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Focusing a Moulding Business
Question
I got a call recently, and it really got me thinking about evaluating my business. The caller told me that his business only produces one molding profile, and only sells in truckload quantities with employees in the single digits. It produces over 70,000 lumber feet per day and he says he does very well for himself. My question is this - if I already have the machinery in place and ready to run high volumes at high speeds, what would be my best plan of action be to transform my custom molding business into a specialized high output cash machine? I've never run any product in truckload quantities, but I'm more than ready to take the plunge. I want to specialize in moldings that are less than 1" wide. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Forum Responses
From contributor C: To the original questioner: What kind of moldings are you doing that are 1" or less? I realize your waste could be reduced, but to me it sounds like you have high overhead and too many profiles. From the original questioner: Contributor C, actually I have extremely low overhead. We have a whole lot of machinery for two guys to run and it run efficiently. Our shop consists of a chop saw, planer/sander, gang rip, 6 head molders, profile grinder, cnc router, vacuum dry kiln, and a few other machines we rarely turn on. Our shop could employ a few people if I can key on one product and sell in large quantities. We've managed to keep overhead low because we basically do everything ourselves. From contributor E: To the original questioner: It sounds as though you have a well thought out plan. I caution you though about the dreaded unknowns such as breakdowns, suppliers, etc. Even the simple maintenance costs thousands of feet and at .05 it takes time to regain that. I think you may be optimistic about 80,000 feet with 6 employees - just moving and gang ripping the stock will be a chore.
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