Why Are Ketubahs Usually So Expensive? (And How Can You Have Such Great Prices?)

When talking with couples we work with, and other couples we know, one question we commonly get is, “Why are Ketubahs so expensive? We know yours are very well-priced and cheaper than almost all others, and far-and-away the cheapest given their quality — but I would have still expected ketubahs to be a fraction of the cost that they are! Why aren’t they this cheap? You’re just printing something out, right?”

Boy oh boy, do we have a lot to say on this subject! So lets go:

1.) We agree with that comment! In fact, one of the reasons we began This Is Not a Ketubah is because, we realized that too many other people overcharge for their Ketubot. Our vision is to ensure that everyone has a truly awesome Ketubah, regardless of their budget.

2.) We create our ketubot using the most high-quality materials — our canvases are magnificent! Printing on A4 printer paper is cheap, but printing museum-quality Ketubot can get very expensive! It is museum quality, after all!

But there is a lot more going on here than just the printing cost! Lets see…

3.) To our surprise, what takes the most time is… personalizing the Ketubah. Coordinating the exact information you want, in Hebrew, can be a big and time-consuming pain in the (I don’t want to write the word in this family-friendly G-rated post). Everyone has a different convention — should we write the year like this, or like that? Who would have known that a lot of people really prefer the Hebrew year written out, rather than as a number? We didn’t!

4.) Among the most time-consuming parts of the process is, getting your Rabbi’s, Cantor’s, or Officiant’s approval. This is essential to us — he (or she) is the one making your wedding happen so he needs to love the text! And just getting ahold of a rabbi takes a lot of time and back-and-forth. We were shocked to discover how busy all rabbis are — but it makes sense, if I were a rabbi, I’d be spending all my time with my congregants and studying the Torah and a million administrative duties!

5.) Truly awesome customer service is… well… time-consuming for us. We answer our phone — so you can call us any time. We chat with you online. We respond to every single email within a day. We hold your hand and guide you through the process. We’ll tell you things you might otherwise forget (Don’t forget about getting a pen for the ketubah! Oh, here are our recommendations!). We pride ourselves on our fun, good-energy, non-stop fun customer service to the point where we just hate the phrase “customer service.” And this takes a lot of time.

The more time-consuming something is, the more expensive it will be — since we need to buy lots and lots of coffee for our studio, to give us energy!

6.) We offer an awesome refund policy, no questions asked. Therefore, we need to keep some money in order to save for the occasional person who asks for one so we can afford it! In other words, in order to offer a great refund policy, we need to make sure we have enough money to afford the refunds! (Note: this hasn’t happened yet! Yay!!! Knock on wood!!!)

7.) We are truly dedicated to ensuring that all of our artists receive a living wage. Our artists are all Argentine Jews, many of whom have few opportunities. We pay all of our artists handsomely because, after all, we were founded as a collective of Argentine-Jewish artists. We believe artists deserve to be paid fairly for their work, at least enough for them to live off of.

8.) We also use 10% of all of our income to support Ieladeinu, Argentina’s Jewish orphanage.

We are truly committed to our vision of ensuring that everyone gets an awesome Ketubah at a price they can afford, and we will stop at nothing to make sure everyone gets the best price! That said, we still wish we could reduce our prices even more — and we’re working on it!!!! Stay tuned for some upcoming exciting announcements, making our prices even better!

Taking all of the following into account, the obvious follow-up question is, “Guys, you are offering so much and doing so much — how can you afford to have such a lower price on the market?”. To which, my response would be:

A.) Awww thanks for the kind words! We strive to have the best price and I’m happy you think so (Yes, I’m talking to you, hypothetical blog reader who happens to read this!).

B.) We are in Argentina, where the costs are lower than in the USA. A livable wage in Argentina is substantially lower than a livable wage in the USA, for example.

C.) We’re not a for-profit that’s trying to make every penny we can; we’re just a team of artists trying to make sure that you get the best ketubah at the best price! So we’re not trying to find a way to extract a penny from you here are there.

We’re dedicated our vision of, the perfect modern ketubah for every single couple, no matter what their budget is.

Any questions?

Morgan
Team Ketubah

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