Note: Last week, I shared a simple, one‑time way to support my work if it’s been helpful to you. As promised, this is my final mention of the Friends of Barney (FOB) offer.
“In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.”
— Phil Collins
As publisher of Art Marketing News, my role is simple: to help make sense of what’s really happening in the art market — and what it means to you.
That means staying alert to information grounded in reality, not opinion or hype.
Without question, one of the most consistent and valuable sources of that kind of insight is my good friend Jason Horejs.
Jason has successfully operated Xanadu Gallery for decades — no small accomplishment in one of the most competitive retail art markets in the country.
Practical advice for pricing your art. No pitch. Just the good stuff.
Each year, Jason publishes a candid breakdown of his gallery’s performance. These reports offer one of the clearest, most data-driven views we have into the workings of a real gallery — not theory, not hype.
What makes them especially valuable is Jason’s approach. He studies his own results carefully, learns from them, and then shares what he’s learned openly. That habit — learning deeply and teaching freely — is a big reason his gallery and related Art Business Academy continue to endure.
Jason recently published his 2025 Review on RedDotBlog. I found it full of practical insights and promised last week to share what stood out—and why it matters as you plan for 2026.
First: 2025 was genuinely hard.
Sales were down about 13% year over year. That wasn’t a feeling — the numbers confirmed it. Many artists experienced the same drag, even if they couldn’t quite put it into words.
But here’s what mattered more.
Volatility was the real story.
Jason reported nearly three times as many days when sales didn’t cover operating costs as in the prior year — long, quiet stretches followed by sudden bursts of activity.
If your income felt unpredictable last year, it wasn’t a personal failure.
It was the environment.
Which leads to the report’s most important insight.
Online sales quietly became essential.
In 2025, online sales grew from roughly 10% of total revenue to 37%.
That’s not because people stopped valuing galleries.
It’s because collectors became more comfortable buying serious work without standing in front of it when trust, presentation, and communication were in place.
This reinforces something I’ve been saying for years:
Your online presence is no longer promotional support.
It’s a core sales channel.
Another point worth sitting with:
Lower-priced work drove a significant share of revenue.
Pieces under $250 accounted for more than a third of all sales. Even more telling, over 20% of the gallery’s top collectors — those who spent $5,000 or more — began with a purchase of $500 or less.
Relationships with collectors grow much like any meaningful connection. They start small, built on trust and genuine interest, and deepen naturally over time — without pressure.
Lower-priced sales aren’t insignificant. They’re often foundational.
To tie these insights together, consider the foundation that supports them all:
Repeat buyers accounted for roughly 72% of total revenue.
That’s the engine many artists underestimate.
Not followers.
Not likes.
Not traffic spikes.
Relationships — because no one, not even established galleries, has the time or resources to find a brand-new buyer for every single artwork that comes up for sale.
So, what should you carry forward into 2026?
• Expect volatility — and accept it as part of the process
• Build a financial and emotional buffer into your plans
• Treat online communication as a sales environment, not an afterthought
• Offer accessible entry points without devaluing your work
• Focus on serving the people who already said yes
Jason closed his article by saying he plans to double down on what’s working rather than wait for conditions to improve.
That feels like sound advice — for galleries and artists alike.
If you want to read the full breakdown, here it is:
2025 in Review: Volatility, the Rise of Online Sales, and the Reality of Hard Work
(Highly recommended.)
As always, my aim isn’t to tell you what to do — it’s to help you see the landscape more clearly, so you can choose wisely.
Your friend,
Barney
P.S. Thank you to everyone who reached out or supported my work last week, or anytime, in any way. Having you as a friend means more than I can say. See you next week.