Advice on pricing large, wet bowl blanks

[Charles Randal Smith]

I would appreciate some help with pricing large bowl blanks.

I have been asked for blanks measuring about 16 to 18 inches in diameter and about six inches in thickness. Most will be cored by the persons requesting them. One request is for ash, and another is for maple (hard, soft, spalted). A third request has been made for black walnut. In all cases, the wood is wet. The blanks are straight-grained, but one person is interested in large crotches as well. The wood comes from trees which I felled then milled on my sawmill.

What would be your suggestion as to a fair price? Should I charge based on the number of board feet in each blank, the diameter, or a different parameter? I thank you for your consideration.

Charles

[Paul Williams]

I can not help you with a price point as I never buy anything that large. I can tell you that the commercial suppliers here charge by the board foot. However the price per BF is adjusted for how much work went into the blank. For instance is it cut to round? Are both top and bottom cut flat or parallel. On one hand I would think that you could charge more per BF for larger blanks, but you also have to allow for who is taking the risk of cracking (usually the buyer) when you sell green blanks. So green would be less than kiln dried, or even air dried.

[Bruce Pratt]

Check the pricing on commercial sites, e.g. West Penn Hardwoods, etc. They may not have the exact size or species, but you should be able to get some idea of the price range.

[Faust M. Ruggiero]

I won't give you a number but here is how I would determine a price. I assume the customer is near enough to pick up the blanks so why not have him there to help determine the position of the blank in the log. Not every log will yield a 16" blank. These are probably trees in excess of 24" in diameter if he wants to turn away the sap wood. Nice trees like that are hard to come by in many places so there is value in the wood. Most turners don't even have the saw to prep a blank from a log that size. There is value in custom blanks, probably more then most people would spend for a dripping piece of green wood. Ask yourself how much you want for your time. Add something for the wood and don't be shy. If he won't cover that cost you haven't lost anything.

[John Keeton]

Keep in mind that you will need to seal the blanks, so add in the cost of the wax or Anchorseal. If you use wax, you will need a larger than normal setup to dip large blanks.

[Reed Gray]

Unless the wood is figured, crotch, spaulted, etc. it is fire wood. Hard to say. A walnut tree on my dad's property was valued, by a forester, at about $10,000. I looked at it and commented, 'well, you might get that much from the milled and dried wood, but not from the log'. When I buy a log, I sell to friends at cost, which generally is in the $20 per firewood round size.

robo hippy

[John Grace]

I would do the following if faced with the same question. Review several commercial blank web sites as a starting place...noting the types and quality of woods comparable to yours and the sizes (e.g. Got Wood, Blanks 4 U, etc). And as John pointed out, factoring in preparation in the form of waxing and whatever tooling is involved, etc. A question in the final pricing includes are you trying to create a business/market for selling blanks and therefore pricing them competitively enough to keep people from paying web site prices (even with the shipping factored in) or are you simply doing this as a 'one off' favor for someone? Based on your description of what's requested...I've seen that size in the $75 - $100 range. I'd under-cut those numbers by 10-15% and work from there. Good Luck...

[Kent Adams]

This may sound snarky, its not meant to be, but price them to where you earn a fair profit. I don't think it matters what others are charging because your costs may be different.

[Dan Hintz]

This may sound snarky, its not meant to be, but price them to where you earn a fair profit. I don't think it matters what others are charging because your costs may be different.

But if people can (and do) get the same thing elsewhere for a lower price, his profit is guaranteed to be zero. Costs matter, but market matters more if you hope to make a sale.

[Sean Hughto]

What is the value for the wood if put to the highest use you can muster? If these would bring you the greatest return by milling them to planks, the people wanting the bowl blanks should be willing to pay you that value (at least minus the time and expense of drying and milling). If absent selling the blanks the wood would be corded up into firewood, then you might charge a lot less for the blanks. When I bought some cherry in that range, it was not cheap, but well worth it to me:

https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7187/6818231444_5daf0606ec_b.jpg

[Kent Adams]

But if people can (and do) get the same thing elsewhere for a lower price, his profit is guaranteed to be zero. Costs matter, but market matters more if you hope to make a sale.

Profit matters the most though. Take a look at smartphones. Android has 82% of worldwide market share for smartphones, yet Apple has 90% of mobile profits worldwide. Which would you rather have? The best use of the wood may not be bowl blanks, it may be for instance pen blanks? I'm no expert in wood/timber reselling, but for me, unless it covers at least fixed costs for another type of product I'm selling, I'd want to make sure I'm selling the bowl blanks at a profit. There are of course other considerations, such as market and brand awareness where you may sell at a loss to establish a relationship with clientele, but I don't think that is the OP's purpose. If you can't turn a profit and you're not trying to establish a brand or CS awareness, then the only other reason I can think of to sell would be to get rid of something that's taking up space. If the latter is the case, I'd make an inventory write-down to make sure I received some sort of tax benefit from the sale.

In my line of work, commercial banking, I see a lot of businesses which have absolutely no idea what their actual costs are. They just assume if they have money in their pocket after the sale, they "made" a profit. I've spent the last 3 decades analyzing businesses seeking capital and over the last couple of years, I've been giving serious thought to becoming a consultant for small business to help them understand their costs and to be able to analyze year over year trend lines. So many businesses don't know when to cut loose a product or how to best utilize their production runs and product mixes to maximize profit. If you have a good grasp on your costs, then the question of "how much should I sell this for" is really moot. On the other hand, if you know your true costs to produce your product and you can't sell it and be competitive as well as profitable, then change your product mix and sell where you can be both competitive and profitable.

Let me give you an example. I had a client that ran a large scale wholesale nursery. Every year, he would grow tens of thousands of poinsettas for sale through the Borgs. Being the natural skeptic I was, I asked him what his per square foot fixed costs were for his greenhouse space. He was selling the Poinsettas for less than $2 per plant. Each plant took approximately 1/2 of a square foot. After sitting down with him to go over his fixed costs on growing space, it turned out that his greenhouses had a fixed cost of $4.85 per square feet to grow poinsettas. Therefore, he was loosing .42.5 cents per plant he grew and sold. Spread out over tens of thousands of plants, he was loosing quite a bit of money growing and selling these. He didn't have a good grasp on his true costs. He replaced the poinsettas with ferns the following year and earned I believe $2 per plant in that same space. Little things like these, spread throughout an operation can in some circumstances determine whether a business is profitable or not.

[Dan Hintz]

I'm not suggesting profit doesn't matter, Kent, only that looking solely at profit margin can often guarantee you get zero sales... and where's the profit in that? I look closely at every job I bid on. If the profit margin is too low, I simply don't bid. Yes, I can make SOME profit, but it's too low to make it worth my while and I know another job will be available soon where the profit margin is much higher. But the key here is I let some jobs go.

If the OP cannot sell his product at a rate that competes with the market, he won't make many sales as customers go elsewhere... profit on each might be decent from a calculable standpoint, but it's all for naught if he can't sell more than a couple each year. Suddenly his "cost" just increased dramatically because he has to include basic survival between sales in the bottom line.

I have a set amount of money I wish to make (in profit) for every hour spent on a project. If the project doesn't meet that rate, the only way I do it is for sheer enjoyment (like when you see woodworkers selling beautiful bowls for $5-10 at the craft fair... they're not making a profit, but they love the work, and the few dollars they bring in buys a tool or two). The OP may just want to make a few bucks on the side, but he should be aware of what he's competing against.

[Marvin Hasenak]

I would do the following if faced with the same question. Review several commercial blank web sites as a starting place...noting the types and quality of woods comparable to yours and the sizes (e.g. Got Wood, Blanks 4 U, etc). And as John pointed out, factoring in preparation in the form of waxing and whatever tooling is involved, etc. A question in the final pricing includes are you trying to create a business/market for selling blanks and therefore pricing them competitively enough to keep people from paying web site prices (even with the shipping factored in) or are you simply doing this as a 'one off' favor for someone? Based on your description of what's requested...I've seen that size in the $75 - $100 range. I'd under-cut those numbers by 10-15% and work from there. Good Luck...

I wouldn't drop the price, if you do you will find yourself working at selling. If the competition can sell it at $50, I would also sell it at $50. This is not an inventory that you can regrow in your lifetime, even if you have ample sources of resupply, the work involved to process it also needs to be factored in. A friend of mine started selling wood blanks, started out cutting prices, soon found himself so busy he hated to see the sawmill and the processing shop. So he raised his prices to match others, he made more money with a lot less work.

[Kent Adams]

I'm not suggesting profit doesn't matter, Kent, only that looking solely at profit margin can often guarantee you get zero sales... and where's the profit in that?

Perhaps I wasn't clear. Sell at a profit only those things you can competitively sell at a profit.




[/QUOTE]
I look closely at every job I bid on. If the profit margin is too low, I simply don't bid. Yes, I can make SOME profit, but it's too low to make it worth my while and I know another job will be available soon where the profit margin is much higher. But the key here is I let some jobs go.[/QUOTE]

Agree. Resources are better utilized in higher profit work than lower profit work.


[/QUOTE]
If the OP cannot sell his product at a rate that competes with the market, he won't make many sales as customers go elsewhere... .[/QUOTE]

Agree with that as well, unless there is some sort of value his product is delivering that others may not be. For example, let's say his bowl blank buyers are local and they trust him. The buyers may buy from him at a higher price than a non-local competitor, allowing him to charge more. Price is not the only consideration for everyone. It might be for this type of product, but not for other products.

.[/QUOTE]
profit on each might be decent from a calculable standpoint, but it's all for naught if he can't sell more than a couple each year. [/QUOTE]

That would depend on his costs, including labor. If he makes 2 widgets a year that cost him $1,000 and he can sell them for $5000, then it might be worth his time to lower production for higher returns.

[/QUOTE]
Suddenly his "cost" just increased dramatically because he has to include basic survival between sales in the bottom line.[/QUOTE]

That's the point I was making with covering fixed costs by selling at a break even which is a legitimate reason for a business to sell at break even. However, selling it at a loss because you don't know your costs, means you won't be in business for very long.


[/QUOTE]
I have a set amount of money I wish to make (in profit) for every hour spent on a project. If the project doesn't meet that rate, the only way I do it is for sheer enjoyment (like when you see woodworkers selling beautiful bowls for $5-10 at the craft fair... they're not making a profit, but they love the work, and the few dollars they bring in buys a tool or two).[/QUOTE]

I assume when you say in the example above that the bowls selling for $5-$10 cost at least and no more than $5-$10 because you wrote there is no profit. Why not take that $5-$10 and just buy the tools? The sale didn't put any money in your pocket, it was just traded for a break even cost.


[/QUOTE]
The OP may just want to make a few bucks on the side, but he should be aware of what he's competing against.[/QUOTE]

Agreed. This may not even be a business for him, just keeping a few friends or customers happy (refer back to my original post about building brand which is a legitimate business reason to sell at a loss or breakeven in the short term).

[Shawn Pachlhofer]

ya'll are waaaaay of into the weeds.

I would sell based on number of board feet, and adjust for figure or uniqueness of each blank.

[Rich Sabulsky]

Another vote for keeping it simple. Determine cost to produce (Labor, raw material, and consumables) and add a markup. A sliding markup for larger sizes and nicer figure would be acceptable.

[Dan Masshardt]

Since he's cutting it on a sawmill, you can't compare the value to firewood. You'd compare the value to a thick slab of the wood, which is exactly what it will be before he cuts it up.

If it's a local pickup expecially I'd try to sell it as squares not rounds as that saves the layout and bandsawing. And possibly the sealing if they take it when you cut it.

Heck try to get the person to buy a whole slab. Then they can saw off bowl blanks as needed.

[guy laizure]

Green wood slabs around here go for $1 a board foot.Price goes up if it is kiln dried.