I’d say there’s a fundamental flaw in suggesting numbers like 300 suppliers paying a £10 membership fee. As Simon notes, this does not touch the sides financially, but it may well hamstring a benevolent dictator who might feel answerable to 300 people. CiB may effectively be subsidising these supporters by providing lower-than-market-rate rent and positioning and this will generate a communal conflict of interests. In my experience Birmingham Artists found it incredibly difficult to make important strategic decisions for this reason.

I think you can make a good case for CiB Shop being worthy of subsidisation, via free rent, or other means, but I’d echo Mr Stuka’s plea for a business plan. For instance: standard retail markup in galleries is, I believe, 50% and not the 25% CiB Shop charged. So if CiB shop had raised prices by 25% and retained that it might have turned over £60K, not £45K in three months, which would provide an additional £5K of operating income per month. Would this start to make things look a little more viable?

I know profit is a dirty word for some artists (until they start making a little), but profit doesn’t necessarily go straight into individual’s pockets. It’s the life-blood that allows you to invest and create space to operate. It’s also a reasonable motivating factor for a benevolent dictator. Not the only one. But it helps.

BTW: 100 well-wishers paying £1,000 for a 0.5% share and an annual private view invite sounds a little more like it.

300 suppliers paying a £10 membership fee totalling £3,000 clearly wouldn’t pay any rent – but £3,000 does buy a lot of flyers to market to the offline target buyers.