GOODBYE Kitty! Popular designs OFF the menu?

lumierre white makes hello kitty look nice. sometimes I use my lumierre's to "spice" up different designs. i also add a jewel to the center of hello kitty's bow. the girls love it. my puppy dog is painted all in lumierres and starblends. i paint each spot a different bright color. the outline is still in wolf black though. the design i quickly removed from my board was the black mickey mouse ears with the bow --- wayyyyy too much black on little kids in my opinion, and i also removed any and all monster high designs i had. those are my cringe designs.

Luvs to paint wrote:lumierre white makes hello kitty look nice.  sometimes I use my lumierre's to "spice" up different designs.   i also add a jewel to the center of hello kitty's bow.  the girls love it.   my puppy dog is painted all in lumierres and starblends.  i paint each spot a different bright color.  the outline is still in wolf black though.     the design i quickly removed from my board was the black mickey mouse ears with the bow --- wayyyyy too much black on little kids in my opinion, and i also removed any and all monster high designs i had.  those are my cringe designs.

Thanks for the tip! I had been using metallic white and it goes so quickly I have to keep reordering. I like to spice up the salutation cat with glitter all the way. Which Lumiere White do you use? What is the format of the makeup?

lol, VictoriaS., i purposely chose my least picked colors to paint on the menu board faces hoping they would get picked more often.... they DO! i also don't add extra details on my menu designs... i only show the bare-bones design so when it's busy, i can stick to that design and no one complains "it's not like the picture." if it's not busy and i have more time, i can beef it up and tell the child they were so good that i painted my super-special-deluxe-good-kid-award design... that makes the parents think they got extra without paying extra...

ben nye lumierre's are powders similar to starblends, you don't wet them. they have a metallic appearance. i LOVE my lumierre's. as far as I know, there is only one lumierre white, it may be called ice. the pink (azalea) is WONDERFUL. i bought the pallet and added extras with magnets... instead of it holding 12, it now holds 21, lol.

Luvs to paint wrote:ben nye lumierre's are powders similar to starblends, you don't wet them.  they have a metallic appearance.  i LOVE my lumierre's.   as far as I know, there is only one lumierre white, it may be called ice.   the pink (azalea) is WONDERFUL.   i bought the pallet and added extras with magnets... instead of it holding 12, it now holds 21, lol.  

Thanks... there is the creme Lumiere, a pressed powder one, and a loose powder one. I've used the pressed powder and the loose one.

Panda Bears...I refuse to do pandas...I just think they are plain old white face with black eyes..hehehe...I will remove HK every once in while when I am tired of painting 45 little girls exactly the same...I wish I could get rid of SPIDEY Guy!! Well atleast for the 1st time 3 year old...

VictoriaS wrote:

nikkili26 wrote:I don't use menus.

I paint by request.

I've tried to do this so I don't always have to update my menu, but none of the kids have any clue what to get painted as. Often I get requests for characters I've never seen, I have to look them up on my phone which takes more time.

I find a menu saves time or at least gives suggestions. I also like to suggest designs but only if there is time. How do you save time without a menu?

i save time by suggesting my fastest designs as soon as they get in the chair.
i will use a word list for outdoor events.
if it was ppf, i'd use a menu and limit it to quickie favorites that you all loath painting

maybe because I'm still new, but i just looooove all the stuff you all mentioned not liking!lol....

Coral, I feel your pain[t]. I have a design that I call my peacock mask. It's very popular but I hate painting it, I hate the way it turns out. However, I have gotten more emails thanking me for the design on their daughter from that mask than any other. I cringe every time someone asks for it!

I do not like the Minnie ears and bow either still looking for a better option... If I get to many I just start making the bow huge and the ears peek out from behind... Still not happy with it.

omg, I love that one!those kids just look sooooooooooooooo stinking cute, I can barely stand it!

Jobena1 wrote:Panda Bears...I refuse to do pandas...I just think they are plain old white face with black eyes..hehehe...I will remove HK every once in while when I am tired of painting 45 little girls exactly the same...I wish I could get rid of SPIDEY Guy!!  Well atleast for the 1st time 3 year old...

I hate pandas, too. White with black eyes. Blah.

Once we get tired of doing a particular face, we will increase the price on it. That way even if you have to do it, you remember that you are making more from it.

Am I the only one who doesn't get tired of doing butterflies? And Spider-Man?? I guess I paint all the ones on my board so much that's it's all the same to me. I do remove unpopular designs, I have a dragonfly face that I thought was really cute, but it rarely gets picked so I am gonna take it off. I still love to paint them all. I have used word boards for large events and I love the ability to play, but I love the look of a nice picture display board.

me too eva!and i will never ever get tired of the tiger or unicorn!

TheGildedCat wrote:Coral, I feel your pain[t]. I have a design that I call my peacock mask. It's very popular but I hate painting it, I hate the way it turns out. However, I have gotten more emails thanking me for the design on their daughter from that mask than any other. I cringe every time someone asks for it!

I feel your pain with HK and I too am sick of her. I was going to take her off my board but thought no, I will just raise the price. It still got picked over and over so I raised the price again. It still gets picked but I am OK with it as long as they want to pay the price for boring me to death. I cannot find anyway to spice that plain HK up. I always use Metallic White unless they request another color. I also wonder why they will not pick a beautiful butterfly instead or anything else? Then I look at it this way, my price is more to paint her and I can paint her really fast and get it out of the way (I have had too much practice on this one). Then my line helper says "another HK is waiting". I just want to scream... My tiger (pink & blue M. Reid) is $15.00 and many mothers do not want to pay that price but they will pay 10 dollars for a HK. I found a fabulous half-face tiger and I tweaked it for girls. I started with a baby blue than painted one in purple & gold (our state universality colors) and the young girls to teens love it. Now I am getting a lot more half-face tigers instead of HK. I do love my tigers in any color. I also put my 1/2 face tigers up in all their beautiful colors so this attracts the girls. I never work from a word board these people do not like to read. I can't even use a price key because they won't read the simple instructions and they repeatedly ask what is the price. I digress, MY point is find something that is so cool and unusual for a girl but at the same time it's beautiful. I do a spider girl and can spice that up. But don't take HK off your board just raise the price... There is nothing beautiful about HK not in my eyes...

I agree with the price change. I did a little menu tweaking before fall festival season began. I raised the prices on a few that I really don't like doing, and now I don't mind them so much. I figure that if they're willing to pay the price, I'm willing to paint it.

So far I've been sticking with a flat price per face, so if you want something super small/quick you're still paying for a standard face paint. It's just simpler/easier for me, and less complicated for customers. Plus then there's less room for arguments about pricing. No requests for "Can you just do a little (whatever) for $X?"

But yeah, I can see there's a definite advantage to having two price points in steering people toward some designs & away from others without taking them off menu altogether. Hmmm...might have to re-think my pricing.

I'm hearing you gypsy! I can paint beautiful cats and tigers, but when all they pick is HK they don't get to see how awesome the other designs are. I wonder if having a picture board, as much as I am reluctant for various reasons, would encourage more variety?

rthling wrote:I agree with the price change. I did a little menu tweaking before fall festival season began. I raised the prices on a few that I really don't like doing, and now I don't mind them so much. I figure that if they're willing to pay the price, I'm willing to paint it.

You should re-think your pricing. These girls are going to ask for that HK either way so get paid well for painting it. It will still takes the same time to paint that it did before the price was raised. Like rthling said, if they are willing to pay the price she is willing to paint it. I had 3 prices, $5, $7 & only the $15 M. Reid tigers, one for the boys and one for the girls. Now I have a $10.00 and HK is it for now.
About the menu board, I see that not having one is a disadvantage. Maybe it is just my state but these people do not read anything and will come up with strange request and colors. So I stick with my board. I have a special board just for my cats. Then people see all my beautiful cats on one board. I don't like dragging these boards around and I am always looking for a better way to display them but I like working from the board. I also love showing those cats and since I did make them to stand out above anything else they are getting picked a lot. They are in different colors and are 8 x 10's all on a black background. As I said before these special cats or 1/2 face and it's an easy $7. I could paint cats all day and sometimes I trick them out even more when time permits. Of course I get permission from the parent to make sure I can take the picture of her beautiful child wearing my cat. I don't know why a customer would argue with an artist over pricing, either they want it at my price or not. No arguments. I just don't find it hard to stick to my board or my price. What are you charging for HK? I would hate to do her for $5.00 that would make it even worst. I do wish you the best of luck and I hope you try a cat board at least. What can it hurt? Except to drag one more thing with you but I live.

MeeMee said everything I was going to say lol!

to: A New Face
I don't like the black Minnie ears. either. Try this:


The little girls love it.

I personally don't agree with charging more for a design you are "sick of painting" - it doesn't seem fair to the client but that's just me. I would sooner refuse to do it than charge more for that reason.

maybe because i'm new, but I just don't understand that logic, veelux.
this is a basic case of supply and demand.

the same customer thinks nothing of paying $22 for a plate of alfredo pasta-something that can be made at home for less than $3 and feed a whole family plus leftovers.

poor people tend to dodge the expensive events-I know this because i'm poor.
if I don't have money to spend, I look for freebies.

if I HAVE money to spend, I will treat my babies to whatever they choose to do-even if it is a $20 simple hello kitty.


this isn't about how good the painting is-it is about making my kid happy.
if the seller says $20, I always have the option to walk away with my crying kid....or pay up and leave with my smiling kid.

you are either a hello kitty fan, or you aren't.


I've paid $30 EXTRA for a blanket just because it had beloved dora the explorer on it.
this is what parents do.

if we have the money, we spend it on our kids.even if we know it is way over priced.and if it is way out of our budget-we put it off until we can afford it.....sadly, we sometimes can never afford it (Disney world).

nikkili26 wrote:this is a basic case of supply and demand

Absolutely, and good examples to support this.
Wonder why your salad is $10 is a restaurant? They're obnoxious to make/keep ingredients on hand.

veelux wrote:I personally don't agree with charging more for a design you are "sick of painting" - it doesn't seem fair to the client but that's just me.  I would sooner refuse to do it than charge more for that reason.

Supply and demand aside, I get a little bit of joy out of knowing I'm getting paid twice what I used to charge for the exact same design. And that tiny spark of joy overrides my annoyance for having to do a design I'm not fond of.
"Why, yes, I CAN paint you as Captain America!"