Reply To: islamic prayer times clock
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Max wheeler you made my day.
Pricing is a difficult subject for hand toolers and I’ve been asking myself this question for a very, very long time, just how much should I charge. I’ve read a book on this subject from popular woodworking and it didn’t help me at all. Their pricing structure is based upon unrealistic completion times and machinery involved in the making. They claim an average shop time is $35/hour, then overheads plus materials and after all of that 300% mark up. Wow 300%? But when I look at the prices of items in the shops that’s exactly what it is so you can imagine just how cheap the manufacturer gets his materials plus labour. They also claim if you were to sell to shops then expect to sell it at 50% less, if you were to sell it to a wholesaler then even less than that. So none of that theory can be applied to me, since none of my work so far could be completed in a any given single day. If I employed machinery plus a laser cutter and a CNC then the bulk of the work would be completed in less than a day but you then have finishing so I would need spray equipment a space suit to finish the finish in a day or two at the most.. Having all that equipment I would be able to on my own complete several clocks by the end of a single week. Now with this mass production type work I could charge what they recommend and be competitive.
If I were to go down that road I would be abandoning every principle I believe in and have fought so hard to promote. Let’s face it many people I speak to love to hear that everything is entirely hand made but no one would ever go down that road because it’s just financially not feasible, personally I believe people are lazy. I’ve given many examples just to get off the topic for a sec just how mass manufacturing can be applied in the hand tool world and the most obvious one is employ more people. But you can see it in their eyes where greed kicks in and the fear of sharing profits amongst your workers don’t sit too well with them. Wenzloff & Sons are popular and I can imagine how months or years their back log is, even though they use sophisticated machinery still many things are done by hand and just how many are in the shop building not many I suspect, however Lie Nielson is also all about quality and he too uses sophiscated machinery but is capable of mass manufacturing at a high quality rate to meet his demands by employing several people in his shop. So my point is you cannot work alone or in small numbers and expect to truly compete in a mass manufacturing arena. So you specialize and take your time in standing out from the rest which is not only time consuming but does realistically cost you a lot. Unless you have a great name and constant work orders flowing in and a large capital to cover your basic living needs plus to sustain your material costs your pretty much doomed from the get go but you persist and do a second job. Thommas Lie Nielson wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth but he is a business man, he started just like us with nothing. Worked till late at nights in his shed and persisted with it. He ran it as a business and succeeded.
So to get back to pricing, according to that book and I can’t remember the name of it I calculated the hours, plus materials plus 300% markup and one item came to $20,000. Which reminds me of a clock I saw in a gallery for $30,000 and according to him this is the new and improved version which says to me he is selling. I did it again on a business card holder and the price came to $300 but looking at it its not worth more than $50 and it’s time consuming to make. I personally don’t believe I can afford to charge those prices even though if I were to earn a sustainable healthy income from this that is what I should be charging but reality not negativism says I would be an idiot to sell at those ridiculously high prices. You would find one or two people who would pay those prices but the general market wouldn’t and those are your bread and butters the earlier are the cream of the crop. So you can see our predicament, just how do we charge for what we do. If we are overly expensive then no one will buy no matter how good it is, if we are cheap again no one will buy so what is a happy medium.
Considering I have wasted 17years in the belief that cheap was my only alternative and the 8 years prior to that was only hobby I am at loss in knowing what to charge. I know that cheap is not the answer because it didn’t work for the last 17 years but I now know that pricing to what it’s worth is the answer and does sell and that my friends is what I think the answer to your question is. For now atleast.
Before I begin a project that project is already finished, completed in my head. I visualized it and I know what it looks like, I know the materials needed that will suit it. I then predict just by it’s looks alone what it’s worth, I’ve always known it was worth more than what I was charging, anyway I look at the materials on hand that I will need to complete this and I know instantly whether or not this clock or furniture is viable or not. I do this just by its worth and cost of materials plus the time it takes to make alone. One example is a phong clock it’s a Chinese pattern design and I know that black American walnut would be a great choice with a brass clock insert, I also know that it’s worth or should I say that people would expect to pay no more than a $150 for it but when I was cheap all I could think of was a fire sale at $50. So I abandoned making it because the materials alone would cost me close to that. Now I’m thinking the price will be anywhere between $150-175 and that to me is worth me making as before being too cheap wasn’t.
I know it’s not the correct method of calculation but I don’t know of any other method I could employ without blowing the prices out of the water. Remember I work alone, I use hand tools, a lathe and a scroll saw when needed all of this is done by hand so it’s time consuming. I plane every timber from its rough sawn state and that’s time consuming sometimes an all day event. I have to rip up several boards, chop mortises and not poke them with a mortiser. All this takes time and I never rush any operation but I enjoy the process so back to pricing how in the world can I charge my time for choosing to work with hand tools as other methods such as machinery is made available to me. Time is money thats the old saying but I don’t care too much for either of them, I continue to work at my own pace, I continue to build quality over profits, I survive.
So after boring you all with my words in the end I’ve come up with no real solution. The question still remains. How much does one charge for their product. My current solution is this come on you did read a lot so I have to leave you with something. Here is a simple formulae I’ve come up with.
Looks + quality + materials = worth. Please don’t ask me about time it doesn’t fit into this equation not in the hand tool world.