“If you mean do we have our own galleries dotted about the country, in short ‘no we don’t’. That said we’ll only supply galleries that hold stock. We won’t supply any internet based company, but if they have a proper gallery in a proper high street retail environment and they have a website as well, we will allow them to put a level of images on the website, but we won’t allow them to put on the whole portfolio because that’s taking away from galleries that have committed to stock. Both Anthony and I are old fashioned in that we want to support retailers who support us. It’s a symbiotic relationship. “We’ve put a lot of money into shows, spending fi ve to six thousand pounds a week on the retail shows up and down the country, not to mention the Spring and Autumn Fairs and Harrogate Home & Gift.” I think I’m right in saying that Collier & Dobson are the only ‘true limited edition art publisher’ to exhibit at all three major trade shows and wondered what the attraction was to them?
Philip again: “The market has changed a lot. You’ll
fi nd that there are a lot of lifestyle shops and smart gift shops out there who are selling high-end furniture, lamps and décor in general who also want to sell quality pictures. “With the galleries they either sell originals only, these tend to be the more old fashioned galleries, then you’ve got what I call the gallery/framer and most of those survive on being framers and if they sell a picture it’s considered a bonus, others experience a 50/50 split. It all depends on the space they have and how art focussed they are.
“Running a workshop and framing business and running a gallery space and selling limited edition prints and originals are two very different things and the two surprisingly don’t necessarily meet. “Getting back to the galleries, if you sell to a gallery and they don’t buy from you again you haven’t really made any money. Business is all about them reordering on a regular basis. Our artists across our portfolio do sell but they all sell at different paces and different prices. Some artists sell four to one, but both us, and the artists are making similar money because of the differing price points. So many galleries get focussed on the quantity they sell, not the value of what they sell. For instance Kate Wyatt specialises in British Wildlife and over the last two years we’ve sold getting on for 8,000 of her limited edition prints. They sell at trade from £20 up to £65 and they come mounted. Whereas Tabitha Salmon’s limited editions sell at £345. A gallery owner may say I’ve only sold one Tabitha Salmon against six Kate Wyatt, however if you add up the money involved, it probably amounts to the same. It’s important for a gallery to have the mix.”
Perhaps now would be as good a time as any to talk about the printing side and bringing Anthony Dobson into the conversation. He said that it took two years for Philip to talk him into giving up what he did and moving forward to what they do now. Anthony advised further: “Philip was my best customer so we had good history and very early on we established that we are very different people and that works exceptionally well. We have very defi ned rolls and discuss everything albeit from differing viewpoints, but we do actually meet in the middle and
Durwin & Daryl by Kate Wyatt
99% of the time we agree whole heartedly and with the other 1% Philip does what he wants! [Laughter ensues all round]. “I don’t put forward the purchase of any equipment unless I think it worthwhile and it will be of value. When we invest in equipment we’re buying top end so it has a longer useful life and we’ll get the maximum out of it. It’s not just about buying the kit it’s about how you use it and buying a printer as a 60” piece of kit doesn’t make you a good printer. We spend time to develop our processes and techniques to get the best out of that equipment. Effectively we run a workfl ow that has been designed for purpose, that being printing our own published images and printing for other artists. There is a lot of software involvement.” Anthony continued: “We make all our own profi les to ensure we get better colour matching and that’s all done in-house right from the scanner to the printed output.”
Collier & Dobson has a ‘Cruse’ scanner, which scans 1.5 x 2.5 metre originals in one hit. It can generate up to 1,000 mega-bites, which by any standard are huge fi les. The company has fi ve printers in the print room, which resembles ‘NASA Mission Control’; they have machines to cut paper as well as laminating equipment and a framing workshop. As far as the printing is concerned they print on only the highest quality papers and canvases. Everything is cut on electronic mountcutters and they do all their own mounting and framing and have four people in pack and despatch at all times. In addition, I must say that every department is very tidy which is no mean feat when considering we’re talking overall of 11,500 square feet of workspace.
Philip again: “People come to us for the quality of the service and the reliability. We’re not the cheapest printer in the country, neither are we the most expensive but we’re certainly the best and I’m happy for anyone to try and prove otherwise!” He continued: “We’ve just completed a job for Deloitte. They recently held their world partners meeting and we printed and stretched 300 canvases,
Café Society St Germain by Jon Barker 17
Waiting II by Mark Pearson
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