Is selling on MyFonts a good idea?
I am finishing up a font, and I have no experience in selling fonts. MyFonts seems to be the obvious choice; however, many on TypeDrawers seem wary of MyFonts. Should I use MyFonts to sell my fonts, or should I use some other platform. Also, if I were to sell on MyFonts, could I put my fonts on Adobe Fonts or another reseller platform?
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I think Monotype is now requiring people to sign an NDA before they see the contract so you probably won’t get many good replies. You need to read that contract carefully yourself and consider the potential consequences.Monotype isn’t a friendly small company partnering with you. It’s a private equity firm that sees your business relationship as a product they can sell down the road. Never forget that.Don’t assume that you’re going to suddenly make thousands or even hundreds of dollars a month selling fonts on MyFonts. Almost all of the typefaces on MyFonts have disappeared amidst the tens of thousands of other typefaces. No matter how good your work it probably won’t be the next Brandon Grotesque or Recoleta. That’s not a judgement against MyFonts or you, it’s just how the marketplace works because there are so many products in it.14
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You can’t just “put your fonts” on Adobe or many other distributors.
I would advise you to sell licences from your own foundry’s ecommerce website, and market through social media such as Tik-Tok and Instagram, generating sales material with AI.
After all, distributors are not going to market your fonts beyond an initial introduction, if that, and if you are going to do most of the work in producing sales material, why not reap the benefits directly?8 -
I can't tell you how happy I am that I went it alone 20+ years ago. It was expensive at the beginning, but all these years later I am independent of all of these resellers and all the others.
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As a new foundry you have at least two alternatives with higher standards and better ethics than MyFonts:Once you build more of a reputation you could apply to these retailers which have a more selective catalog:
- Fontstand (my top recommendation)
- Type Network
- Adobe
I used to highly recommend Fontspring, but now that they sold to Creative Market the standard for inclusion and royalty rate have taken a nosedive.Yes, if you sell on MyFonts you can also sell elsewhere, but other retailers may offer you a special deal if you are exclusive with them. Also, if you sign with MyFonts you must offer all your fonts there.12 -
I've been doing some research on the latest (freshest) platforms for selling fonts, and I've discovered that there are many more options available than what's commonly discussed. Each platform offers unique advantages and caters to different audiences. In light of this, I highly recommend considering a variety of platforms, especially since MyFonts has become quite saturated and their terms appear to be shifting towards more conservative policies.
Here are some notable platforms to explore:
It's 2023, and the notion that MyFonts is the only viable option for font distribution is definitely outdated. Today, you also have the flexibility to distribute your fonts independently using platforms like Gumroad for the download delivery.
It's much easier now than it was a decade ago to get your fonts into the market, and there's no need to be locked down by some of the new restrictive terms coming out.
I hope this information helps you in exploring new avenues for your font distribution.
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FontSpring, CreativeMarket, Dribbble ... one company.
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FontInsider said:
Here are some notable platforms to explore:
It looks like you haven't done much research... Since there are questions about some of the platforms you mentioned. In particular, about the abundance of leaked materials from there. Compared to them, Myfonts is a super-secure resource.A separate story is about sales of stolen fonts... Or resale of fonts, which is prohibited by the original license... Which indicates an irresponsible approach to the processing of posted material.
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At the end of the day, no reseller is going to care about your fonts as much as you. Sure, you can take the gamble and hope that you get featured, which may or may not result in an increase in sales for a month, or you can spend some time and put together a strategy to tell people why you’re so excited about this thing you made and get them excited about it too.5
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MyFonts Top 25 Bestsellers
- Neue Helvetica® by Linotype
- Gotham® by Hoefler & Co.
- Helvetica® Now by Monotype
- Avenir® by Linotype
- Univers® by Linotype
- Gilroy™ by Radomir Tinkov
- Akzidenz-Grotesk® by Berthold
- Frutiger® by Linotype
- Helvetica® by Linotype
- Neue Haas Unica™ by Linotype
- FF DIN® by FontFont
- Maison Neue® by Milieu Grotesque
- Avenir® Next by Linotype
- Neue Haas Grotesk™ Display by Linotype
- TT Norms® Pro by TypeType
- Futura® Now by Monotype
- DIN® Next by Monotype
- Knockout® by Hoefler & Co.
- Franklin Gothic™ by ITC
- Brandon Grotesque by HVD Fonts
- Neue Frutiger® by Linotype
- Campton by René Bieder
- ITC Avant Garde Gothic® by ITC
- Recoleta by Latinotype
- Trade Gothic® by Linotype
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I wonder what this list – including items not marked in bold – says about designers and hence design these days.
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Compared to them, Myfonts is a super-secure resource.0
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FontInsider said:Compared to them, Myfonts is a super-secure resource.There is such a thing as piracy. Practice shows that the maximum that can be stolen from Myfonts is a web font (and even then not always). Other resources have certain holes through which a new product (in the original) very quickly appears on pirated sites. So has it become clearer?Now I’m thinking about which platform to go on my “independent sailing”. But I don’t consider some of your resources, also for this reason.
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I know, just being my usual off-topic self.0
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Reflecting on the MyFonts top 25 bestselling fonts, it strikes me that their popularity might not necessarily be a direct reflection of current customer tastes. These rankings could be more indicative of the ongoing need to update licenses for fonts used in older documents and style guides, particularly those created in the 2000s.Several factors could contribute to this phenomenon. New employees joining projects require access to these fonts, leading to additional license purchases. The expansion of language coverage in documents necessitates extended language licenses. The development of apps and new websites drives the need for pricier app licenses and web fonts, respectively. Furthermore, changes in software bundling can influence sales. For instance, my Marion typeface was included with iOS until 2019. Its sales were negligible before its iOS inclusion and remained modest during that period. However, sales picked up notably after its removal from iOS, likely due to the number of documents created that required it. Since every one of the typefaces on that top 25 list are solid, there's probably little need to every update those documents or style guides.What I'm getting at is: I think the demand for these fonts is heavily influenced by the need to maintain consistency and compliance in pre-existing corporate materials, rather than emerging design preferences or trends. To draw a parallel with fashion, which I know can be a contentious analogy, it's akin to a prestigious magazine like Vogue highlighting the top 25 best-selling clothes on their main page, only to feature mundane items like socks and underwear.16
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Olexa Volochay said:FontInsider said:Compared to them, Myfonts is a super-secure resource.There is such a thing as piracy. Practice shows that the maximum that can be stolen from Myfonts is a web font (and even then not always). Other resources have certain holes through which a new product (in the original) very quickly appears on pirated sites. So has it become clearer?Now I’m thinking about which platform to go on my “independent sailing”. But I don’t consider some of your resources, also for this reason.
Rip the webfont, convert it back to desktop, and post the pirated font takes less effort than using stolen information to purchase a font. So you might want to rethink your made up piracy theory, because MyFonts looks the least secure because of this. Saying the maximum that can be stole from them is you just making up random ideas.The other platforms mentioned all have user authentication to some degree, I even recall YouWorkForThem having customers wait on their first download till their team reviewed the signup data to reduce piracy. Envato used to call customers as well to validate credit card charges, also to reduce piracy. I have never heard of MyFonts doing any of those steps.1 -
FontInsider said:Envato used to call customers as well to validate credit card charges, also to reduce piracy. I have never heard of MyFonts doing any of those steps.You defend these sites so zealously that one gets the feeling that you have some kind of personal interest in this:-)You are considering only one option for piracy - «buy and share» ((it doesn’t matter whether it’s an honest purchase or a stolen card). And this is not at all true.And finally, use the search, there have been quite a few threads on some of these resources, including the most offensive thing for any designer - having their work appropriated by other “authors”.
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Funny, I was going to say the same about you and MyFonts
I have no interest in those platforms, I simply provided alternatives to MF/Monotype, since that's where the thread was going. But you took my input and twisted it into something else about piracy and how great MF was, which you are still making abstract assumptions about. But hey, we can keep going in circles...
I would still suggest those platforms (and a few others) for new foundries to explore, as they have large audiences with value to a foundry trying to make a living.
Your last statement, could also be said for a search on MyFonts...
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I recommend that new designers avoid Creative Market and Fontspring. Their contract allows them to set any price for your fonts, so they can sell your fonts at steep discounts to draw attention to their web sites while you get fucked.5
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@James Puckett I'm sorry you feel that way.
Our contract allows us to adjust pricing to "maximize your overall performance", to "help secure additional revenue on your behalf", and to "maximize sales or revenue on your behalf."
I believe the only time we've adjusted pricing in this way was to enforce minimum pricing thresholds, moving pricing up instead of down.
When Fontspring sought to increase our web font and application license pricing tiers in February of this year, we did so by notifying foundries in advance, made it optional, and made it very easy to switch back to original pricing if you didn't opt out.
To my knowledge we have never offered a "steep discount" against a foundry's wishes, but if you have a specific example of CM or Fontspring doing that, I'd like to know. That's not the way we run our businesses.2 -
Hopefully the scenario @James Puckett is referring to is only hypothetical. I've had a Creative Market shop for a couple years, and have not seen any examples of this. Whenever there's a sale, I have to opt in, choose what products to offer, and choose the discount level myself. The contract does say that CM can make price changes, but they have to be for the benefit of the shop owner in most cases.1
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@JoeManbeck I appreciate you coming here and joining the conversation. Now that Fontspring is no longer independent, I think many of us fear that what Fontspring has done in the past may not reflect what it will do in the future. In that respect, having a contract that allows a steep price cut without the type designers agreement is... less than ideal.
I am afraid, and I think I'm not alone, that Fontspring was great until it wasn't anymore.2 -
JoeManbeck said:
Our contract allows us to adjust pricing to "maximize your overall performance", to "help secure additional revenue on your behalf", and to "maximize sales or revenue on your behalf."
Is my understanding correct?
If so, I am still totally willing to believe that current management wouldn’t do that. But if the contracts allow it, and it might be in the interest of the platform to have some loss-leader deep discounts, it is entirely reasonable to worry about the longer term.0 -
Aren't there legal hitches to the idea of a manufacturer dictating the price of a distributor? Isn't that why there's the S in MSRP?
What price controls can be put into a foundry-distributor contract that can be reassuring to the foundry but will not be liable to a legal charge of price fixing?1 -
@Craig Eliason Price fixing would be if foundries were in collusion to set prices.
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Yes, my terminology is wrong. Maybe "resale price maintenance" would better name the legal hazard we're talking about. Or maybe even "vertical price fixing" specifically?0
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They are called “resale price maintenance agreements” (RPM), and although no longer inherently automatically illegal (“per se violations”) at the federal level in the USA (since 1997 for maximum prices, 2007 for minimum), they are still per se violations in at least some individual states, including California.
I would not be shocked if the kind of contractual guarantee that some folks on the foundry side would like, is in fact an RPM and in violation of state laws in some states. Probably in some other countries too.
Not that I am a lawyer. This might be a good time to consult one, if one was considering such terms.2 -
Craig Eliason said:What price controls can be put into a foundry-distributor contract that can be reassuring to the foundry but will not be liable to a legal charge of price fixing?
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