Follow your dreams

[Malcolm Schweizer]

This is to inspire; not to brag.

Yesterday I took in 500 bft of mahogany and 1000 bft of yellow birch for the hotel restoration project we are very involved in, on top of the 1000 bft we already had in. It was one of those moments that I realized how far I have come. I remember when I bought my first mahogany, and I was so proud of my three carefully picked boards. I was beside myself. I still appreciate every board as much as those first few.

Many times people have asked here about going pro, and a lot of people said to keep it a hobby or else you will hate it. HOGWASH!!! Do what you love, and you’ll love your job every day. Since I built the shop and went full time, I have yet to have a day that I didn’t get up excited to go to work. There were days I knew I had a lot on me, and had stress about something needing to get done, but it was a different stress, because I was in control, and I knew what needed to be done, and I liked doing it. It was more of a sense of urgency than stress. When I had a corporate job, it was daily stress, and I never felt like I was in control.

There was a lot to invest, and a lot of time without pay as I built the business and reinvested profits into growth, but I am so glad I made the move.

I am sharing for anyone thinking about making woodworking a full-time thing. Just do it. Don’t let the nay-sayers bring you down.

Oh, and the mahogany is for a very large bar, and the birch is for doors, millwork, and furniture for the hotel. More is yet to come, as we have added a contract for a gift shop, another bar, and more doors. We really need a forklift, but the drivers have so far been very cool and patient with us hand unloading all this.

https://youtu.be/1G-Kqm2yV14?si=WG801fOfaV1SUX6b

[Richard Coers]

It takes a special personality to do this work for a profession. For me, I knew a few years in that I was a lot better craftsman than businessman. I closed my business after 8 years before going back to my previous corporate job. Now we are a two pension family and will be leaving our kids a nice gift when we die. When I was doing custom woodworking, we often were in a pinch at the end of the month. I definitely was not saving for retirement! That is what I caution dreamers about now. Being a professional woodworker takes way more business savvy than wood savvy. Probably 75% to 25%

[Maurice Mcmurry]

Its fun to get a peek inside your shop! Keep up the good work. Don't forget to surf (at least a little).

[Phillip Mitchell]

My experience is that *it depends* and that it can be a difficult profession to find balance and financial success in.

It depends on so many things that are not woodworking related. Things like location/market, networking skills, financial stability prior to starting the business, investment capital, risk tolerance, wanting to be more of a “growth” oriented business owner or more of a “creative” person who actually works wood most days and which side of that balance you can stand, if you can stand managing employees or need to work alone for the rest of your life (*raises hand*), if you have a family with young children and how you value your time.

I could say a lot about all of this, but will be succinct in this post by saying that I started my business in 2018 in a small, mostly rural market with very little investment capital or risk tolerance, coming from working for years prior as an employee from within the woodworking profession and not having a corporate job/income prior. While I have definitely seen “growth” over those years in many forms / metrics, I have also had some personal challenges and struggles and grown as a person and father of 3 young-ish children and realized that there are things more important to value than 50-60 hrs a week in my small shop alone and that my time outside the shop may just be more valuable than time spent inside of it. It has me assessing and questioning if I am spending my work time as well as I can and comparing it to other fields where I could work less hours overall and make 1.5-2x more $ with less expenses and headaches and enjoy the woodworking on my own time and tastes and not the clients’.

It really depends and I’m glad you have found success along your path.

[Mark Gibney]

Very well expressed Phillip.

[Patty Hann]

Ditto Phillip... you hit all the relevant points to consider.
One of the big ones: "... if you can stand managing employees or need to work alone for the rest of your life (*raises hand*)."
I can especially identify with that one (*raises TWO hands and BOTH Feet*)

[Rich Engelhardt]

Do what you love to do and you'll never have to work a day in your life.

I was fortunate enough to have such a job for close to twenty years.

[Jimmy Harris]

It takes a special personality to do this work for a profession. For me, I knew a few years in that I was a lot better craftsman than businessman. I closed my business after 8 years before going back to my previous corporate job. Now we are a two pension family and will be leaving our kids a nice gift when we die. When I was doing custom woodworking, we often were in a pinch at the end of the month. I definitely was not saving for retirement! That is what I caution dreamers about now. Being a professional woodworker takes way more business savvy than wood savvy. Probably 75% to 25%

In my experience, this is every profession. And more important than business savvy, if you want to consider it a separate thing, is networking. I know so many businesses that are successful, but are run by completely incompetent people who are neither good at their craft, good at business, hard working, or smart. But the one thing they all have in common is they're good with people. They're salespeople at heart. Being able to convince others to give their money to you is the first, second, and third most important skills a business owner can have.

[andrew whicker]

Lol, we have a lot of the "incompetent but connected" in Utah for sure. It's practically the culture here!

I'm happy for you Malcolm! Congrats on the success.

I have so many thoughts on running my own woodworking based business. There are some absolutely magical days when the shop doors are open on a beautiful day, the music is on and I'm just doing my thing.

There are also days where I'm sick, days I'm looking at the mtns wondering why I'm still working, days of being absolutely unsure where my next money injection is coming from, days of self doubt, etc.

However, as much as I hate it some days I'm not sure what else to do other than to make it happen. I am getting very nervous about going too much longer without retirement injections after 14 years of doing that every pay check.

It's a wild ride and i overalls love it. It made me a lot more open to social changes (ideas and actually laws) to make this world a better place. We talk a lot about loving small businesses but boy is that not true! And it's too bad because we're leaving a lot of people out of the system.

Anyway. Back to work and I'm making myself get off by 5 so that I can mtn bike or run. I refuse to be a one trick pony. Life is a lot more interesting than a job, no matter how cool the job.