Do You Allow Deadlines?

[Renee Brown]

I have a marketing campaign coming up in 2002. Starting in January, I have booked fourteen to twenty of my portraits in monthly shows in my area. The paintings will be removed on the last day of the month and placed into the next location on the same day, where they will be exhibited for the following month. I live in an area where portrait commissions are plentiful.

I will be getting new commissions this way. My question is, in the past I have always allowed clients to back me into a deadline. This puts pressure on me and I feel does not allow me the freedom to complete the job in a relaxed way and in my own timeline. Now, I feel I want to set the rules and change them to my advantage. I am a relatively quick painter so one would receive their painting in a reasonable amount of time (say two months, sometimes less), but I am specifically talking about when one has perhaps four portraits going at once. The idea that a portrait must be done by someone's birthday is a real problem.

How do the pros on this forum handle this? Is this something to include in my contract and how would I word that? Thanks for the advice.

Renee Brown