^ this is the right answer, I assume paintings turned from a hobby to a business at some point. It may have been fine to tell your friends that you could or could not deliver because they have an established relationship with you, but you can’t put that ambiguity on your paying customers.

If they are going to be offended for having to pay a discounted rate for cookies that you can’t give them for free due to fees and resources than that’s their problem.

You tell them how much to pay, how they react is up to them. One thing I have just began learning is I can’t control peoples emotions even if I want them to be ok with something and in my mind I believe there is good reason; the simple fact is not everyone thinks alike. So do what you can but after that it’s their fault if they make a big deal over some cookies.

I feel like some kind of paid vacation would be nice, I don’t know maybe like a nice trip to hawaii with flight and boarding covered or something like that?

A lot of problems with gift giving at older ages is people have money, so if they really wanted something they would just buy it. Other than that you could give them something commemorative like a plaque or something, but that wouldn’t quite hit the monetary threshold that is also a pretty important aspect when celebrating a milestone.

A trip or something similar is a nice way to show someone you value you them monetarily and also their commitment to your company by saying ‘hey I see all the hard work you put in, why don’t you take a few extra days off this year’.

I’m going to try to say this in the kindest way possible. But your plan is possibly the least thought through plan i’ve read today. This is coming from someone who likes to trade sports cards, literal pieces of shiny cardboard.

Of all the odd money making schemes I come across on reddit each day, I think this takes the trophy.

Buying wholesale swords, and going to pawn shops to try to convince them they are getting a deal by hoping the find the price of a certain sword listed on 1-2 specific websites for the already niche group of people that would buy swords.

And on top of that, thinking that you wouldn’t saturate the market in literally 1 go (if you could somehow trick them into buying the first round anyway). You can’t seriously believe people would be buying up those swords from the pawn shops after you sell it so that you can go and sell more to said pawn shops right…?

I am curious, Since much of her content revolves around movie edits, and you are selling HP merch, is it possible that if you become too big, that HP could come after you to cease and desist for copyright infringement.

Maybe that is your whole question of how to pivot off of that in order to monetize, sorry if it was I just wasnt clear if you were looking for how to continue doing the same, or if the whole goal is to leverage what you have built and go in another direction to monetize.