[For Sale] Custom furniture, woodwork, etc., made to order

[Toxxyc]

Doing a lot of work on quotes, but nobody commits

Come on guys!

 

[StangV2_0]

Doing a lot of work on quotes, but nobody commits

Sux hey???





Free bump. Dont ban me.

 

[DubDubZA]

Doing a lot of work on quotes, but nobody commits

Don't over commit your time on quotes... point 1 post #180 of this thread.

I KNOW it feels completely counter intuitive, but you are only hurting yourself by sinking too much time and effort in quotes/design, it's your time down the drain for no payment. You should have a fairly good ballpark of material costs and how much time it will take you to make before you. So fire off the the estimated price right of the bat and eliminate your time wasters as soon as you can.

1. Hey Toxxyc, I want a 6 Seater basic Oak Dining Table.
2. OK, that will be around R17-R19K.

3a. O wow! I can buy a table from Makro for R8K!
3a. Cool. Let me know if I might be able to assist with other work in future.

3b. That sounds reasonable considering cost of material and your awesome work.
3b. Cool can I send you a design or two with accurate costing. I charge R500 for this. You get to keep the designs and bill of materials if you don't accept the quote. If you accept the quote the R500 will be subtracted from your 70% deposit. 30% Final payment upon delivery.


If you need to design in order to quote, don't design for free... If your customer wants a design he has to pay for it (see it as a non-refundable deposit). If he does not accept the quote he gets the design from you and he can do with it whatever he wants .

This way at least you get paid something for your time.
- Your client wins, because he gets a design and bill of materials if he does not accept the quote. that he can either try and make it himself or give it to another Frikkie. There are a shit ton of people who will bend you over with designing and costing stuff, shit I had retailers do it to me (designing and quoting for months and 3 months later my exact designs are standing on the shop floor made by some anonymous shop)
- 99% of your customers who pay for the design and costing, will accept your quote.

Another option is to make 5 of 6 items with 2 or 3 choices of material only (forget custom altogether). That way your costs are relatively fixed and you have a fixed price list you revise every 3 months (to be honest this is the way I would do it if I jumped back into this game).

**edit - adjust your design/costing fee according to complexity of the design and time needed of course.

 

[Toxxyc]

Problem is people don't know what they want. I get a client asking for example, I want a 2m desk with a solid wood top. This is a VERY typical conversation:

Me: I need some information. Pine, a hardwood like Kiaat, or what are you looking for?
Client: I like Walnut.
Me: OK that'll be around R25k.
Client: Wow, why so much?
Me: Because that's more or less what Walnut costs, and then it's not even the fancy stuff.
Client: OK can you give me an exact quote?
Me: <Call everyone to get prices on wood, steel, board laminating (cheaper than I can do it for), etc. etc. Spend 2 hours doing this, in stores, finding the finishes they want, etc. etc.> OK I overestimated the price of steel, it'll be R24k.
Client: OK how much for pine?
Me: <Do the same, but for pine.> That'll be R14k.
Client: OK wow that's still too much. I had a budget of R5k.
Me: Well, for R5k I can probably do a Postform top, but you're going to sacrifice measurements. Top will be 600mm deep instead of your aimed 800mm, and 32mm thick which is the norm. I'll also not be able to do drawers and cable trays and all that.
Client: <silence indefinitely>

And that's frustrating. I've had people ask me "how much did you charge for that exact table" and I say "R10k" and they say "OK quote me on that table" and I do it and poof, silent.

 

[DubDubZA]

Me: <Call everyone to get prices on wood, steel, board laminating (cheaper than I can do it for), etc. etc. Spend 2 hours doing this, in stores, finding the finishes they want, etc. etc.> OK I overestimated the price of steel, it'll be R24k.

I hear you bud, been there done that and I know exactly where you are coming from (preaching to the choir)...

If you are sticking with custom you should set things up with your suppliers and get their price lists regularly - ideally they should send it to you every 2 weeks or whenever there are major changes. Calling for every quote is madness, this info should be on hand all the time.

Your major supplies (especially wood and steel doesn't fluctuate that wildly/quickly). Your sundries and consumables (finishes, sandpaper, fixtures etc) should be on hand, and should get a feeling for prices for those you don't have on hand.

"Custom" is NOT easy. It is so fluid wrt your TIME. Just writing down your measurements, client specs and rough drafting could be anything from 3-18 hours before you've lifted a tool from your bench. You need to get paid for that time, if you don't, you WILL not move in the right direction (you'll be insanely busy yes, but being busy does not necessarily mean you are making profit). Working your tits off and not getting paid is not good. Custom is expensive in every single industry for a reason.

I would stick to 3 or 4 products with 2 or 3 different choices wrt materials and fix their prices and market the shit out of it.
6 months down the line I would drop my worst selling item and replace it with a new product.

Contrary to what many think, this particular game is not easy.

 

[Toxxyc]

Oh it's not easy for sure. I want to focus on a specific style and product, specifically that sleeper wood patio table, if possible. That's why I said I'll build them for R10k a piece. I loved that build, I know all the dos and don'ts by now and if I can work with that, I'd be happy camper. But there seems to be no interest

 

[DubDubZA]

It's a nice piece and a fair asking price.

Design, make and cost a 2-3 seater bench and a single seater to compliment the table. Benches and seats are multi functional and can be used as side tables/storage (I have 3 benches around the house with the primary function of book/magazine storage, and convenient when we need extra seats some days).

Try and visit smaller shops (i.e non-franchise/corporate) that focus on "speciality"/hand made items like curio shops and some antique dealers whenever you are out and about (think Clarens, Prince Albert sort of vibes). Give them your details/product info and pricing. Many of them love supporting local makers. If you can, offer them a set for their floor to try and sell on consignment with the agreement that you will pick it up after a certain time and move it to the next shop if it does not sell. You'll eventually identify a a couple of shops where your product just moves (typically these shops will soon ask for a "regular" fixed supply. Keep in mind some of these shops are greedy as hell and expect to sell it at 30%-50% markup so be prepared for that in your pricing (remember they are also helping you, people tend to want to see and touch furniture before buying - so their expectation making margins is not unreasonable). Pubs and outdoor restaurants and event planning agencies should also be on your list of potential clients

Tables are actually a difficult sell. People tend to NOT buy many tables in their lifetimes and often use tables that have been passed down from family etc. Tables also have a large footprint, so people are often limited with regards to space.

I liked to do multi functional pieces. At one point I made a lot of traditional Japanese toolboxes (out of reclaimed pallets, which I fucking hate), but people used them for storage, seats, decoration, bookshelves, gift boxes, small tables for picnics - hell we are using them as bog-roll storage in our bathroom to this day. Easy as chips to batch out a couple of hundred of these per month if you are doing it full time. Sold them for R300/unit and my material cost was around R80 a box. I'll send you a pic. They were also easy to scale up and down, small to large.

The point I'm trying to make is that I think your work is awesome and your pricing is right, but for the bigger, "furniture" items, you are going to have to do some serious leg work to get the orders going... unless you are Pierre Cronje, word of mouth is only going to go so far...

Smaller items are easy to overlook and you can sell them consistently. I sold more boxes than I dare to try and recall (not just the "toolboxes") - around 80% were bought by people looking for a sub R500 gift. Nice picture frames also did well for me. Get a Small stamp. Stamp your Logo and email address somewhere inconspicious on your items. I started getting orders through email from people I have never met using a custom made rubber stamp (forget the custom branding iron initially).

Keep grinding bud, it will pick up, but cast your net a bit wider than just furniture. Rememeber your time is literally money in this game, don't waste it uneccesarily.

 

[Toxxyc]

Yeah I have a bit of time and I'm hoping to score a contract job again, mostly because the furniture business is dead. I've had people ask me to quote on a couch but for that I just said "hell no, but thanks".

I love tables through. Desks. Dinner tables. Those thin tables you put under your TV or behind your couch. You seen those narrow "tables" that people place behind couches in the middle of a room, that just rounds off the back of the couch perfectly? I love doing that.

I just wish our economy wasn't a mess so people could order more.