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start up cabinet shop

12/11/16       
RON Member

Reading a lot on this site about cabinet makers. I have a question and would like all options. I have a wonderful friend that is giving me all the equipment to start a cabinet shop. I am a amateur woodworker doing it about 20 years. Would just like some input.

12/11/16       #2: start up cabinet shop ...
Family Man

Find a successful small shop out of your area and offer to work for minimum wage for a three month period if they'd be willing to give you the cliff notes version of an internship.

If it's out of the area they won't feel threatened to give up their secret sauce and in this busy time a minimum wage hand who is all in and working their butt off would be a huge blessing.

Financially, in the long run, this will save you tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars. Family & relationship wise, this will save you hundreds and thousands of hours away from your loved ones as you can skip a good many courses in the school of hard knocks.

Suck it up and pay the price upfront. Then begin to line up work.

Good luck-

12/11/16       #3: start up cabinet shop ...
rich c.

Marketing and business skills are more important than woodworking skills. How many years of business skill do you have?

12/12/16       #4: start up cabinet shop ...
RON Member

That one thing I dont have much of

12/12/16       #5: start up cabinet shop ...
Mark B Member

Great information on the internship. Id guess it'd be difficult to pull off if you dont have some other source of income or a large amount of savings.

Lot of loose ends in the question. The equipment is one thing but what about a space/facility. Ancilary equipment, starting and operating capital. Do you have a building? Will you have to rent? Supply chain? Do you have a couple years of buffer money in the bank to hold you over while you get the business (and yourself) up to speed? It'll take every bit of that to learn 10% of the mistakes.

Hate to sound pessimistic but its a very tough game when you reasonably well positioned (good knowledge of the process, reasonably low overhead, established customer base). Coming in dead green on all fronts would be a major task in my opinion.

My $0.02 would be to treat the gift as a major push to your hobby of woodworking and begin to pursue your hobby aggressively with the thought of one day breaking out on your own full time. Keep your day job. Prepare your family for either you not being there much or them having to spend time with you in the shop while your working. Then put your head down and get at it.

Mark

12/12/16       #6: start up cabinet shop ...
Puzzleman Member

I didn't have much in the way of marketing skills when I started, however, I quickly realized my lack of the skills. Took classes at local college to learn more about sales, marketing and business. It really helped a lot. Things made so much more sense afterwards.

12/12/16       #7: start up cabinet shop ...
RON Member

I already have a 4000 sq ft building I do woodworking on the side my building is heated and have central air for summer i have a 50hp phase converter

12/12/16       #8: start up cabinet shop ...
rich c.

If you already have the space paid for, and you're getting more free equipment, then start running a business while you keep your day job. You will want to outsource parts to reduce build time, but you get to practice running a business while you keep a back up plan. You'll figure out a marketing plan, discover what the real overhead is, and do time studies to discover how slow/fast you really are. Then decide if you can justify quitting the day job. I worked part time for probably 6-7 years before I quit my corporate job. I lasted 8 years in business before complete burn out almost killed me. I shut it down and went back to a corporate job. Luckily for us, my wife had a job with health insurance and benefits while I ran the business. That was the final cog in being able to quit my corporate job.

12/12/16       #9: start up cabinet shop ...
David Yurk  Member

Website: http://www.crockettscabinetry.com

Ron, that was me 10 years ago. Quickly realized what rich c. said about business and marketing being more important than woodworking skills. Family Man's point about getting experience in a for-profit production setting is equally important. Had it not been for 9 years of that kind of experience, I probably would not have made it. Woodworking on the side or as a hobby is one thing. Doing it full time for a living is a whole different animal. Best wishes.

12/13/16       #10: start up cabinet shop ...
cabmaker


What you are selling is a service. All you have for sale is your time. In the customer's mind, however, they are buying "product". These are two different animals,

Actual cabinetmaking represents maybe 25% of the equation. Anybody can flatten a board on a jointer. Learning how to read sign is the big challenge. A lot of the discussions that take place are like two rug salesmen haggling over the price of a rug without anybody actually mentioning the rug. When they talk about how beautiful the ceiling in the Sistine Chapel is they're really talking about the price of the rug.

You will be asked to commit to a budget before you have any film on any of the players. This includes all the players.You won't know how good of decision maker any of them are and it will be a long time before you learn how to communicate accurately and thoroughly what it is you are providing. You will be in charge of funding all ambiguity.

12/13/16       #11: start up cabinet shop ...
Family Man

Cabmaker is spot on in his answer.

Can you believe I typed that?

12/14/16       #12: start up cabinet shop ...
David R Sochar Member

Website: http://www.acornwoodworks.com

I'll play the cynic......

The best way to make a million dollars building cabinets is to start with 2 million dollars.

Before that, be sure to watch the video below.

So You Want To Be A Cabinetmaker

12/14/16       #13: start up cabinet shop ...
cabmaker

FamilyMan,

Of course you agree with me.
Cabinetmaking is a topic you actually understand.

12/14/16       #14: start up cabinet shop ...
cabmaker

(just teasing!)

12/14/16       #15: start up cabinet shop ...
Family Man

Tim,
I know we go back and forth. There is very little we agree on- including facts. But I respect you as a businessman and cabinetmaker.

As long as the federal government is so large and centralized, wielding power that in my opinion was meant for the states, guys like you and I will continue to butt heads. I really don't have a problem with Seattle or Washington DC doing what they want but it should be localized. You really can't escape it right now by voting with your feet. Someday I hope we can look across a border at each other and be friendly and shake hands, as we each get to live our lives as we wish- the alternative is much grimmer.

Take care and Merry Christmas to you and your family.

12/15/16       #16: start up cabinet shop ...
JSO

Ron,
I can't believe all the doom and gloom on your question. Like others have mentioned, you need a plan, the plan does have a lot of detail in it, like building? Do you own or will you rent? Location and size of customer base? Scooe of work, do you want to do residential, commercial, build furniture or specialize in one area like maybe just build cabinet doors or drawer boxes? Size, how big do you want to get? Employees or no employees? Do you want to install yourself or sub it out? Do you want to finish yourself or sub it out? If building complete kitchens do you want to build every thing yourself or sub some or all of the components out?
There are a lot of details with your situation that we don't know about, that will be for you and your people to figure out and decide upon. Get advice from professionals that you know that can look at your ideas and come up with a plan. Talk to your banker or accountant or some one in business and brainstorm.
It doesn't matter what business you can think of, some people have failed, some have succeeded. I know some people who have become millionaires and I have also seen many auctions for people who have gone bankrupt in the woodworking business.
To sum it up, you control your destiny, do what you think is best for you and your family. I wish you all the best!

12/15/16       #17: start up cabinet shop ...
cabmaker

The OP does not CONTROL his destiny.
He has input but little more.

12/15/16       #18: start up cabinet shop ...
JSO

So please tell me what a good business man is then, or is there no such thing?

12/15/16       #19: start up cabinet shop ...
cabmaker

JSO,

A good businessman recognizes that there is very little he can control and therefore focuses on mitigation. In corporate speak this is called risk management.

In order to manage risk you have to recognize it. This is where contingency planning comes into play.

The typical entrepreneur has no plan for failure because it does not exist in his world. There are no problems according to him, only opportunities.

When the first problem shows up he sleeps right through it. Never even knew it happened. Eventually he does wake up and realize "I got a problem!". Phase two of this epiphany is designing a strategy to remediate said problem. It takes a while to come up with a strategy and then it takes a while to implement the strategy. The fourth time period is waiting to see if the strategy works.

A smart businessman has proactively defined what constitutes a yellow flag for his business. When he sees one he knows it for what it is and goes over to stand next to the red lever. As soon as he sees the second yellow flag he can predict a trend so he pulls hard on the red lever.

This red lever is not necessarily a panacea for his problem but it does provide the advantage of containing his problems in 1 1/2 phases rather than 4.

All the other contributors have done in this thread is help define what constitutes a yellow flag for contingency planning in the woodworking realm.

12/15/16       #20: start up cabinet shop ...
rich c.

A good business man? A person that knows his limitations. If he has never done marketing or graphic design for his web page, he hires it done. Only camera he owns is his phone? Hire a photographer. No idea what a LLC is? Hire an accountant. I was not good at any of those things, but thought at first that anyone could do it. Then hired a photographer for my portfolio, hired an accountant, and read everything I could find. Figured out I had to sell myself first, then my work. Found out interior designers were better at selling me than I was, so worked with some really good ones. Actually a good businessman should go into it KNOWING he is not great at nearly everything! He just needs to find out who is.

12/16/16       #21: start up cabinet shop ...
JSO

I have to disagree with you, to me saying that the OP has little control of his Destiny is like saying the sun doesn't rise in the East. He has all the control of his destiny. But it is just two schools of thought, not a big deal.
Hope everyone has a great Christmas!

12/16/16       #22: start up cabinet shop ...
David R Sochar Member

Despite the differing definitions of Destiny, and as long as we are at the esoteric end of the discussion, I would quote a man that is probably insane, but made sense when he said:

There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. These are things we don't know we don't know.

Donald Rumsfeld

Watch out for the unknown unknowns. They are the ones that will get you (and Rumsfeld) into trouble big time.

12/16/16       #23: start up cabinet shop ...
Pat Gilbert

The key is to find a niche.

The more you specialize the more your prediction increases.

The unknown unknowns become fewer.


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