FAQ:

Q: What is Support Local Art all about?

A: The goal of Support Local Art is to raise awareness of local artists and to allow direct contact with them. We don't believe in putting walls between people (walls should be for your art!).

Sales are handled directly between the buyer and artist, without ANY costly commission being paid to Support Local Art. Our zero-commission policy allows buyers to get some great deals and artists to receive fair compensation for their originality, talent, and time.

All of the artwork shown on Support Local Art is being displayed by the original artist, and all artwork for sale is has it's PRICE DISPLAYED. (One of our pet-peeves is 'please contact for price'... you won't find any that here!).

 

Q: Is ALL of the artwork for sale?

A: It is up to the artist what artwork they display. In most cases the artwork is for sale, and the purchase price will be listed (artwork can also be search for by price). Besides artwork for sale, artists may also choose to display artwork from their personal collection, artwork that has already sold, and also artwork as a sample of custom artwork that they have created for people.

Q: How is Support Local Art different than other online art websites?

A: In our experience most 'art websites' are designed and aimed at artists. Support Local Art is an online gallery that promotes artists and artwork but is aimed at the art interested and art purchasing public. We feel the goal of an online art website should be to help artists to display and sell their work, with a focus on generating the most diverse range of traffic possible.

You will not find banner ads, pop-ups, or pages of artist links on Support Local Art. What you will find is a quality selection of artists and artwork consistantly displayed with a powerful search engine to help people find the artwork that most interests them.

Q: I'm a buyer and I've just found a piece of art on Support Local Art that I would love to own. What do I do now?

A: Contact information is listed online for each artist. To avoid having to charge commission (or any type sneaky 'service' or 'administration fee'), all sales are done directly between the buyer and the artist.

To purchase artwork, simply e-mail or phone the artist. Support Local Art's artists are always happy to answer any questions you may have. Depending on the artist, payment options will vary from cash, cheques, Paypal, and/or credit cards (Visa and Mastercard typically).

Often, artists in the same city or region will be happy to meet with you to show the work before your purchase is made.

Q: I am limited to browsing and buying 'locally'?

A: No. We have found that most people like to start their art search close to home, but we encourage you to see what all of Support Local Art's artists have to offer. Purchasing locally does offer some potential benefits of being able to meet the artist and view the artwork before making your final decision. It can also save on shipping & handling charges, but it is entirely up to you.

Limiting your seach to artists around your city, town, or province can also be a great way to locate local artists to hire for custom projects, gifts, or corporate needs.

Q: Is Support Local Art non-profit? (or not-for-profit?)

A: Support Local Art is a privately owned for-profit company. We believe this approach is will allow us to have more freedom, and to do more to promote and help artists sell their artwork. Non-profit organizations can often be hindered by red-tape. Beuracracy and red-tape is exactly what Support Local Art is trying to cut through. 'Keep It Simple' is what we try to do.

Q: If you don't charge commission when artwork sells, artists can display their artwork for free, how do you stay in business?

Support Local Art was starting in 2003 by Calgary artist Christopher Bailey. Realizing the promotional limitations of having a personal art website, and wanting to be a part of a true WIN-WIN (for buyers & artists) commission free online gallery... when he couldn't find one, so he built one.

On the website itself, Christopher's artwork enjoys the same status as other pieces by other artists. Christopher's art sales & contact through the website are what we base Support Local Art progress and success - if people are finding & buying Christopher's work, then people are also checking out other artist's also. This is how WE KNOW the SLA system works. In the end it does comes down to an individual artist's online presence, detail provided, promotional efforts, and, of course, their artwork. Many art websites base their 'success' on simply the number of hits they receive. These numbers are designed to fool artists into thinking their artwork is receiving all kinds of attention from the art buying public... when really it's mostly just other artists 'kicking tires' (not that they're anything wrong with that in general, but it's typcially not what leads to art sales).

To help gain attention for themselves, and the entire Support Local Art gallery, artists can purchase custom printed business cards (featuring their artwork) and other promotional materials. This is another Support Local Art WIN-WIN, artists get what they need to promote themselves to success and the gallery earns a little from the transaction.

Currently we are also looking at items such as custom decks of art cards (featuring local artist's works). Items such as these will not only be sold online by Support Local Art, but will available a wholesale pricing for artists to sell privately offline for both promotion and profit. As more artists come online, the more win-win opportunities present themselvse.

"Everything is a win-win, if it's done properly". That's what Support Local Art is about, and that's how we stay in business.

Q: Couldn't an artist simply setup their own 'personal art gallery' on the internet?

A: Yes, they can, and many do. (see the above question also). The challenge that most artists quickly discover is that getting traffic to visit their small online gallery is very difficult. This difficulty is compounded when you try to general 'potential buyer' traffic and not just other artists 'kicking tires'. Unless a buyer happens to be searching for the specific artists's name, or already knows the website address, almost no quality traffic will visit the site. This is a shame because many of these artists do have really great and unique artwork on display.

Often these small "galleries" share links in an attempt to gain extra traffic. From a serious buyer's perspective, surfing from one small artist site to another, without any consistency between them can turn into an exercise in frustration. Often many of the links are no longer working, or lead to non-related websites.

These are exactly the challenges that Support Local Art is designed to help artists overcome.

We do think that personal gallery pages can be of benefit to artists to further explain their artwork, processes, and/or themselves. Linking a personal website from the artist bio page on Support Local Art brings the best of both worlds... potential buyers finding and using the power of the Support Local Art website to search for quality artwork from professional artists. Once they find a piece of artwork they are interested in, they will then find out more about the artist... including the link to the artist's personal website.

Q: Do you have a LINK PAGE that artists can add their websites links to?

A: No. 'Recipricol links' (exchanges between one artist website and another) are extremely popular in the online art world, so it may seem a little odd at first that you don't find a huge links page on Support Local Art. There are a few reasons for this.

1. Support Local Art provides consistancy and search features that allow people to find and view the artwork/artists that interest them. We believe this approach works much better than the inconsistant & often frusterating (dead links, pop-up ads, innappropriate websites, etc) that link pages lead to. As listed above, artists can have links to their own personal websites on their bio page.

2. The Support Local Art website and promotions are designed to attract 'new' people from outside the usual art circles. The hard work that SLA artists put into promoting not only themselves, but also Support Local Art, would be undermined by simply having people 'link away'. This would be great for the artists on the links page, but quite unfair to all of the artists on Support Local Art.

Q: 'Traditional' art galleries do a good job in acting as a type of quality control of artwork and artists. How does Support Local Art handle this issue?

A: Quality of artwork and professionalism of artists is certainly a concern. Many online art web sites, and of course home-built galleries, don't worry about quality control and will allow anybody to display literally anything as art.

To ensure consistent high quality, Support Local Art is a peer-juried website. This means that any potential new artist is juried by the existing online artists. Artists who have already 'made the cut', are not interested in having others who cannot conduct themselves in a professional manner (either in their artwork, presentation, communication, or business practices) being promoted along side them. This voting system also eliminates individual artist's 'personal style preferences', and also the politics which can often rear it's ugly head in the traditional gallery circles.

Q: Most websites (art and otherwise) RELY on getting hits from search engine sites such as Goggle. Are you setup for this?

A: Yes. With the variety of artists currently online, Support Local Art receives many hits from search engines. The better search engines also take note of the last time that the website was updated. We strive to update Support Local Art at least once per day to ensure that artists are receiving the largest opportunity of being "hit".

Relying on search engine hits may work great for most businesses and services, but when it comes to artwork, it more often leads to 'artists browsing other artists works'. It seems that artists themselves are the people most likely to type 'watercolour wildlife canadian artist' into a search engine. This is why we use the search engines as a 'bonus' methed of getting website traffic.

Besides relying on search engine hits (and therefore the limited numbers of people who are already searching for art online), Support Local Art also uses many offline grass-roots type promotional materials to attract the buyers who have never even thought of searching for art online. Promotional materials include custom printed business cards, bumper stickers, large windshield stickers, and bulletin board posters. Buying direct from artists has great local appeal, and this one of the reasons why Support Local Art is setup the way it is.

Q: What happens if I had an artist mail me a piece of artwork, and I'm not satisfied?

A: We have yet to have a purchaser not be satisfied with the artwork they have received. As a rule, the actual artwork will look far superior the low resolution image displayed online.

If such an event does occur, "return policy" is up to the individual artist. Most professional artists would rather return a client's money and receive the artwork back, than have an unsatisfied buyer with their art.

In the very unlikely event that a Support Local Art artist does not handle themselves in an appropriate and professional manner, their online status may be removed.

Q: I'm an artist in an area not yet covered by Support Local Art. Do I need to wait until I see my province or city listed?

A: You do not need to wait. We are currently expanding across Canada. If you are in a 'new' area, please contact us for details about getting started today!

Q: Only in Canada, eh? Pitty.

A: While the Support Local Art website can be viewed worldwide (obviously), and artwork has been sold and shipped international, our current focus is to help Canadian artists promote and sell their artwork commission free. We believe Canadians have the correct attitude and positive outlook to understand and help Support Local Art take off before we expand across the globe. Support Local Art.com's headquarters are located in Calgary, Alberta.

Q: Wow, Support Local Art sounds great. I'm an artist and I'm interested in displaying and selling my art. How do I get started?

A: To ensure quality, Support Local Art is "peer juried". You will need to e-mail images of 4 original pieces or your artwork. Full details regarding getting started with Support Local Art can be found here

If you have any comments or questions about Support Local Art.com, please contact us using the link below. We look forward to hearing from you.