Taxidermist tipping

The best "tip" you can give a taxidermist is to bring him more work - yours and fellow hunters to whom you recommend him.

Red Leg said:

The best "tip" you can give a taxidermist is to bring him more work - yours and fellow hunters to whom you recommend him.

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@Red Leg that's a very good way to put it and that's what I have done!

Red Leg said:

The best "tip" you can give a taxidermist is to bring him more work - yours and fellow hunters to whom you recommend him.

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Amen to that. Word of mouth and bring in new customers is the greatest gift you can give a taxidermist.

Never tipped before

No tip. Always pay when requested, and always pay in cash.

Never have even considered it. When I start receiving "tips" for bringing my business to a taxidermist I may reconsider...

Through out the years I've been tipped a few times but it is not the norm, much more often is someone trying to to beat you down on the price!!

Service rendered at set price, if the taxidermist feels that he is not charging enough, he should make that increase in his pricelist as does the rest of the business world. It is a respected profession, they are professionals at their trade, to tip them would be like tipping a welder every time he lays down a slick weld for me. Now, on the other hand if you feel that they have absolutely killed it for you, a bonus may be in order.

Never crossed my mind. Still hasn't.

Yep, get tips...My delivery guys most always do..or when I deliver...Get tips when I reconstruct an entire face a nyala and it costs the client the same as one in good condition. Takes me and my finisher additional 4-6 hours + into the mount PH's should tip taxidermists...they have NO idea what we FIX on clients mounts soley to make the world a better place...WHY would I want to tell a client that half is fur is gone on his hyena and then start a crap storm between a ph and client with all of it....Leopards come in with back leg ripped to shreds and in 12 pieces...I simply fix it spend extra hours making his memory incredible and not passing the buck to the PH. Guy blows a .375 thru the side of a duiker and I have to take another stock one at my cost and replace a patch the size of a orange on it...Just to make it life better and make him happy...I take pictures of the damage and show it AFTER it a gorgeous mount and they see what it took to make it right. Yep get tips, and THEY ARE appreciated more that you will ever know....it's a unbelivable experience to get them...It makes you FEEL incredible ! If you don't it's perfectly fine. I do my work because I'm driven to do it. It's not my JOB, Nope it's my life...Yep get tips then a client KNOWS that he blew stuff up . Or his bear came in green and half rotten with maggots crawling all over it or salted so bad anyone else could not have saved it or mounted it, we get it mounted. Yep gets tips when I get a brown bear with Half it's Fur GONE , bald like leather and every other taxidermist tells them it can't be a life-size mount but I make a great mount out of it repaired and all....IF you spent 1 day in my shop and saw the missing hooves, the skins with no lips, eye holes cut big as baseballs, HUGE exit holes, Noses cut off, skins looking like colanders with 100's of holes we repair. Legs cut off by skinners and we have to make an entire leg out of 2 part putty....to mount it....Skins that are cardboard and stiff and client get told they are not mountable or ruined and we FIX them and mount them...Yep we get tips....and when I do I am as HAPPY and GRATEFUL as can be .....and it doesn't matter if it's 10.00 or 100.00 or 1,000.00. When the tips stop then all prices go up..and start charging for major repairs...Guys that TIP keep the prices the same for all clients at this point. If It stops then damaged skins large bullet holes , Ph damage from bad skinners and salters in Africa that damage skins will cost those clients with bad skins that need repairs more..so don't think tipping is not a tool everyone benefits from...

Got it, no tips=increased prices for everyone...
I wonder if a guy brings in a bear skin that was handled and prepped perfectly then done up and the day of pick up the customer gets the wonderful news that since it was handled so well there will be a discount off the quoted price?

Red Leg said:

The best "tip" you can give a taxidermist is to bring him more work - yours and fellow hunters to whom you recommend him.

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Well said - and goes for ant business venture. Word of mouth, i.e. AH, is best tip you can give.

dt

Instead of raising prices for everyone, how about this idea?

Charge the guys who bring in damaged skins the reasonable cost of repairing them, without worrying about whether the PH's skinner is at fault or the client is at fault for blowing a bus-sized hole in a duiker. Fix the hole and charge him accordingly.

I blew a bus-sized hole in a duiker last year, and decided in the field I didn't want to pay the taxidermist to repair it. So I told the PH I wanted a skull mount, and that was that. If I'd wanted it mounted, I would have expected to pay for the repairs.

I'd just as soon not pay for someone else's damage. Strikes me as kind of socialistic.

Charging a guy for damage isn't going to lower my price list for my mounts for anyone else.
The repairs are done for FREE...the tips make up for my LOST hours on these mounts you aren't paying for them, the guys that tip are making it worthwild to HELP other hunters that get SCREWED with bad skins and damage and their are lots of them.
EVERYONE benefits from the way I do it.

When I shot my mountain goat, it fell a few hundred feet, and one horn was lost. The taxidermist charged me extra for making a replica horn. It never occurred to me to expect it for free, and it didn't occur to me to tip him either.

Are you saying you'd have made a replica horn for free?

I guess if he had done it for free, it might have occurred to me to tip him.

YEP I do those kinda things ALL THE TIME
Thats an easy one takes an hour to make a matching horn

I charge for excessive repairs and most people understand that if it take more time it costs more.

If a guy is spending 4k plus the base cost for a Mountain goat, I'm going to replace his missing horn for free for an hours work.

Nothing is free. Nothing. What is basically being said by Wildlife is that he makes enough money on his base price to allow him to pay for the repairs without an additional surcharge. Now it is very possible that wildlife's passion for taxidermy allows him to work for a very low wage. On the flip side maybe he makes so much money he doesn't feel he needs to make more. But to imply that he is doing it for free is simply not true. It's built into his business model.

When my daughter's deer horn was broken off, the Taxidermist repaired it and of course charged for it. I did not expect the repair for free. Bullet holes that another story, and I am sure their are some exceptions, like an exit hole the size of my fist.