New Business Plan

[Scott Shepherd]

You want fast tile engraving, visit this site

http://www.lasertile.com/lasertilemaster.html#null

and click on the "video here" link just above the photograph of the machines. Not sure I'd like to be competing against this with a standard laser system.

[David Fairfield]

I wonder if the laser engraver companies could help you out with a variety of business plans, or a newsletter profiling successful users? Its in their interest to have that sort of information available. Ask for references so you can verify results.

Dave

[Angus Hines]

Thats fast so fast it looks like somebody actually engraved the auto feed table too.

You want fast tile engraving, visit this site

http://www.lasertile.com/lasertilemaster.html#null

and click on the "video here" link just above the photograph of the machines. Not sure I'd like to be competing against this with a standard laser system.

[Dan Hintz]

You want fast tile engraving, visit this site

http://www.lasertile.com/lasertilemaster.html#null

and click on the "video here" link just above the photograph of the machines. Not sure I'd like to be competing against this with a standard laser system.

This explains the speed:

3-axis high speed galvo marking head

When you're not moving an optical head and gantry platform back and forth, you can really crank up the speed. Looks like the focal length is a couple of feet, so they can do some fairly wide tiles.

[Scott Shepherd]

No disrespect meant to anyone (don't you hate it when something starts with that?), but I haven't met too many people who are running successful businesses who will post their business plans and strategies online. I think you'll find they offer up a lot of advice (very good advice), but I wouldn't expect you'll find too many people openly putting up there bread and butter ideas on a public forum, despite the appearance of it on forums.

[Mark Winlund]

I cant resist..... after more than 25 years at this, I must say that most new technologies don't make much money for by themselves in the beginning. Your customers have to know about it and shift their way of thinking. After all these years, I still make money on rotary engraving, because everyone knows what it is, and what it looks like.

So many lasers are now sold to people that are essentially hobbyists. It is a fun machine to use, and it will do a lot of things that couldn't be done before. That ususally does not translate into a money making business. You really have to already be in the engraving business to make it work.

It's kind of sad to read the posts of people that have spent their retirement money on an expensive machine, and then rather plaintively say "what do I do now?"

Making money in the engraving business is not easy.... it requires lots of hours, business skills, artwork prep skills, and a big financial cushion so that you can last a few years while you make mistakes.

Mark

[Sylvia Mossbrucker]

Ive only been doing marble photo for about 4 months but ITS NOT SIMPLE AT ALL!!!!! Im good with computers, actually real good, but im learning photoshop,photograve,coreldraw,corelpaint,universa l laser systems print driver, epilogs setting, power settings, speed settings, dpi, ppi, contrast, brightness, how to fix a bad photo, etc.,etc.,etc..........granid im using a 120 watt epilog and a 75 watt universal so i must learn both, THE SETTINGS are ENTIRELY DIFFERENT AND THE MACHINES ARE QUITE DIFFERENT!!!!! So just keep in mind when you said (I ASSUMED engraving a 12x12 would be easy................) NOPE, not even close!! Im not trying to burst your bubble at all but I have never im my life had a learning curve in a job position like I have at my current lasering job!!!!!! Wish you the BEST OF LUCK...and listen to everyone here they have great advise and experience!

Sylvia

Thank you all very much for your insights. I guess I have been a little mislead.

Everything I have read (other than here) indicates that although there is a learning curve, engraving is generally like using a printer. I ASSUMED that engraving a photograph on a 12"x12" piece of granite or marble would be relatively straightforward and easy to do.....and the quality would be as good as what I saw when I visited Vytek (granted I did not see them actually laser that item, but the 3D subsurface items that they DID do in front of me seemed relatively easy to do). I also assumed that using a 60-75 watt laser, I could do a 12"x12" granite piece in under 30 minutes.......am I totally disillussioned here? So it's not just....scan, import and print?

I'm in Upstate NY and a kiosk in our local mall is going for $750/mo (but it jumps to $4,000/mo for Oct-Dec). If I could make $40 on that 12"x12" piece of marble......that's only 20 per month (less than 1 per day) to cover the kiosk. Granted I know that a kiosk location would be a challenge due to the venting issues. What am I missing? Does the average parent not want to spend $50 on a picture of their kid etched in marble?

Also, I guess I was surprised that there are so many business failures.....I haven't really read anything about that on the net and the number of used lasers for sale seems relatively small.

So if I don't go retail........does anyone have any good niche market ideas that they'd be willing to share with me? I went to Dee's website and was very impressed with her sets.....but obviously it must have taken her quite some time to develop that market.

Thanks again for all your comments and advice!

[Rodne Gold]

There is only one secret to making money using a laser and that is MARKETING!!!!!!!!
It really is as simple as that..............

[Peter Vasic]

Steve,

The retail thing, in a mall.....with a laser...selling trinkets.....that require an enormous learning curve to produce an image on..........................

Then when youve worked out that it truly isnt going to work ( which it isnt).....and you decide you need to go commercial, because your laser payments are due and you dont have the time to chase the work, because your still trying to work out how to use all your software..and you need to price your work so you can clear your overheads and you dont have a metal or plastic shear to cut your metal and your customer wants an engraved i.e rotary look.phew....

Then you realise you are actually in the same market place as everyone on this forum and 10 other forums and all those not on forums, trying to take their business.......

I got up yesterday and walked into a bank and said to the person behind the counter....I want to be a bank manager, I can count and I watch him through the window over there, sitting behind a desk, counting , writing and talking to people, reckon I could wing it within a few months very easily


Peter

[Craig Hogarth]

Personally, I would love to have a mall location. Every Things Remembered I've seen in a mall has always had customers in it. I don't know how much they do in sales, but they definitely don't have a problem getting people in the door. While rent would be considerably higher, I'm sure you wouldn't have spend nearly as much on marketing than would with another location.

[Joe Pelonio]

Personally, I would love to have a mall location. Every Things Remembered I've seen in a mall has always had customers in it. I don't know how much they do in sales, but they definitely don't have a problem getting people in the door. While rent would be considerably higher, I'm sure you wouldn't have spend nearly as much on marketing than would with another location.

One other thing to consider at a mall is who shops there, and to have items that those people will buy. Around here, for example, except for the holidays when most everyone is forced to shop, the malls are full of teenagers who hang out there but don't really buy much other than electronics and clothes.

Many of us avoid the malls, and prefer to shop online or at specific stores and ignore the others. Recent studies I have seen on it shows the greatest number of mall customers at ages 14-17, next is 18-24. Ages 35-44 is the smallest group. Also, the ratio of females to males is 63%-37%.

I don't remember where I got this but it was in my notes from research I did a few years ago, and was from a recent University of Texas study.

[Craig Hogarth]

Joe, I really never looked indepth into it since the good malls are over 90 min away from home. But going off your stats, even if female age 35-44 make up 10% of the mall patrons, you're still talking thousands of shoppers weekly. The thing I like about the mall is that there is a ton of money being spent on luxury items there. That's my biggest problem. We get a lot of people who love our stuff, but most don't have the money to spend.

While I'd love to give the mall a shot, I never see it happening. It'd probably take about 50 12x12 tiles or more just to pay overhead and that's just way too much work without staff.

[Bill Jermyn]

All of the above. I had the idea of making a killing off all the nifty stuff I could make with the laser. Problem: no customers. Go after large commercial and manufacturing, retail is not worth the effort.

[Craig Hogarth]

It is possible to make a living doing retail, but not without a storefront or a very very good website.

[Peter Vasic]

It is possible to make a living doing retail, but not without a storefront or a very very good website.

Craig,

Why go to all the trouble of tying up thousands of dollars in machinery, inventory, software c etc etc. to "make a living""

when a good resume will get you a well paid job, with a tenth of the stress, car paid for, phone paid for, medical benefits, holidays, public holidays, sick leave, bonuses, incentives??????????

Sounds like making a living is like investing everything you have into working out of a shed in your backyard, having a bad website and eking out a living.