Scantlings

Some of you know I've blabbed about starting my own business. I've had that bug for as long as I can remember. Technically had my first business when I was 13. Over the years I've tried all sorts of things from running a VW parts business to AutoLISP programming services. Over the past 7 years I've been obsessed with 3D printing. My basement 'lab' is overrun with 3D printing stuff. I do 3D print work for on the side for folks. 3D printing parts for people is not lucrative. At least not at a small scale. There are plenty of people doing it and it can be done online.

That said, my intuition is telling me that something's missing. There should be a lot more 3D printing activity than there is. I think marketing and education is what's missing. So the business I've been noodling on for years will be around that.

I found a small commercial space with extremely affordable rent that will allow me to scratch that itch and move all my stuff from my basement. At this point, it's probably safer to approach it as a hobby with the ability to break even. I have a lot of ideas and I feel having this 'incubator' will help me develop them. With the rent being so cheap, I am not stressed about making it work. I'm confident I can get this to pay for itself.

It may seem strange to be doing this now when so many shops are closing their doors. Probably one of the reasons my rent is so affordable. And at some point, this will be over, right? I have plenty of avenues for getting customers and my online presence will be key. Servicing the local market, I'll have the ability to provide pick up or delivery (one of the differentiators to online shopping).

Soñadora wrote:Some of you know I've blabbed about starting my own business. I've had that bug for as long as I can remember. Technically had my first business when I was 13. Over the years I've tried all sorts of things from running a VW parts business to AutoLISP programming services. Over the past 7 years I've been obsessed with 3D printing. My basement 'lab' is overrun with 3D printing stuff. I do 3D print work for on the side for folks. 3D printing parts for people is not lucrative. At least not at a small scale. There are plenty of people doing it and it can be done online.

That said, my intuition is telling me that something's missing. There should be a lot more 3D printing activity than there is. I think marketing and education is what's missing. So the business I've been noodling on for years will be around that.

I found a small commercial space with extremely affordable rent that will allow me to scratch that itch and move all my stuff from my basement. At this point, it's probably safer to approach it as a hobby with the ability to break even. I have a lot of ideas and I feel having this 'incubator' will help me develop them. With the rent being so cheap, I am not stressed about making it work. I'm confident I can get this to pay for itself.

It may seem strange to be doing this now when so many shops are closing their doors. Probably one of the reasons my rent is so affordable. And at some point, this will be over, right? I have plenty of avenues for getting customers and my online presence will be key. Servicing the local market, I'll have the ability to provide pick up or delivery (one of the differentiators to online shopping).

Great to hear. We'll be able to say "I knew Richard back when he was just Rick."

Phew, you've got balls to start a business now. Well, smart people will be able to leverage this crisis into an opportunity. Hopefully you're one of them.

I have been a small business person most of my life, you can’t go wrong using your own spare labor if you stay ahead of your cashflow.

Never let the financial and operational tasks leave your grasp, you should always be the CFO and COO.

If you have to use more people, try to engage them on contracts, not direct employment.

Stay away from cashburns and debt, and stay light on your feet. Your eventual business may look nothing like the one you imagined when you start out.

I actually think this is a good time to get into a business in the IT sector, it has been everyone’s saviour throughout this mess and people have come to realise its value.

Rick,

The ALL-TIME BEST time to start a new business is in the middle of a crash!! Rents are cheap, employee labor is low, etc.. etc... etc......

That said, the key question is always: "Does the customer know they have a problem??"

What I fear in the real demand for 3D printed stuff. I know it's really cool for we tech folks, but (pre-COVID-19) I don't bump into folks LOOKING for a source of 3D printed parts. I know I do NOT know your business idea, so I'm just making it up. But the #1 issue for a company is always customer demand. Please, make sure you have it.

This discussion reminds me of the bit in the Steve Jobs movie where Woz is emphatic that computers should have upgradeable memory and ways to hardware hack peripherals, and Jobs keeps telling him that people want something useful and as such is easy to use.

To me another example of seeing ourselves in others. Woz thought about hardware geeks like himself.

I had a business idea once, and a friend's dad said, in effect, "make sure you're providing something people will pay for." Obvious, but it made it clear to me my idea wouldn't be a good business. In my case I could do something better than anyone could, but the market for the product was tiny.

Another mistake I see is people growing by hiring more people, expanding their footprint, doing all the stuff associated with a business. A business should grow through growing sales. Period. When that happens do everything else.

kdh wrote:This discussion reminds me of the bit in the Steve Jobs movie where Woz is emphatic that computers should have upgradeable memory and ways to hardware hack peripherals, and Jobs keeps telling him that people want something useful and as such is easy to use.

To me another example of seeing ourselves in others. Woz thought about hardware geeks like himself.

I had a business idea once, and a friend's dad said, in effect, "make sure you're providing something people will pay for." Obvious, but it made it clear to me my idea wouldn't be a good business. In my case I could do something better than anyone could, but the market for the product was tiny.

Another mistake I see is people growing by hiring more people, expanding their footprint, doing all the stuff associated with a business. A business should grow through growing sales. Period. When that happens do everything else.

Cash is KING!

Rick,

Let us know when the doors are open and the website is up!

Joel

The discussion brought a couple things to mind. I'm not at all sure they point the in same direction, though.

The overall trends, probably since 1850, are toward standardization and cheapness. It's hard to buy much of anything in the US these days that doesn't conform to some standard or another. We could probably put together a rant about how the market power of Walmart and Home Depot and other big boxes are driving down the quality of goods in the market. The flip side is that specialty goods get more and more expensive, relatively speaking. In some sense, anything that is manufactured lot size = 1 is a luxury. I'm not sure what the lesson is here except maybe that you're making a luxury good, so get a luxury price.

Of course, even average people get some luxury goods. If you do some 3D printing in metal, maybe you could do custom signs for homes and mail boxes.

My other thought seemed somewhat encouraging. In the gun business, there are many small companies that found they could offer new products once they got a CNC machine. Not too hard to develop a new flash hider or compensator, or similar replacement part. Somewhere in among your first 100 orders will be an idea you expand on as a stock item.

kdh wrote:This discussion reminds me of the bit in the Steve Jobs movie where Woz is emphatic that computers should have upgradeable memory and ways to hardware hack peripherals, and Jobs keeps telling him that people want something useful and as such is easy to use.

To me another example of seeing ourselves in others. Woz thought about hardware geeks like himself.

I had a business idea once, and a friend's dad said, in effect, "make sure you're providing something people will pay for." Obvious, but it made it clear to me my idea wouldn't be a good business. In my case I could do something better than anyone could, but the market for the product was tiny.

Another mistake I see is people growing by hiring more people, expanding their footprint, doing all the stuff associated with a business. A business should grow through growing sales. Period. When that happens do everything else.

Keith,

This is terrific advice. I only wish the majority of companies I worked with followed these rules:
1) Only go after large markets
2) Never hire someone you can't afford to pay from profits unless you have an explicit and credible set of conditions and a time when the spending of equity dollars would end.

Beau

Get a monopoly if possible. Or find a dirt business that is necessary that no one else wants to do, I knew of an Ink Business that did very well, but it was sure dirty. (Obsolete now.)

kdh wrote:
Another mistake I see is people growing by hiring more people, expanding their footprint, doing all the stuff associated with a business. A business should grow through growing sales. Period. When that happens do everything else.

I think people like to empire build. You don't need that many people to run a medium sized business anymore. We had less than 300 people for a $200MM fulfillment business that grew 40-50% a year. And sure, that piece of whatever equipment is state-of-the-art and will reduce your COGS, but do we have the volume before we lay out the CAPEX?

in light of the chaos here in the Twin Cities, I'm shelving this idea.

Soñadora wrote:in light of the chaos here in the Twin Cities, I'm shelving this idea.

Excellent idea. I was worrying about you.