Most business plans are built on a certain under serviced or completely unserviced demand consumers might have. There are, of course, those who target the broad markets, but I feel in 2018 such an approach is quite futile as there is no universal service or product, that could cater to everybody.

But recycled bamboo toothbrushes and novelty coffee cups aside, where do we artists fit in to the supply and demand equation? We provide a service (commercial work and commissions for example) and we produce products, that aren’t that far away from the common idea of a commodity item (putting aside the multimillion sales at Sotheby’s) — even Marx himself constructed his theory of the commodity by examining artistic objects.

But do any of us do market research? Or do we approach the open markets in the same (or at least similar ways) that marketers of other products do? Some of us. But many, I feel, do not do their due diligence, as we may approach the markets (or galleries) with a certain idea, a certain concept that they do (like impressionist painters or people who do only abstract painting) but don’t take the time to research our consumers preferences or expectations. And while this does bring up the question of creative integrity, my question is, hw do all of you tackle this issue? And if, are you successful in applying standard marketing to the artistic field, or does the specific status that art has make such endeavours even possible?