7 Taxidermy Pricing Mistakes That Are Hurting Your Shop

By MountChief Editorial Team|Updated Mar 2026

80% of taxidermy shops undercharge for tannery and storage overhead costs. If you haven't done a line-by-line cost analysis of your most common mount types in the last two years, there's a reasonable chance you're in that 80%.

Pricing mistakes in taxidermy don't feel catastrophic in the moment. They feel like being busy but somehow not making as much money as you should. They feel like a profitable season that somehow doesn't leave much in the bank. These are the signs of systematic underpricing, and they don't fix themselves.

Here are the seven mistakes most commonly hurting taxidermy shops, and what to do about each one.

TL;DR

skilled professional taxidermist's time is worth $35-$50/hour at minimum.
If a deer shoulder mount takes you 5 hours of production time and you're valuing your time at $15, you've priced in $75 for your labor.
At a realistic $40/hour, that same job deserves $200 in labor cost.
A deer shoulder mount sitting on your shelf for 8 months after completion isn't just a nuisance.
Shops that add a storage fee for mounts held over 90 days recover $2,000-$4,000 annually in previously uncaptured revenue.
fix: Pull your last 12 months of tannery invoices.

Mistake 1: Not Calculating Your Actual Tannery Cost Per Mount

This is the biggest single pricing error in the industry. Most shops know what they charge at the counter. Far fewer know exactly what the tannery bill adds up to per cape, per species, per season.

Your tannery bill is a direct cost that must be reflected in your pricing. A deer cape at $85 tanning cost, $15 in shipping, and a $100 form means you've spent $200 before you've even touched a form to the cape. If your deer shoulder mount price is $450, you're working with $250 to cover your labor, eyes, glues, overhead, and profit.

The fix: Pull your last 12 months of tannery invoices. Calculate your average tannery cost per species. Plug those numbers into your pricing model. If your current prices don't cover those costs with meaningful margin left over, prices need to go up.

Mistake 2: Ignoring Overhead

Overhead is every cost your business incurs that isn't directly tied to a specific job. Electricity. Insurance. Software subscriptions. Tools that wear out. Your truck if it's used for business pickups. The monthly cost of your beetling setup.

When taxidermists set prices, most think: form + tannery + labor = price. Overhead doesn't appear anywhere in that equation. Then they wonder why the business feels tight even when they're busy.

The fix: Add up your monthly overhead costs. Divide that number by your average monthly job count. The result is your overhead contribution per job. Add it to every job's price. For most shops, overhead adds $40-$80 per mount.

Mistake 3: Undervaluing Your Own Labor

The most common version of this mistake: taxidermists value their own time at $15-$20/hour when calculating prices because that's what minimum wage looks like, or because they feel guilty charging more, or because they've just never thought explicitly about their own labor rate.

A skilled professional taxidermist's time is worth $35-$50/hour at minimum. If a deer shoulder mount takes you 5 hours of production time and you're valuing your time at $15, you've priced in $75 for your labor. At a realistic $40/hour, that same job deserves $200 in labor cost. The difference is $125. Across 150 deer per season, that's $18,750 in labor value you're not capturing.

The fix: Set an explicit hourly rate for your own labor based on what skilled professionals in comparable trades earn in your market. Track your actual time per mount type to know what you're working with.

Mistake 4: Not Charging for Storage

A deer shoulder mount sitting on your shelf for 8 months after completion isn't just a nuisance. It's a real cost. You're paying to store it, insure it, and work around it. The bailee's insurance covering it costs money. The space it occupies has value.

Shops that add a storage fee for mounts held over 90 days recover $2,000-$4,000 annually in previously uncaptured revenue. More importantly, storage fees create customer urgency to pick up. Fewer mounts sitting on shelves means more working space and lower bailee's liability.

The fix: Implement a storage policy. After 90 days of availability for pickup, charge $10-$20 per month until pickup. State this policy clearly at intake, on your receipts, and on your price list. Most customers will pick up promptly when there's a financial reason to do so.

Mistake 5: Flat-Rate Pricing Regardless of Animal Size

A standard whitetail shoulder mount is not the same job as a whitetail with a 24-inch neck circumference. A small black bear is not the same cost to mount as a 400-pound boar. If your pricing doesn't account for size variation within species, you're giving discounts to the most expensive jobs.

The fix: Build size-based pricing tiers into your mount types. For deer, consider neck circumference or antler score as a size proxy. For fish, per-inch pricing already handles this. For bear, quote by body weight or overall size range. For elk, consider whether the animal falls into a standard or oversized category requiring a custom form.

Mistake 6: Not Adjusting for Material Cost Increases

Material costs across the taxidermy supply chain have increased 25% since 2020. If you've maintained the same prices since before 2020 or haven't reviewed them since, you've effectively given every customer a 25% discount since then.

Raising prices feels uncomfortable. But raising prices to reflect actual input costs is not optional if you want to run a sustainable business. Your customers can absorb modest annual price increases much more easily than they can absorb finding out their taxidermist went out of business because prices weren't sustainable.

The fix: Do an annual cost review every February. Compare your current pricing to your actual material and tannery costs. If costs have gone up, prices go up. Communicate any significant price changes to customers before the season opens, not during intake.

Mistake 7: No Differentiation in Rush Pricing

Rush taxidermy, whether a customer needs a competition mount finished by a specific show deadline or a gift-giving deadline, represents genuine additional value. You're prioritizing their job over others. You may be paying tannery rush fees. You're reorganizing your production schedule.

And yet most shops charge the same price for rush work as for standard timelines.

The fix: Define what "rush" means in your shop (typically a timeline shorter than your standard turnaround by 50% or more). Set a rush premium of 20-35% on top of standard pricing. Communicate this as a service, not a penalty. Customers who need rush service almost always understand and accept the premium because the alternative is not getting the mount in time.

How to Fix Multiple Pricing Problems at Once

If you recognize several of these mistakes in your own pricing, don't try to fix them all simultaneously by raising prices dramatically overnight. A sudden 30% price increase will generate immediate customer friction.

Instead, start with the next season:

Calculate your true cost of production for your two most common mount types
Set a price floor based on costs plus a healthy margin
Implement storage fees immediately (this one has no downside)
Add overhead and labor cost to your pricing model going forward
Build size tiers into your deer pricing for next season
Set a rush policy and rate before turkey season

Use the taxidermy pricing calculator to run these calculations without doing them by hand each time. Having a model you can adjust as costs change is more useful than a fixed price list that goes stale.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the most common taxidermy pricing mistakes?

The most common are: failing to calculate actual tannery costs per mount and building them into prices, ignoring overhead costs that add $40-$80 per job, undervaluing labor time at unrealistic hourly rates, not charging for storage on mounts held past pickup windows, using flat pricing regardless of animal size, not adjusting for material cost increases since 2020, and charging the same price for rush work as standard timelines. Most shops are making at least three of these seven mistakes simultaneously.

How do I calculate the true cost of producing a shoulder mount?

Add up four components: (1) direct materials, including the form, eyes, ear liners, and finishing supplies, (2) tannery cost including shipping to and from the tannery, (3) your labor hours multiplied by a realistic hourly rate for skilled work in your market, and (4) an overhead contribution, which is your total monthly overhead divided by average monthly job count. The sum of these four items is your cost of production. Your price should be this number plus your target margin, typically 25-40%.

Should taxidermists charge for long-term mount storage?

Yes, and the implementation is straightforward. Define a pickup window in your intake agreement (typically 30-60 days from completion notification). After that window closes, charge a monthly storage fee of $10-$25. State the policy clearly at intake, on receipts, and on your price list. Storage fees recover real costs, create customer urgency to pick up finished mounts, and reduce your bailee's liability exposure. Shops that implement storage fees typically recover $2,000-$4,000 annually in previously uncaptured revenue and see faster pickup rates across the board.

How does this apply to solo taxidermy shops?

The principles in this guide apply to solo shops just as they do to larger operations, though the scale differs. A single-person shop may have lower absolute volume but faces the same documentation, compliance, and customer communication requirements. The practical advice here scales down to any shop size.

What is the most common mistake taxidermists make with taxidermy shop pricing mistakes?

The most common mistake is treating taxidermy shop pricing mistakes as an afterthought rather than building it into the standard workflow from the start. Shops that encounter problems in this area typically did not establish clear processes before season, which means every situation becomes a one-off decision rather than a standard response.

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Sources

National Taxidermists Association (NTA)
US Fish & Wildlife Service
Small Business Administration (SBA)

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