Thank you everyone for your kind comments and suggestions! I think at this point, I will continue as I have for the past few years, and pursue my instrument building obsession as an "after hours" endeavor. Thank you Paul for your real world assessment, which basically confirmed what I suspected- I had hoped there was a magical place where I could work in my shop doing what I love full time, and support my family, but I guess in reality the market is just not there. I will build and sell instruments as requests come in, but not pursue it full time- I agree with you that the design and building is THE fun of the whole thing, and that is what I am going to focus on. If it grows beyond my expectations...AWESOME! If not, I will have lost nothing, because I began this whole journey to explore the possibilities of bowed keyboards. That is what I am doing; in the process I am meeting people from all over the world, and I am having a blast!
Jon
--- In oddmusic@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Marshall" <paul@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Jon,
>
> coming back to this quite late, apologies.
>
> I'm 10 years building unusual instruments commercially and I do quite a bit
> of bespoke building, maybe not as odd as some of the one-off stuff you'll
> see here but it often has to be commercially viable, suitable for outdoors
> and to safety standards etc etc so I have to work within specific
> parameters. I've installed this stuff in hundreds of schools & parks and
> worked with as designer Stomp, IKEA, 20th Century Fox and was bridesmaid on
> the TV ad for Ford car part musical instruments (congrats to Bill Milbrot!)
>
> There are a bunch of things to consider when you make the change from a cool
> hobby into a business. Be prepared to experience moving further and further
> away from the design/building side that you love, it's unfortunate that the
> building of the instruments themselves is the fun and easy part, it's
> maintenance of a business that sucks away your life. 10 years later for me
> I'm spending my time managing the business instead of making all the cool
> stuff that I have in my head, on scraps of paper and on sketchup (what a
> terrific tool!). I still design but it tends to be only the bespoke stuff
> and only when I have someone who has commissioned it - that's so much fun
> but it needs to be done quickly because these people want to talk concepts
> with you on Monday, have firm CAD plans on Tuesday and have it built by
> Thursday and they want it for half of what it costs to make it - ok so a
> sight exaggeration!
>
> I'm happy to exchange private emails if that would be useful but I will say
> off the bat that the marketplace that you are looking at is pretty small and
> would be difficult to maintain as the sole income source, particularly if
> you are formed officially with the requisite insurances and the various
> overheads that it takes to keep it a commercially viable entity. If you wish
> to service a wider/related market like my own then be prepared for
> workshops, staff, raw materials, tooling etc etc, before you know it, you're
> spending $5k every month just to keep the business afloat so you've to sell
> $10k worth of stuff to make it worth your while and then austerity measures
> kick in so budgets are cut, the market shrinks.... On top of that you get
> the customers who decide thay they want 60 days to pay instead of 30 so as a
> result, you can't pay your suppliers or sub-contractors or staff and then
> you have to manage all of that when really you just want to be designing
> cool new stuff.
>
> I would say at the heels of the hunt, be careful what you wish for. My own
> experience was to get carried away with the excitement of the design side
> but even though I have an MBA, I didn't really give the business side
> sufficient gravitas until it really became unavoidable, at which stage
> you're already up to your neck. A business plan is good but be prepared to
> change it every few weeks once you start to get down & dirty in the trenches
> and work out that you need to re-evaluate everything that you had assumed to
> be something different that what it was.
>
> Drop me an email if you have specific questions, I may be limited about what
> I can say in some areas, I'm happy to help fellow builders but there may be
> points beyond which I won't/can't go :)
>
> Cheers
>
> P
> ______________________
> Paul Marshall DMS MBA
> Managing Director
>
> 2001-2011 - 10 YEARS OF OUTDOOR INSTRUMENTS
>
> www.bingbangbong.com
> The Outdoor Musical Instrument People
>
> ---- Original Message -----
> From: jon
> To: oddmusic@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Thursday, March 24, 2011 6:32 PM
> Subject: [oddmusic] Wheelharp
>
>
>
> Hello everyone-I'm the guy who came up with the wheelharp several years ago,
> and it seems that Oddmusic has generated way more interest than I would have
> ever thought. I have had several people wanting me to build them one, or a
> varient...but I still felt the design had a few bugs to work out, so I have
> spent the past seven years experimenting with new designs as time allows. I
> am starting on an instrument now that uses what I feel are the best
> qualities of everything I've tried so far. It's home will eventually be a
> gentleman in L.A.,who I am sure will master the thing...goodness knows I
> never will. Anyway...I am slowly trying to learn the business end of things-
> and am taking some free business classes offered by a local university
> extension office. Aside from being FREE, there is even the prospect of a
> grant to fund start up of a small business if they feel it has a shot. Has
> anyone here ever done a business plan, and demographics of who potential
> customers would be for odd musical instruments? I know there are folks out
> there- they may be few and far between, but they are there. I was even
> contacted by someone who worked for Bjork, as she was interested in
> commissioning a wheelharp- unfortunatly, my spam filter trashed it, and I
> didn't find the email till over a year later.
>
> So...any ideas as to who future wheelharp owners might be hiding?
>
> thanks!
>
> Jon
>
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