Question for those who run part time shops.

[Joel Ifill]

I read some of the other threads on a similar topic, but thought mine was split enough it was easier to make my own. Okay onto the question...

Hello, I'm a long time lurker and I just started posting today. I've been thinking of getting into custom engraving as a side business. About me, I'm a welding engineer by day, my background is in art and I have a second degree in CNC machining. I've worked with quite a lot of lasers (as a welding engineer) and done my share of CNC work and worked as a waterjet operator. I think I have the necessary background in hardware and software skills to plug into laser engraving, obviously I lack all the learned applied knowledge that comes over time.


Now I was thinking of doing laser engraving as a side business, with the intention of it NOT becoming a full time job, or a prime bread winner. I wanted a fun constructive hobby in-line with my skills, and I make a decent wage as an engineer. However I would like to make enough money to pay off the laser, and bring in some pocket money to pay for other toys.

Now my question is:
For those of you who run a laser as a side business, what sort of time investment in terms of hours per week / month do you put in?
What would be a realistic goal for net sales, and how long did it take in months to start turning a profit?

What I was looking at was a time investment of ~10+ hours a week 40/month minimum and a target of $1000 net/month. I figure at that rate I wouldn't be buying a ferrari but I would be able to pay off the small business loan I'm considering taking out and have some money left over. I'm worried that the only profitable jobs I would find are small to medium sized runs and I would be stuck working 3-5 hr/day after work 5 days a week in order to keep my head above water.

Finally as far as product: I would like to stay out of the onesies and twosies trophy plaque market (although I would be willing to take on the work). I think I would be looking to try my hand in custom motorcycle parts and custom gauges. Now I understand that a lot of those types of jobs are more about networking, marketing and getting in with the right references, but I think I could push that market and make some inroads and hopefully setup a few "product lines" to get some repeat work going.

Thoughts? Am I off base or crazy? I happen to have a coworker who owns an older 90's epilog laser, I was thinking of running some lead pieces on his machine or acting as a middle man to see if I could find a product that sells, prior to making the considerable investment.

[Steve Clarkson]

I think it's a great idea to start by sending work through your coworker to see if you can find a product that sells.......after 6 months, you'll be very glad you didn't take out a loan to buy your own laser.

[Rodne Gold]

You can Pick up a fairly large laser for $6k or so , so it's not a huge barrier to entry. Give it a bash.

[Arturo Villegas]

Yep, what Steve said.

Wish you best of luck but the reality is other.

[paul mott]

Unless you already have a really great idea which is 'as good as sold' to more than just a single customer then, in my opinion, you would be unwise to take the investment / profit risk.

As a hobby, it would be just great and I think you will have so much fun, it will make it all worthwhile. Who knows you may sell stuff along the way.

Good fortune with your venture.

Paul.

[Martin Boekers]

Some people buy a boat, others a laser! ;-)

If it's something you like, then go for it!
The better your networking circles the better you have a chance to do.
Find some niches, after the newness wheres off so does the little jobbs
you did for family and friends. If you are an engineer than you may have
some software skills. Which is good the software is a steep learning curve
the laser not too bad.

I think your being realistic to consider your net at about $25 an hour, but
that being said... Figure 6months to a year to get there at the the start.

I say go for it have some fun and maybe pay for a neat hobby along
the way.

Marty

[Mike vonBuelow]

My laser is my mid-life crisis alternative to a car... I do it part time after work, everything in the garage, spend about 1-2 hrs per day after work -

I'm still 'practicing', so I only make ~$300 month, and after a year with my laser, I'm still trying out new things and trying to find my niche.

[Robert Alexander]

I read some of the other threads on a similar topic, but thought mine was split enough it was easier to make my own. Okay onto the question...

Hello, I'm a long time lurker and I just started posting today. I've been thinking of getting into custom engraving as a side business. About me, I'm a welding engineer by day, my background is in art and I have a second degree in CNC machining. I've worked with quite a lot of lasers (as a welding engineer) and done my share of CNC work and worked as a waterjet operator. I think I have the necessary background in hardware and software skills to plug into laser engraving, obviously I lack all the learned applied knowledge that comes over time.


Now I was thinking of doing laser engraving as a side business, with the intention of it NOT becoming a full time job, or a prime bread winner. I wanted a fun constructive hobby in-line with my skills, and I make a decent wage as an engineer. However I would like to make enough money to pay off the laser, and bring in some pocket money to pay for other toys.

Now my question is:
For those of you who run a laser as a side business, what sort of time investment in terms of hours per week / month do you put in?
What would be a realistic goal for net sales, and how long did it take in months to start turning a profit?

What I was looking at was a time investment of ~10+ hours a week 40/month minimum and a target of $1000 net/month. I figure at that rate I wouldn't be buying a ferrari but I would be able to pay off the small business loan I'm considering taking out and have some money left over. I'm worried that the only profitable jobs I would find are small to medium sized runs and I would be stuck working 3-5 hr/day after work 5 days a week in order to keep my head above water.

Finally as far as product: I would like to stay out of the onesies and twosies trophy plaque market (although I would be willing to take on the work). I think I would be looking to try my hand in custom motorcycle parts and custom gauges. Now I understand that a lot of those types of jobs are more about networking, marketing and getting in with the right references, but I think I could push that market and make some inroads and hopefully setup a few "product lines" to get some repeat work going.

Thoughts? Am I off base or crazy? I happen to have a coworker who owns an older 90's epilog laser, I was thinking of running some lead pieces on his machine or acting as a middle man to see if I could find a product that sells, prior to making the considerable investment.

Your questions and your job skills are just (C.N.C., water jet welding, and art background)like mine. I bought a 45 watt epilog Helix in 2005, (Then a C.N.C. router in 2009 but that's another story) and did laser work part time, until 2009, when I went full time.
I got it because it was a way to do art that no other machine could do. I have not made a lot of money until the last 2 years. I have not specialized in one area, I like to do different laser projects, and I have found some specialized markets for my laser along the way. But I have found out that word of mouth from customers has been my best advertisement. Even if I did not make any money at it. I would still buy a laser. Like Martin said some people buy a boat some a laser.:)

P.S. Also I don't like the trophy plaque market, but when people come calling and offering to pay extra for a one of a kind artistic plaque that the trophy shop can't make I am happy to do it.

[Scott Shepherd]

One suggestion I would make if you do decide to give it a try, is to price things accordingly. For some unknown reason (maybe it's just lack of experience) people that start from their home seem to think it's a great idea to price things cheap. They tend to believe that "Hey, I wasn't making anything for my time before, so this extra money is just great". That's a disaster waiting to happen.

You should price your products to the market, not to what you're happy making in your "free" time. If you price things to what you're happy making, you'll get flooded with work, which will seem great. You'll work like crazy and make very little money, then one day, you'll get so busy you'll run out of space, you'll take the plunge and move out into a larger space. At which time, you'll find you have rent and other bills to pay. To cover all that, you'll have to raise your prices. When you do that, you'll put off all the customers that came to you because you were working for such low prices. Then you'll have a nice new lease, with bills to pay, and you'll have a small fraction of your old work. Then, someone will open a shop from their basement to compete with you, and they'll do the same thing you did, they'll offer cheap prices. Then you'll be competing against wages and prices you can't compete with.

So, my advice. Price it like you were competing with all the other brick and mortar shops. If you get the work and grow, you won't lose customers or money when it comes time to move out to your own place, should you do so.

If the market rate for a product is $100, and everyone in the market is used to paying $100, why in the world anyone would start charging $30 for the same product is beyond me. If you want to compete, charge $98.50 and move on. Otherwise, you are leaving a lot of money on the table, which is a bad thing.

[Richard Rumancik]

Joel, have you considered looking at a business using a CNC router rather than laser? Since you have background in CNC that would seem like a viable alternative to me. Take a look at the signmaking forum and some of Keith Outen's posts on the subject of CNC vs. laser. You can find some production work in the CNC field, like plastic shapes, control panels, wood carving etc. not just signs. If you bought V-carve and a Stinger or a small Shop-Bot you can get set up for probably less than a name-brand laser system. One-off signs can still make a decent amount of profit whereas one-off plaques usually don't make any money.

I wanted to get both a laser and CNC router; I have the laser and but have only dabbled in CNC with a small mill. But sometimes I think maybe I should have started with a router. Just my thoughts.

[Ken Maxwell]

I agree with everyone. I have a background in CNC machining and programming CNC machines. I bought a laser about 4 years ago to get a small business for retirement, it is now paid off and my Stinger CNC router will be here next week. As I think back maybe the router would have been a better fit for me but I think they both have there place and they can do different things. The last few months I have been so busy I work 40 hours a week at my real job and about 60 at my "small" business. I can't wait for my router so I can play with it in my spare time. At some point my hobby might become my full time job, it all depends on when you need to decide to make it or not.

[Jim Beachler]

Making things is not going to be a problem for you with all of your skills. What most people don't realize that even though you can make the neatest stuff in the world, if you can't sell it, it worthless. The biggest thing is that you need to do is to learn to sell, make contacts, influence people and sell some more.

Not everybody is cut out to be a salesperson, just like not everybody can design for the laser and CNC.

I agree with Steve about getting your feet wet designing and selling your products until you have sales that make it worth while.

Of course, if you want to buy it anyways, go for it.

[David Fairfield]

If I had CNC skills, I wouldn't bother with a laser. I'd set myself up with a CNC mill and lathe. If I could trade my 2d graphics and laser skills for 3d graphics and CNC skills, I would in a heartbeat.

I guess my point is, if you're wanting to earn money moonlighting, you've got all the skills you need already, without starting to learn something new. And If you don't figure you could make the bucks with a CNC, having a laser probably isn't gonna make a difference.

[Rodne Gold]

Whats most versatile or best is entirely dependant on the market , for custom bike parts , you need cnc lathes and mills and for guages , lasers
Buy em all and have fun. You seem to have the skilz..
The most profit can be made if you can combine your machinerys output. Like make a product using all your tools that is unique. I can think of tons of ways you could make stunning parts for bikes combining CnC'd billet aluminium/metal/whatever , lasered inlays of exotic woods or leather. Even a wooden guage dial is quite unique..lasers will enable you to do stunning multilayered and backlit guages

[Joel Ifill]

Thanks for the advice!
I was looking more the laser route, as the small independent Machinist guys aren't doing that great (right now) from my usual posting on machining forums (www.practicalmachinist.com great site) and doing the quick mental math; cost of entry appears to be higher, in terms of buying vises, tooling, inspection gauges etc etc. I think I hinted towards the fact that my first trade was as a welder, and now a welding engineer, I picked up CNC machining on the side but my focus was always welding. I own a few welding machines, but again the money in welding isn't great, and owning a rig is an even bigger investment. Very little money in home welding, and time investment is high.

I am hoping a laser would be a smaller capital investment, and smaller time to pay-off. I can and should look into CNC routers as that's a viable path too. Of course like most here, if I had all the money and time in the world I would have a shop chalk full of CNC machines, rapid prototype machines and high end welders. But truth is I am looking to start small with the money and time investment. I'll be firing up the CAD and designing some parts to run on the coworkers laser, just to get my feet wet. I'll keep the 6 month - 1 year time frame in mind.

P.S: no mid life crisis yet! I'm 25, I have been in fabrication my whole life and can't stand to stop creating things.

[Martin Boekers]

There are some pretty cool Plasma CNC machines out there......:-)

[Richard Rumancik]

Joel, I agree that a precision machining business might be a bit tougher to get going. The tolerances are higher so you need better fabrication equipment, and as you say, better inspection equipment to check what you are making. But CNC router parts are often an order of magnitude looser in tolerance. Instead of +/- .001" often +/- .010" is good enough. And for wood parts you might get away with +/- .030" or more; for signs it could even be more as often appearance is more important than exact dimensions. You can get a small CNC router for less than $10K and that amount of money does not buy much in terms of a CNC mill and tooling.

If you understand CNC machining you will understand how to use the CNC router as the concepts are the same.

Have you looked at the Vectric site? You might get some ideas of what people are doing with Aspire, VCarve, Cut 3D etc. It is pretty economical software to start a CNC router business.

I suppose you could even consider building a CNC router, if you have the time and inclination, as it sounds like you probably have the mechanical skills. For the electronics side you can buy a system rather than build. There is a ton of info available on the subject. Depends on whether you are willing to spend several months buying parts and building, or just want to get making things.

[Bruce Boone]

In my opinion, the trick is to come up with a niche product first and market it on the Internet. I used to make my own line of bike stuff and still get weekly inquiries about them some 15 years after I stopped making them. We were in 56 countries all over the world, and I would make them now, but I've moved on to other niche products that pay considerably better and can't take the time to do them. The trick for me was to concentrate on increasing the dollars per hour. Combine all your creative and machining talent to coming up with an item that has cool factor that a specific market would love to have. Every market has those products that someone will pay top dollar to have the coolest stuff. Hikers love strong and light titanium tools, knife guys love crazy tactical stuff, cyclists love functional lightweight and cool looking stuff, car guys love high end additions for their ride, etc. You can source out the manufacturing at first and bring it in house if and when it overtakes your normal income. I think the laser's simply one of those tools to have in your arsenal to add value to a product, but it won't necessarily make sense as a standalone purchase at first since you will be boxed in to charging what anyone else with a laser is charging for similar stuff. Once you get out of that box, you'll find that it's the cool new product that will be bringing in the money. If you make the coolest stuff, they will come. Trust me on this.

[Mike Null]

Let me add my two cents worth. And it's just the opposite of many of the other posts. I am an engraver full time but in my basement shop. I don't have any "niche"products at all. Most engravers don't have such products either. What we do is provide a service. That is our product. When somebody-hopefully a commercial enterprise wants something engraved, marked or made we do it.

Like the others though, our "product" must be marketed well in order for us to succeed and again, contrary to popular opinion, word of mouth just doesn't do it. You need to devise a marketing plan to achieve your goal.

[Tim Bateson]

I agree with Mike, except for the Marketing aspect I want to clarify - Fliers don't work, paid advertising doesn't work, give aways doesn't work, simply building a web page doesn't work.
What marketing strategy DOES work (for me) is shaking hands, meeting people (networking), having a web site that is on the 1st page when queries are run (don't need to pay for this either), Service and finally - QUALITY. Low prices are meaningless (within reason) to good customers, Quality is the premium they seek. Unlike Mike, the bulk of my recent work has been due to Word of Mouth. Maybe it's my market, maybe I'm just better than Mike. :D lol .. or lucky

Having fun with you Mike - BTW for others here Mike has been a great mentor to me. He seems to always have the answer I need. If he & I ever disagree on advice - you'd be wise to take his... most of the time. :cool:

[Mike Null]

Tim

I thought that would get your attention but it truly isn't a source of business for me. My website is the key. I do no other advertising.

For sure, no one can question the quality of your work.

[Martin Boekers]

Tim, you have come a long way. you dealt with the initial frustrations, you didn't give
up. You are unerstanding how important customer service and quality is. It takes time
to grow a business. Don't slow down now!!

[Joel Ifill]

Thanks for the advice, I'm doing all the back end things first. Setting up a website, designing prototype parts etc. The last thing would be to buy the laser. I would rather have everything sorted out and run the parts on someone elses machines as opposed to having a machine and no website, no customers and no product.

I'll keep everyone informed but this will be a months long process

[Larry Allred]

I started part time, and it gradually turned into more than full. Good advice on this thread. Use your talents.

The cost of a laser isn't the only expense. There's software, venting, materials, etc. Upkeep isn't much as long as you keep it clean and lubricated.

Time-wise, plan on a large learning curve. Corel is the standard, and there are good classes online and at the ARA and laser shows. You'll be spending extra time learning the software, the laser and how materials look and act. Once you get your feet wet, though, you'll start coming up with new ideas and trying things you never expected.

If you plan on limiting the usual etching, awards, trophies, you'll need to find a niche where there is a need you can fill without much competition. You might do some prototyping and market trials first, before you spring for the machine. Others mentioned this too. I've done products I was sure would sell like hotcakes, and didn't. 6 months in, during a brainstorming session we got a wild hair for something, tried it and bingo! We almost can't keep up now. (Your actual results may vary!!!!!)

Anyway, learn fast, research, don't be afraid to try things, but go in with your eyes wide open. Good luck!