They have been pretty popular, so I’ve decided to try to sell them – only $25. You can buy them at my shop on Etsy

Here are the final drafts awaiting her approval….

I have had a concept in mind for the cabinet, ever since I completed my curved panel clock, shown here:

I liked the look of the curved panel, so I wanted to incorporate it into the design of this TV cabinet, which is to be a stand, plus shelving underneath for the DVR, VCR, etc. Here’s what I came up with in SketchUp:

She liked it; truth be told, it’s one of my best designs. I like the curved panel sides, and what I did with the arching in the doors, as well as the blackwood inlay in the lower front. All cherry.

It’s about 4’ long, 22” high, and 1 1/2’ deep, a decent size, and will accommodate my gear nicely.

Side note: The rendering was done outside of SketchUp – you can see the name of the renderer. You can get a trial version for 30 days. This was about 20 hours of rendering; at it’s max, it will render a photo-realistic rendering!

NEXT UP: Making a detailed drawing.

I’ll explain. I’ve been working on the Limbert #240 table for a client. I’ve been keeping track of my hours – looks like about 35 hours total, when it’s all said and done. I think that’s quite a bit for that project, BUT, it was my first time making it, and I’m sure I could trim off several hours when I do it again.

What did I price this piece at? $375, and $50 shipping.

WHY did I put that price on there? Because I just looked at it, and did a mental evaluation of how much time it would take, wood needed and so on.

In other words, I guessetimated.

Well, turns out, after the math is all done, I made less than $10 an hour. For skilled craftsmanship. I could skillfully make a Big Mac for that wage, and not inhale as much dust.

And then I looked around the ‘net for other craftsman making the same table. Their prices? $1400, $1800 and $2200 bucks. After doing this project I understand why. I thought prices like that were really high, and these guys had the attitude, “Well, I don’t want to make one for others, but if I have to, you’re going to pay dearly.” Well, now I see they are being paid properly. If they took the same 35 hours or so to make it, as I did, the least they’d make is $40 per hour – a reasonable amount for a skilled craftsman. Hell, plumbers make more.

So, I’m seriously going to up my prices – at least double. If I’m going to take the time and pain, and use my rather decent woodworking skills to make a piece, probably for someone that can afford to burn some money, then dang it, I’m charging good money for it.

And for that matter, double the damn shipping – i always get burned on that too!

At the risk of angering someone out there, I’ll say it anyway: the Chinese are thieves. I don’t mean your neighbors from China stealing your stuff, I mean in a corporate sense – they copy our DVDs, Software, and all kinds of engineered stuff, and sell it either as a cheap copy, or as a blatant counterfeit. Go to Chinatown in NYC if you don’t believe me.

So how about a little pay back, craftsman style? LOL

Make a better copy of the crap they send to us, and sell it at a higher price? Let’s say they have a nice style dresser or table at Target, which I can guarantee is made in China. Rip them off. Make a copy of the style, but this time using a finish that won’t rub off, drawers that won’t fall apart, and something you don’t have to put together; steal their style, improve the follow-through.

Fight fire with fire.

Maybe this is just an anger piece, maybe this is a decent proposition – I’m not sure.

Thanks for listening. :)

Here are some factors that have come to mind when considering the formulation of a price:

Cost of making the product How much did you spend on materials? How much did your shop “charge you” to make it?

Time making the product How much time did you spend picking out the lumber? If you designed it, how much time went into that? How much labor time did it take to make it?

Cost of Marketing How much does it cost you to sell it? Are you doing it through Etsy, eBay, print ad, a craft show, etc?

Uniqueness of product If you’re the only one making this product, consider that a reason to increase your price – if it’s a good seller. If you’ve got a hot item, you can charge a premium, but if you have a unique item no one is interested in, you can’t.

What is an acceptable profit to you? This is usually expressed as a percentage. If a piece cost $50 in material, and another $10 in marketing, you spend 3 hours making it, and it sells for $150, is $90 (or $30 an hour) a profit level of 250% acceptable? Myself, I like to use the per hour dollar amount, since I can compare it to a real world job.

Can it be sold? An off-shoot of the above acceptable profit thought above is, the salability of the product. Sure, you can make a 250% profit ($30 per hour), but what does it matter if no one buys it?

Wholesale or Retail? Will you be selling to wholesalers, strictly retailing it, or a mix? Wholesalers generally pay you half what they want to sell it for; is that enough profit for you? If you are the only one selling it, yes, you’ll profit more, but sell less in number. If you do both retailing and wholesaling, you can’t undercut the wholesaler’s store price on your website.

Cost doesn’t necessarily dictate price Create your price not necessarily on cost, but on perception of value. Let’s use an example to illustrate. Perhaps you make a shadow box for the display of the American flag and medals, as seen here:

You usually charge materials x 3. There is not a lot of materials in this kind of piece, and really not a lot of time. Maybe what, $25 in materials? So, $75 is what you’d normally charge. Sounds like a great markup right?

Well, think again. The shadow box in the picture is mass produced, sold at Linen N’Things for $120. You came up a little short at $75, didn’t you? You should be pricing that at at least $150. Why? Because it’s handmade by a craftsman, is real cherry, not “finely crafted wood with an elegant cherry finish” as they describe theirs (cheap wood made to look like cherry, which it never does). The point is, something like this, which is an emotional purchase, can command a high price, because many people want the best, and they perceive you, a craftsman, as producing the best product. Get paid for it.

Well, there are some thoughts…I hope they benefit you.

Sadly, it’s not woodworking, though cutting boards usually do well.

Actually, it’s a photographic craft, but don’t despair, it’s something just about anyone can do, has a very high mark-up and woman love it.

Basically, what it is are 4×6 pictures of letters that are happened to be formed in your neighborhood. You take pictures of all the letters of the alphabet, and then arrange them into a word, such as “love”, “family” or other women-friendly words. Here’s an example:

They go for about $65 for 4 letters, framed! The photos cost next to nothing, maybe 25 cents each, and the frames I’m sure are bought in bulk, for probably $5 each. You do the math on that profit. Women LOVE these. They are unique, and thanks to being able to choose a word, emotional. Amazingly, they smash the usual $20 rule that is the usual at craft shows (things being $20 or less being best sellers).

You can read more about this – and other great selling craft show items – at my website blog.

I’m still trying to figure it out.

There’s an interesting phenomenon called “perceived value”, which is a nebulous value, yet should be taken into account when pricing.

Let me tried to explain what perceived value is, at least as I understand it. Perceived value is what the consumer feels a product is worth. Obviously, if you NEED something, like a new water heater, it’s perceived value is high; if you’re a guy, and you see a Coach purse on sale, your perceived value is probably very low.

However, in the woodworking world, it’s a different story. Let’s say John builds a trestle table, and Mike builds the same table; both use the same materials, plans, finishes and building techniques. John puts a price on it of $500; Mike puts a price of $1,500 on his. If you were just an average consumer (not a woodworker), which one would you buy? The $500 one? Maybe not.

I think most people will look at this proposition this way: A) “If they look the same, I want the cheaper one,” or B) “Hmmmm, I think I want the more expensive one. This is obviously a great piece, and the guy that did the cheaper one must have cut corners, used cheaper materials or something. I want to spend the extra money for the better one.”

Perceived value.

I was watching a pricing video on Etsy , and they were doing a case study on a shop – I think the lady made knit goods. Her top seller? An item on the less expensive side. Not surprising. What is surprising is what her second-best selling piece was: a piece that was ten times more expensive. This lady was straddling the market – catering to the people who only wanted to spend a little, and the crowd that wanted to spend a lot for the very best.

Desire is a big component of perceived value; it’s an emotional response, and as such, irrational, usually. If people really want something, they’ll pay a lot to get it. Think of a Coach handbag. These are high-end, expensive, very well made ladies’ handbags. Many women lust after them. They run $300 plus. Now, as a guy, I don’t get paying that kind of money to tote stuff around. Maybe $50, but $300? But for a woman, it’s a status symbol, beautiful and functional – an item with a high perceived value. It’s very subjective. You’ll also see this phenomenon in play with the “must-have” toys at Christmas. If the product is in pretty short supply, you’ll see people buying them up at the store, and marking them up several hundred percent on eBay – and they get their price! Those moms buying at those big markups find perceived value in not having to camp out at stores all night to get the toy, not disappointing their kids, etc – and they are willing to pay a lot for that perceived value.

There’s another gentlemen on the internet that sells a very similar clock to mine; I think most people would be split pretty evenly between preferring his and mine. He sells a lot of them, from what I understand. Granted, he advertises more, goes to trade shows, and so on. I don’t.

However, he sells them at about 3X what I do! I’ve lowered my prices from $495 to $295 – only to find I sold more at the higher price. He sells in the $850 range…which, I would have a hard time charging, feeling it’s too much. I would feel like I’m gouging people. That’s not to say he is gouging people – he’s not. He put a price on something that’s not an essential item, and people buy it – good for him! Maybe I have a problem with not pricing high enough.

As woodworkers, we need to realize that when a transaction is made, when someone buys your piece, that they are NOT just begrudgingly giving up money to buy your piece – like they would feel if they had to replace a water heater. No, they are feeling GOOD buying your piece, or, at the very least, they want to feel that way. They are not just getting a product, but a good feeling as well. I think we need to build relationships with customers. What I mean is, don’t just put a piece out there, slap a price on it, and ship it. Instead, put a feeling onto the piece, let people feel good about buying from YOU, a real person, and not some factory in China. Here’s what I mean – don’t just put up a website like “Dan’s Woodworking”, with a bunch of pieces with bland descriptions about materials and dimensions, and a “buy it or don’t” feel. Instead, create a good feeling about the product: “I designed and built this table myself after I was inspired while I was hiking in the Adirondacks, and came across a natural rock formation…”, or, “I made this table out of recycled wood – actually from shipping pallets – because I am concerned about the environment, and wanted to challenge myself to make something awesome from a product that would have just ended up in a dumpster.” Does that interest you more than just “Made of solid oak, with a poly top”? I would hope so. Also, let people know who you are. “We are a family run business in Wisconsin; Mike and his son Tim, build the pieces. Jan, the mother, takes care of customers and other business matters. They’ve been making great oak products for over 10 years.” something warm and fuzzy like that. Isn’t that better than “I’ve been doing woodworking since 1980?” The point is, give the product a story, and let people know who you are, a real person they can understand that crafted this piece, as opposed to a bunch of guys in a factory in India.

Think about it; have you ordered something, and when it came, you were hoping (and expecting) to be wowed, either because of the price or it’s reputation? How did you feel when it met that expectation? Capitalize on that.

Now to get rid of the old “A”, using my Dremel with a router base:

After fitting in the new “E”, I am working in the color to match, as seen in this series of photos:

Problem was, I was never going to get an exact match on either the background (dark brown) or the the lettering (a pale yellow). So, I ended up just stainging the whole background, and repainting the letters and border with a close match outdoor paint. The results look pretty darn good!

Here’s the sign the way it was…..

Call from some friends – can you help us out? What’s the project? Take this sign:

“We no longer live on a mountain (“peak”), but still love the sign. Can you erase the “A” in Peak, and make it an “E” instead”?

“Sure” i replied.

How to do it? Make a copy of an existing “E” and replicate it in a plaster type material. Here’s the casting material I used. Basically, it’s a two part putty that cures to a fairly hard rubber mold.

Take equal parts of putty, and mix it thoroughly, quickly apply to a good E; it’s nice I had one right next to the letter to erase, since there would be continuity of the background

Applying it to the good letter:

Wait 30 minutes, gently peel off. No residue, and didn’t pick up any wood:

Here’s the mold. Looks perfect:

The porcelain/bisque material is called Permastone. Basically, it’s a powder, and you add enough water to make a thick cream. Set’s in about 30 minutes.

Poured into the mold:

NEXT: Removing the old “A” and fitting in the new “E”

So her favorite son-in-law is stepping up to the plate. Requirements: Simple, beautiful, lower shelf.

Here’s what I came up with:

It’s looking like the materials will be about $150…and I’m thinking $100 for labor. Cheap, I know, but it’s the in-laws, what can you do? LOL.

The dark wood you see on the top and feet are ebony inlays. The top is 4/4 Cherry. The bottom stretchers all have a slight arch. Difficult to see, but the legs taper up, and are off center.

It’s just getting up and running, so come on over, join, and contribute. I think you’ll like what you see.

Just a note: all pictures and videos posted are moderated; they don’t go up unless I’ve seen them.

Also, WoodBuzz is smartphone friendly, no app needed. Just open Woodbuzz on your iPhone, and a phone-friendly version comes up automatically:

You can join Woodbuzz here: WoodBuzz

• Plans. A picture of the piece, a brief description, indicate whether it’s free or paid, and a link to the site.

• Sketchup Plans. Your plans that you’d like to share with the community for free.

• Woodworking software. Planning software, like Sketchup, and related plugins; layout software; cost estimation software, etc.

• Style guides. What is “mission style”, and what shapes or materials do you usually see in it? What are Krenovian influences?

• Marketing help. Articles on how to market yourself, both on the web and at craft shows or showrooms; setting prices; ideas for things that sell, etc.

• Encylopedia. An alphabetically ordered description of terms – scarf joint, rabbet, Sam Maloof, and so on.

• Multimedia. Helpful videos or podcasts that entertain or teach.

• News. New woodworking products or recalls; news of woodworking schools, trade shows.

and of course, a forum.

Again, I think you can see the distinction from LJs. LJs is a community driven site, whereas mine would be content driven.

Are there any other features you’d like to see?

I think this niche is under served – with the possible exception of Fine Wood Working – but you need to be a member there to get any of their articles.

I won’t off any false pretenses; this site would be a for-profit venture – not through membership fees or donations (very few donate) – but ad based, as is LJs.

I’d appreciate any feedback on this endeavor.

Let’s compare the Chicken Pox to …how about LumberJocks?

Obviously LumberJocks has done very well for itself, with over 17,000 members in about 4 years. Doing the math, that averages out to be about 11 new members a day! But WHY has it grown?

Because LumberJocks is like Chicken Pox, from an epidemiological (how it spreads) point of view.

Let’s peek behind the curtain….

Chicken Pox is a transmittable disease; you can catch it through an airborne virus – if someone with chicken pox near you sneezes and you happen to breathe it in, you could very well get it too (assuming you haven’t already had it). You are susceptible to it -able to be harmed by it.

Likewise, if you are someone interested in woodworking, you are susceptible to the LJ website. If you’re a woman in her 80s, probably not so much.

Next, comes exposure. If your whole family has chicken pox (or even the common cold), you know how likely you are to get it! Likewise, if a few of your buddies from the local woodworking group you belong to mention the LJ site, you are exposed to it as well.

Now the infection. Because you’re whole family has chicken pox, now you’ve contracted it as well. In like fashion, since your buddies were talking about LJs, you also joined.

You are now infectious – you could spread the chicken pox to your neighbors. You could also tell your friends in another woodworking group about LJs, and the cycle starts all over again.

This is the essence of something on the internet “going viral”. Think about those popular videos someone emailed you – and probably several other friends as well. If you’re like me, you passed it along to several other friends too – again, an example of viral marketing.

There is actually a coefficient that must be met for something to go viral. That is, a certain number of people that must be told for the “virus” to continue. If it doesn’t meet that number, the site stops or slows growing. The higher the number, the higher the acceleration rate of growth, to a point of full saturation – in which everyone pretty much is aware of it – like YouTube or Google. When you reach that point, you don’t need anymore people coming in, because in all likelihood, you’re not going to be knocked off the top of the mountain anyway. Who could beat YouTube at hosting videos – in terms of numbers?

Kinda interesting, huh? :)

Being the “netrepeneur” my dog thinks I am, I am considering starting up my own woodworking website.

STOP. It won’t be like Lumberjocks! I love this community too much to try to even challenge it. Whereas LJs is more community driven, by virtue of posting projects and forum topics, WoodBuzz would be more informational and news driven, with yes, a forum of course. There would be resources for us LJs – things like where to find free plans, how to market your business, appropriate videos, and so on.

Again, this is not to threaten LJs – I think of it as more of a companion site.

Your thoughts?

It originally started out on the campus of Harvard by a few undergrads looking to make an online “facebook” – a term used for the printed listing of alumnus, where they live, email, and so on. Well, it went viral quickly, as more and more people used it. Just using it makes it viral. You invite your friends, who in turn invite their friends, and so on.

Here’s some recent stats, from Facebook:

• More than 400 million active users
• 50% of active users log on to Facebook in any given day
• More than 35 million users update their status each day
• More than 60 million status updates posted each day
• More than 3 billion photos uploaded to the site each month
• More than 5 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) shared each week
• More than 1.5 million local businesses have active Pages on Facebook
• Average user has 130 friends on the site
• Average user sends 8 friend requests per month

Crazy, isn’t it?

So, what’s the marketing angle on this?

Obviously, exposure for your business.

You start with a personal page, and find all the friends you can. After that, you can make a page for your business, and invite those friends you made on Facebook. Facebook also will let you import your email addresses from some popular email clients, like Yahoo, and send them an invitation to join your biz page. Jumping off of that, you can take out an ad on Facebook, to be display to a specific demographic, such as male, 25-50, living in the US, speaks English, and has woodworking in their profile. You can pay a certain fee per 1,000 impressions, or pay per click, and set a daily limit on spending. That will help bring anonymous people to you. It gets a bit expensive – I paid about 50 cents per person signing up in my last campaign.

So that gets you started; then it’s up to you to post interesting, relevant information on your business page. And, you have to do it often – at least every other day. People don’t want to see a dead site when they do find you.

You can also post on your friend’s “wall” – that is essentially just a page of items that friend has posted, and things that person’s friends has also shared with him/her directly. Do this with care – you don’t want to come across too strong here. Something like, “Hey Dave, I just make another one of those jewelry boxes you like” – and post a link to your business page’s album with it. A little picture from the album should pop up with the message. So why do this, when Dave is already your friend? Because HIS friends will also see this post, and hopefully become a “fan” – a follower – of your page. It’s reasonable to believe that at least some of his friends will share his interest in woodworking, and come follow you too.

And of course it all comes back to more people exposed to your product, more people likely to buy.

People can posted the dumbest stuff – “Just got a cup of coffee!”, “Can’t believe it’s Monday!” and so on. WHO CARES?!

Then you have the sharks – “I make $2,600 a day on Google adsense – find out how!” – the get-rich-quick guys.

And it seems some people just follow ANYONE in the hopes that those people will follow them back, building their following number.

What I did learn is that you can use target words in your post that people searching on that topic will find. For example, “Come see my great mantle clocks – they make awesome gifts! #wood #handmade #wedding” Not only will your followers see your message, but anyone that searches Twitter on those search terms will find your tweet. Ok, that’s a good thing.

Also found a website URL shortening service that will shorten a url so you can fit it into a Tweet. So, instead of:

http://newmissionworkshop.com/craftsman-difference

I can use:

http://bit.ly/97cH5k

Not only that, they track the number of clicks on the link – all for free.

Case in point – I found this guy's twitter account; he’s making pens, and has over 4,300 followers? What does that mean, and how does it turn into sales? His website listed on Twitter points to his etsy.com account – ok, that makes sense – but I’m not getting the whole picture.

Nevertheless, I set up a Twitter account for NMW, and have posted a few things.

As I learn the benefits of Twitter, I’ll pass them along on this blog – so you might want to favorite it.

If you know the commercial benefits of tweeting, let me know!

One example was Edison’s attempt to make a telegraphic-telephonic repeating and recording device, it didn’t work, but when somebody gave it a spin it sounded like human speech. Edison started from that chance observation and developed the phonograph.

It can also happen in the shop.

In my latest project posting “I had Twins!” I turned would could have been a disaster into a chance to get really creative.

Take a look at this picture – especially the shot of the back of the clock:

Look at the sides of the door. You’ll see the back door, which is quilted maple, a thin sliver of Paduak, and then more maple. It’s a nice visual interest; otherwise, it would have been just plain maple on maple.

It wasn’t intended that way! Here’s the back-story:

I had to rabbet the sides of the clock to recive the back door. I did this on my router table. It was a 1/4” rabbett on a 1/2” stock. Of course, I set up and tested the rabbett on a scrap piece of stock. Worked fine. Right depth and so on. My mistake was, I did the whole depth in one pass on the real pieces. I should have done an 1/8” at a time, instead of the whole 1/4”. What ended up happening was, the bit crept out of the collet on the router, cutting deeper than I wanted. Ugh!

The only option was to throw out 4 nice pieces of maple ( I was making two clocks), or get creative.

What I ended up doing was re-rabbetting all four pieces to an equal depth, and then gluing in a strip of paduak to bring the rabbett back up to the originally intended 1/4” depth. The result was a more visually appealing ( I think) back of these pieces.

Obviously, sometimes mistakes can’t be fixed; if you needed a piece to be 8” long, and you cut it to 7”, you probably can’t just glue it back on and hope no one will notice. Some mistakes are final.

But other times, if you get creative, you can turn mistakes into a positive.