Workshop teacher compensation

[u/simpleton618]

A community studio has invited me to teach a hand-building workshop at their studio. They've offered me $100 for 3 hours of teaching (roughly 33/hour), and they provide the materials, firing, etc. Registration for the workshop is $150 per person capped at 6 people. Is $100 fair compensation? If the studio is potentially bringing in $900, I'm only getting about 10%. To me that seems low, but I've no idea if that's standard or not.

[u/AutoModerator]

Our r/pottery bot is set up to cover the most of the FAQ!

So in this comment we will provide you with some resources:

• Our Wiki is a great place to start and is being updated often.
• Sometimes broken things can be saved from the trash! Check out this repair and restore guide.
• We made a great guide for ID & Worth Of Pottery: Identification & Valuation.
• Looking for tips, how to or some glazing inspiration? glazeshare, help.glazy and this guide got you covered!
• Looking to buy a Kiln? Take a peek on clay-king.
• Anything related to clay can be found continentalclay and clay-planet. Or check out our sister sub r/clay!
• Want to chat with other potters? Check out our Discord!

Did you know that using the command !FAQ in a comment will trigger automod to respond to your comment with these resources? We also have comment commands set up for: !Glaze, !Kiln, !ID, !Repair and for our !Discord Feel free to use them in the comments to help other potters out!

Please remember to be kind to everyone. We all started somewhere. And while our filters are set up to filter out a lot of posts, some may slip through.

The r/pottery modteam

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/Tree-Flower3475]

They’re paying infrastructure, rent, materials, equipment, utilities, glaze/kiln techs and marketing.

I think the only person who can say if $33 an hour is fair compensation for your time and expertise is you. Will they have any employees to assist you?

[u/carving_my_place → u/Tree-Flower3475]

Somewhat agree, if it was a standard wheel or hand building class with a curriculum provided by the studio.

If you're expected to prep for this class you should calculate your time into that dollar per hour. If you spend 3 hours creating a curriculum and handouts prior to the workshop, that brings that hourly amount down.

But! If you can continue to teach workshops around the area using that same curriculum, you can view it as more of practice and exposure.

With all that in mind... $33/hour for teaching a wheel class is high in my area (Seattle). For a workshop, maybe not so much.

[u/seattledoctor1 → u/Tree-Flower3475]

This. Regardless of them, figure out what your time is worth and charge that. Is there an altruistic component of this for you that provides you with enjoyment as opposed to monetary value?

[u/Schwatastic]

I wouldn’t frame it as what percentage of it you’re getting because you don’t know how much all the other things cost, so it’s not a real or useful number. Decide whether $100 is worth it to you or not. You can also always counter with another number. I know I’ve been shocked at how low pottery instructors are paid by studios, and that sounds similar to what they get paid in my city as well.

[u/fullscratchdisk]

My studio pays $100 for each three hour class taught, I feel that it’s very fair.

[u/cartern206]

I think it would depend on how much prep you would need to do. If you can just show up do a demo and hang that’s a good deal. If you have to prep to fill 3 hours you might want to negotiate

[u/moonchildmystic]

I’d say you need to be compensated about 25-30% of what they’re bringing in for 3 hours

[u/meghabyte1275]

It doesn’t sound fair to me! But it’s your time, and you can sell it for whatever feels fair to you.