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Art Licensing: The Real Money In Cartooning 
By: Rick London
There was a time when a cartoonist had to be newspaper syndicated to "be somebody" (with apologies to Steve Martin in "The Jerk"). But even then, as now, the real money was not in newspapers. Besides, the chances of becoming a part of a major newspaper syndication are close to a million to one. One should just buy lottery tickets.
So how does the cartoonist make his or her money? The most lucrative part of cartooning is a little-known but huge business called "image licensing". Image licensing has been around a long time. It is known to be about an 80 billion dollar a year business, yet so few people know about it. That could be because, though the end user is the general retail buying public, this demographic of our population rarely sees or cares to see what goes on behind the scenes.
Licensing works like any other business. It is basically a trade for money. The artist approaches a manufacturer with a piece of art that he or she thinks would help enhance a product and the manufacturer and firm makes a decision. If it is positive, a licensing deal is made. Businesses also license to each other. Like a beer company logo to Nascar (or vice versa).
LIMA is the industry association. One does not have to be a member to be in the art licensing game but it doesn't hurt. Such associations are a great way to make contacts.
But what if the artist is not traditional. Maybe he/she is a cartoonist. Sometimes deals are done the opposite way in this situation. A manufacturer of, say collectible clocks or lunch boxes will approach Disney and ask for the exclusive licensing deal on that product for a certain image or series of images.
I started out a very unknown. Even in my own region so trying t conquer the world was out of the question. I decided to contact some regional periodicals that were in dire need of quality comics with their articles and sold them for what I could. I slowly built a portfolio and finally was able to take it to a manufacturer/drop-shipper who was willing to take a chance and make the products with a royalty split. I did not have a licensing agent so my attorney handled the contract for me. It is always a good idea, if your strength is in art and not numbers to have a professional in another area (like an attorney or agent) do that part of the job.
In time I discovered more manufacturers who made different products than my first ones and was able to make deals with them, using the same contract.
My work has appeared frequently in publications worldwide, I am yet to be syndicated, yet the traditional old way (before the Internet) was to become syndicated first, then manufactured for licensing. Syndication companies are even utilizing the Internet to lure good cartoonists and publish them often in online newspapers. The days of hard copy print may be a thing of the past.
If you are new to cartooning, or even a veteran looking for new outlets, the Internet offers many. It does not happen overnight. It took me a decade. But it will happen if one is persistent.
A decade ago, I launched my business in a broken down tinl warehouse and had less than a hundred cartoons up on a free domain (I couldn't afford a www domain). Now I have 8 websites, 7 e-stores with close to 80,000 products in about 100 different categories, from tshirts to clocks to aprons, and the most visited offbeat cartoon site on the Internet, Londons Times Cartoons with over 8500 original images and almost 9 million visitors. That's not so bad for ten year's work, at least not for me.
One might say I paid a heavy price to get this off the ground. But there are a million stories like mine out there. Mine is but just one. Anything worth having takes hard work. Just enjoy the ride and you'll see that the benefits are worth more than the pain.
Article Source: http://www.uberarticles.com/articles
Art Director Rick London and his artists has created over 8000 original offbeat cartoon, Londons Times Cartoons Cartooning: Where Is The Money?
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