Our book publishing platform does not allow us to use a pay-what-you-want pricing model. However, books will always be launched at a lower price for the first 1-2 weeks only so that the most loyal fans and newsletter readers can get it at the best possible price. I beleive in rewarding loyalty, so the books will never be reduced as low as the early bird price again (unless it is reduced by the seller, which could happen but is out of our control).

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