Tage Frid Workbench
I’m building his workbench and plan to sell it at a Christmas Bazaar. It will be made from Beech and built to a high standard. I’m trying to figure out how much to charge for it. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks
Ed Hobbick
Seattle, Wa
Replies
Hi
Hello, Ed, from Greenlake!
What bazaar?
It's going to be at the Normandy Park Cove on Dec 4th. If you want to sell somrthing at it, get on there website and put an app in.
Ed
I'd use the normal method of materials + time + overhead + profit = price.
I would think that a workbench will likely be an unusual item to find at a bazaar, though.
Thanks for the reply Price.
How do you keep track of time, do you just clock in and out on a project. What if you have three or four projects going?
I've never sold anything so I wonder how it is done.
keeping track of time
I'd just keep a notebook where you log time spent on each project. It doesn't have to be fancy or highly precise. You just want to get paid something for your time.
Thanks. I'll give it a try.
You'll Like It
Once you get used to keeping a log, you'll find many, many uses for it.
I keep a very simple log, fashioned after the one that I kept as a general contractor.
The first line is simply the date, the temperature and the humidity in my shop.
Then I simply note the time and what I'm going to start doing. The assumption is that I'm doing that until I write something else down. So it looks like this:
9/20/10 75º, 85%
1300-- Admin. (Admin is what I say when I'm putting on my apron, emptying the dust collector, writing down the temp readings, picking my nose, pouring my coffee and deciding what I'm going to work on first.
1304-- Sanding box.
1306-- Coffee break.
1426-- Sanding box.
1430-- Lunch.
1610--Sanding box.
1630--Quit.
That's all there is to it. If you then enter those times in a spreadsheet or a database, it's easy to figure out how much time you spent on any task.
The magic happens from simply having a pen and a piece of paper on you at all times. (I use the Write In The Rain books, because that's what I used Back In The Day, and I started using them because you could write on them in the rain, and because they fit into the hip pockets of Carhartts.)
Once you have a pen and paper all the time, it becomes natural, and second nature to use them. You make lists on them, and you never forget things at Home Depot again. You sketch in them, you do calculations in them, you use them for all manner of written work. And that's where the real payoff is. When you have a careful, neat set of calculations written out, and the hip rafter doesn't drop into place, you can go back and figure out why.
And then you can even make a note about it.
I list "important" notes like that (read "notes I know I'll want to find again") in the index in the front of each book, and can re-build important work sequences, including the calculations, the router settings, the saw settings, notes on how to use each jig, notes on why we don't feed stuff into that particular jig backwards, and everything else you could imagine.
I have a shelf dedicated to my old Job Logs, from my contracting days, and one day, to my amazement, I found Mrs. Jammer going through my logs, and she said they were actually quite interesting.
Now, I don't see THAT, but there is a reason I love her.
You milage may vary. Have fun.
Journal.
I have kept a daily journal for thirty years and my only regret is that I didn't start sooner. It just takes 5 minutes at the end of the day before going to bed. Nothing fancy or "dear diary schoolgirl stuff" just what I did, what I bought, sometimes what I ate, where I went. It sure helps when you find an odd charge on your credit card and you can go to your journal, look up the charge date and see, yes you were at Lowes and bought six clamps.
I highly recommend the practice. As you get older the journal becomes your only reliable short term memory.
Thanks for the advise.
Today I sanded for 5 minutes straight!
Log Book
Jammersix,
I have been doing the same thing, I started keeping a log book when I was in a Construction Management progam back in the early 80's. I went back to school and got a degree in Constrution Mgmt. I used note books that were nade for survey crews, they have water proof paper and you could tell if a page was torn out. And I keep track of them by putting the start and end dates on the inside cover. Then when the book is filled I write the dates on the spine of the book so you can see the dates with the books sitting on the book shelf.
Mine used to start off the same as yours almost with date, temp, weather today, trades on site, meetings today, inspections today, deliveries today. and any conflicts today.
Then I take notes of every conversation, meeting phone call, start time, end time you name it. It's a complete accounting of everything I do everyday. Mow as I am no longer in the field my heading have changed a little but I would be lost without my little book. Now I use a daytimer. I have been thinking about going digital with a PDA, But I am still having a issue of trusting that the PDA or computer would crash and losing my notes.
Enough said, I think. Sorry about getting off topic,
Taigert
Log Book
Jammersix,
I have been doing the same thing, I started keeping a log book when I was in a Construction Management progam back in the early 80's. I went back to school and got a degree in Constrution Mgmt. I used note books that were nade for survey crews, they have water proof paper and you could tell if a page was torn out. And I keep track of them by putting the start and end dates on the inside cover. Then when the book is filled I write the dates on the spine of the book so you can see the dates with the books sitting on the book shelf.
Mine used to start off the same as yours almost with date, temp, weather today, trades on site, meetings today, inspections today, deliveries today. and any conflicts today.
Then I take notes of every conversation, meeting phone call, start time, end time you name it. It's a complete accounting of everything I do everyday. Mow as I am no longer in the field my heading have changed a little but I would be lost without my little book. Now I use a daytimer. I have been thinking about going digital with a PDA, But I am still having a issue of trusting that the PDA or computer would crash and losing my notes.
Enough said, I think. Sorry about getting off topic,
Taigert
Price for a bench
This seems to me like a "make or buy" decision, assuming I'm the buyer. If I need a bench, I will look around to find out how much one will cost to buy vs. how much cost/trouble to make my own. Highland Woodworking has one (a "premium" model) on their site for $900. I'm not familiar with the one you are making, but I'd assume it's nice, solid, with good quality workmanship, materials and clamps (likely better than the one from Highland). If you are only making one, then you lose the economies of scale and you probably have lots more than $900 in cost and labor in it.
After all this, I don't have any advice on the price you should charge, just look at it from a buyer's perspective and see how your price competes with others who are selling similar benches.
You're a braver man that I am.
I wasn't going to say anything, because cowards live longer lives.
But when I saw the first post, I did think "...and when I'm offered $550 for my bench, a bench that's CLEARLY worth $3,500, I'll load that sucker back up in my pickup, take it home and eat dinner off it before I'll sell it for less than the material cost!"
Benches are one of those things that anyone who actually needs one won't pay what they're worth, because they have the skills to create one themselves, and because everyone's idea of a bench is different, they won't want to pay what your bench is worth because the brown is three shades too dark, the vises are too small and the dog holes are too far apart, as well as 1/16" too big.
~Jammer, a dyed-in-the-wool coward, hiding under the table, eyes tight shut, hands clamped over ears, chanting "you can't see me, you can't see me, you can't see me..."
Additional questions...
Great question Ed. So what’s your main goal? To recoup your costs? Get a little profit?
I don’t know if this is a charitable sort of bazaar or one where artisans try to sell their work for extra cash or $$$ to (potentially!) support themselves.
And for reference, is this your first endeavor selling your work? If not, what sort of work do you typically make? And what sort of worbench do you have for yourself?
Thanks for posting, Gina, FineWoodworking.com
http://npcove.org/pdf/Holiday-Bazaar-2010.pdf
Work Bench
I have a Tage Frid Bench that I built about 12 years ago. It works very well for me, I put blocks under it to heighten it a bit as I am 6'2" and I bolted it to the floor for stability. I use the bench as an outfeed table for my table saw as well.
I've never sold anything, I have made many gifts over the years though. I typically make nice boxes, lamps, coffee tables, picture frames, wall cabinets ect.
Thank you for responding
Ed
Adam King on Pricing Your Work
http://www.woodworkersjourney.com/2-simple-steps-for-pricing-your-woodworking-in-the-sweet-spot
On a similar vein... Adam King put up a new post on pricing your work today. Like some of the comments here, he asks "How much are people paying for what you make."
Any thoughts on his advice? -Gina
starting out
Hi, I haven’t poked my head around these parts in quite a while but after reading your post I thought a might pipe in.
My advice to the beginner trying to selling their wares would be, keep it small and inexpensive.
Most people looking around at a bazaar don’t expect to spend thousands or have a way to transport big items. I would think the items you mentioned as your general projects would be more in line with the crowd at a bazaar. Also you could probably produce more items faster and for less thus increasing your marketability and sales.
Good luck,
Chaim
Thanks for the input. I'm still going to give it a try and if it doesn't sell I'll have a new piece of furniture for my apartment... the chicks will dig it if you know what I mean.
Here is a question for you or anyone else for that matter. I plan to use a tension rod to attach the trestles to the uprights on the base of this bench. What size would be best for this: 3/8', 1/2" and would it need to be a grade 8 threaded rod or could it be just the regular non graded type?
Ed
solid bench
You can post it in Custom Made on FWW and I bet you will reach a larger group of interested customers
Robert.
This forum post is now archived. Commenting has been disabled