This is an extended version of a post I made at cosplay.com.
The purpose of this post is to highlight some of the things that people forget when they are buying or selling costumes. Most of these ideas can be derived from common sense or with some careful thought about the situation. None of these ideas should be surprising. The only thing that is surprising to me is that people seem to forget that making costumes for others is a business transaction and needs to be conducted like one.
The ideas listed below are guidelines. You may feel free to ignore them or add more ideas for your own case.
Are you a costume buyer or a costume seller?[1] Shop around. Check out the quality and prices of different costume makers. Don't ask the costume maker to do comparison shopping for you. They aren't supposed to do that. In addition, you should check the costumer maker's reputation by asking the costume maker for references or for pictures of their work. Be wary of websites where anybody can leave feedback on a costume maker, because there is no way for you to verify if that person is being truthful or not. If a costume maker gives you references, be wary if the contact information is suspicious. For example, an unscrupulous costume maker may give you fake references all from the same email domain. When you email these references, these references are really the costume maker. Ask the costume maker about any pictures of their work. If you think that the costume maker cannot explain their work well or suspect the costume is not made by the costume maker, don't enter into a transaction.
[2] Read every part of the costume maker's website. Look for FAQs. Any question you might have may have been answered already in the FAQ.
[3] Once you decide on a costume maker, ask the costume maker if he or she can make your costume or prop in question. Give them lots of reference images. Costume makers are not psychic. If you cannot find any reference images, try harder.
In my personal experience, I've bought official artbooks, sent them to the costume maker, and instructed him or her to look at pages X and Y. Yes, that means you may have to go buy something to provide reference material. Consider it as part of the cost of the costume. If you absolutely can't find more reference images yourself, find out if the costume maker will charge you if they do the research.
Some vendors that sell artbooks that are often in stock:
A site that has an enormous amount of official images and fanart of RPGs:
[4] The costume maker is your partner on this project. If you have certain ideas you want the costume maker to consider, tell the costume maker as soon as possible, preferably before the costume is constructed. This includes choices of materials or design ideas. The more information you give the costume maker, the better. If you let the costume maker decide for you, you may not get what you want.
[5] If you have a deadline to meet, make that clear to the costume maker. The costume maker should tell you if that deadline is achievable, provided measurements are received and payment schedules are met.
[6] Agree to a payment schedule. Most costume makers ask for enough money to cover materials. The costume maker will not usually start your costume without covering the cost of materials.
[7] Get everything in writing. This becomes your contract. This cannot be stressed enough.
The contract will often cover the following, though you may think of others:
Both parties sign the contract and each has a copy of it.
If the costume maker doesn't hold up his or her end, you have the contract to prove that (in court if needbe). Likewise, the costume maker will hold you liable for things you didn't fulfill. The document is to keep both sides accountable, rather than having the whole situation degenerate into "he said/she said" arguments.
[7] Document every communication and correspondence. If there is an argument, you have evidence of it. Keep every email or letter. Log phone calls and write down what was discussed. If there is an argument, you will have evidence to defend your side.
[8] The costume maker is human. They will try to achieve accuracy to your reference materials, but 100% accuracy may be totally unattainable. Unless the costume looks blatantly different from the reference images, the costume is the costume maker's best effort.
Remember that costume making is a subjective process and no two costumes made will be alike.
[9] If you end up not using a costume maker, you can write to that person stating why you don't want to business with them, but don't scold them like a little child or give reasons with no backing. "Your prices are too high" is a shallow argument, and nobody will take you serious for it. "My friend can make it for $20" is also a bad reason, because your friend is doing a favor for you. If your friend had to pay for housing, food, etc., it is unlikely your friend will charge you $20. Explain why you feel the prices are too high, but keep in mind these costume makers may have bills to pay or live in expensive areas. Keep your email civilized.
After you write your email, go shopping elsewhere. Don't come back to that looking for a fight. If the costume maker you complained about replies to you and isn't shouting you down, you can continue to keep a civilized conversation. The moment either side starts using lots of exclamation points, lots of capital letters, or any type of "yelling," the conversation is dead. Move on.
[10] Ask the costume maker for tracking on the shipment of your costume. Tracking does not cost too much, and you want this to ensure the shipment of the costume. You do not want to get into an argument about whether the costume maker shipped the item or not.
[1] Keep conversations civilized, even if you need to cut the client off short. The customer is likely very emotionally driven about this process, so try to keep the situation calm. Try your best not to get angry at them, even if they get angry at you. If the conversation gets into a shouting match, just kindly end the conversation, because at this point, neither side is going to budge. The conversation is dead.
[2] You must spell out your policies to the client. If you have a website, point potential clients to that, especially your FAQ page. Make sure your FAQ is prominent on your website (i.e. make it accessible from the home page; don't bury it somewhere). If you don't have a website, make sure you have a FAQ list preprared to email or mail to the client.
Some people, however, will not read anything on your site. It is up to you if you want to deal with them, but if they didn't bother to read anything on your site (even if they said they did, but you know the answer is there), they are probably troublesome clients that will waste more time and money than you have budgeted.
You should describe every policy. This includes, among other things you might think about:
Lastly, if you want to get the word out about your services, make sure you are able to offer pictures of your work to the client, either by setting up a website or sending some watermarked pictures. In addition, you should ask any client that you have successfully done business with if you can use him or her as a reference.
[3] You should ask the potential client for reference images. It is at your discretion if you will charge them to do the research for them, but you must disclose that in your policies.
[4] The client is your partner on this project. Although the client will generally defer to your sewing expertise, there may be some aspects of the costume that you want client feeback. In addition, the client has no idea what they want other than "I want what's in these reference images." Therefore, it might help to get feedback from the client on certain things, such as choices of materials or design ideas. Draw some sketches to demonstrate to the client. Send some fabric swatches to the client, so they can pick and choose the fabrics.
The more information you give the client, the better. In addition, it makes the client think you care about the project enough to put enough attention in it.
If you don't solicit some client feedback, you may find your version of the costume isn't what the client wanted, and then you get into heated arguments in the end. Sometimes, the client may even refuse to pay you. It is better to make sure both of you are on the same page.
Therefore, ask for anything you will need from the client. Assume nothing. Sometimes, if you think a costume design is going to have some trouble, talk it over with the client.
For example, in my own case, the costume maker chose velcro for a fastener for my costume. I hate velcro, but I didn't state this. I'm to blame, but if the costume maker brought that to my attention, I would probably have said "use secret buttons" instead.
[5] You should also ask the potential client if they have any preferences. This goes back to #4 above. Listen to their ideas. If the idea doesn't make any sense, offer a counter example. If the client still insists, warn him or her that the outfit may differ because of his or her idea, but you'll go ahead with it. Document this, so you can refer to this later in case there is an argument.
[6] Review the deadline the potential client gives you. If you cannot meet it, kindly decline. Don't try to cram projects. Leave space between projects for delays or other surprises. Yes, unexpected things can happen!
[7] Get everything in writing. This becomes your contract. This cannot be stressed enough. The contract will often cover the following, though you may think of others:
Both parties sign the contract and each has a copy of it. If you don't hold up your end, the client has a signed contract to prove that (in court if needbe). Likewise, you will hold the client liable for things he or she didn't fulfill. The document is to keep both sides accountable, rather than having the whole situation degenerate into "he said/she said" arguments.
[8] Document every communication and correspondence. If there is an argument, you have evidence of it. Keep every email or letter. Log phone calls and write down what was discussed. If there is an argument, you will have evidence to defend your side.
[9] You may end up with a client who will not be satisified your work. As long as you put your 100% effort, there is nothing more to be done. Under no circumstances should you accept refunds. The client may have worn it for one event and is trying to get his or her money back. Or they just want to rip you off entirely. If you really want to issue a refund, have the client return the costume to you first. Inspect it to see if you can resell it, and then issue the refund. It is common business practice not to refund shipping costs.
[10] Once the costume is shipped and in the client's hands, it is their choice to do whatever they want with it. They can use it for something you didn't think about (i.e. using them for a rag, sleeping in them like pajamas, etc.). You don't have much say what they can do and can't do with the costume, since you were already paid for your labor and cost of materials.
Now, you can state that the client shouldn't compete in the costume, but if he/she tries to compete with it, he or she is doing something considered unehtical by the cosplay community. The best you can do is to try to contact the judges to notify them of the transgression and get them disqualified (you have the contract and photos of your work, right?). Other than that, let the client do whatever they want with the costume. If you didn't sell the patterns, you still have them to make more costumes if needbe.
[11] When pricing, price appropriately. Account for all materials, trips to the fabric store, electricity usage (obviously, you don't charge the whole month's electricity bill, but you should charge something), etc. Most importantly, charge for labor. The Federal minimum wage, as of this writing, is $5.15 per hour. States may have minimum wages that exceed that. If the price you charged for labor divided by the number of hours you worked ends up being less than the minimum wage, you're ripping yourself off. This applies whether you charge hourly or fixed fee for the whole project.
Keep a log of the hours spent on working on a costume. Make notes. You should have the log if you charge by the hour, so you can show the client where your hours went. If you have to make the costume in the future, you will hopefully get more proficient at it. Then, you'll spend fewer hours on a it, because your notes and experience told you what to look out for.
[12] When you charge for shipping of the costume or prop, offer tracking. That way, both you and the client know where the shipment is, and it eliminates the possibility of you being accused of not shipping the item. Tracking is not too expensive, so you can pass the cost to the customer without much resistance.
Insurance is kind of a wild card. Because the costume you make does not exist in the market, it is hard to put a price on it. The shipper is going to make it extremely hard for you to make a claim if the costume gets damaged during shipment. You can try saving receipts from your materials but that won't include your labor.