Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi
Just interested whos a hobbiest and whos making a living building?
If your selling whats the price range
(Pics welcome)

Its every newbies dream to do this for a living.. so whos living my dream

Thanks

took me about 8 years till I could to this for my living. closing in on 200 guitar

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

I am.

1299$ base for Halcyon, 3k$ for the Tinkers.

I had a lot of advantages, such as working at a guitar factory for 18 years before they pulled the plug, during which time I got masses and masses of hands on experience. Plus I've lived in a house with a full basement for 20 years that I've been able to add to slowly.

As layoffs happened more and more frequently I started concentrating my focus more and more on my own shop, which turns out to have been the right move (so far) as when the doors shut at the factory my apprentice and I stepped into full time engagement in my shop which has kept us alive (but barely) for the last year.

My point is that it took 12 years of intensive persistent pursuit to get to this point, even with the giant advantages of working at a guitar factory with tools to die for and a Golden Dumpster of Great Wonder and access to a woodpile we only dream of.

So start slow, and don't quit your day job until your backorder demands it.

Plus, while still enjoyable, it ain't what it used to be...

Hobbyist here. Started out selling them to cover material cost, now price is about double material cost. I need to make a concentrated effort to get over the hurdle of minimal cosmetic defects in order to charge a real price, but the real job is busy and getting busier (the payback for success I guess) and attention to the process is sporadic.

I'd retire and build full time, but then I'd miss the job, which is still fascinating to me. What to do?

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

Hobbyist as well - constantly building when not at "work", give all my stuff away...helps keep me relatively sane....

Hobbyist also One a year is a nice pace for me. Working on number 16. Sell to cover cost of material.
FYI I had to burn 3 of my early builds because I got got in a hurry and really screwed them up.

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Say what you do, Do what you say.

Best way to hurry up is to slow down and do it once...

+1, but I don't discount the benefit of sustained and consistent effort in eliminating repeated stupid hiccups.

Building to scientific measurements a la Gore/Gilet is a step I haven't taken but is very attractive because, frankly, my hands don't really remember what a top feels like from one build to the next.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

You certainly can make your dream come true -- but make no mistake, like any other successful financial endevor there must be a market for the goods or services, those goods and or services have to stand above the competition in value and quality. To that end customers could care less where you got your training or which books you have read -- your work speaks for itself. While there are many making money with the craft --- few are making a living wage. I would suggest that a "real" business requires starting with a professional business plan. Anything less is hobby evolution -- which is OK too --- but don't give up your day job. $.02

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

CP here's hoping that you get to live your dream!

For me it started as a builder who was reluctant to sell anything and commission adverse from day one as well. I had a day job that paid the bills, provided health insurance etc. and building was strictly a hobby that I grew to really love.

Forums from time to time have folks who come and go but while they are here they may have a profound influence on some of us. Rick Turner was/is one of these sorts for me and I am very happy to have had the benefit of Rick's sage advice and tremendous experience.

Rick came to the OLF asserting that many of us were simply making GLOs (guitar shaped objects) if we were using unserviceable methods AND if we had no experience and understanding of the repair side of the trade. Didn't much care for Rick's message or delivery at first and was known to say so....

But as a guy who is rather good at being rather wrong at times..... what's ultimately more important to me is getting it right eventually... and sometimes this means listening to folks that are not telling me what I might prefer to have heard.

Rick's assertions about the repair side were mirrored by my now business partner David Collins. Dave had made his living with Lutherie all of his adult life which included building well over 100 instruments, ghost building prototypes for McPherson Guitars, teaching Lutherie at what is now the largest Lutherie school on the planet and also working at Elderly Instruments in the repair department. Elderly is IMO one of the top 3 music stores in the US and very well known for their selection and the ease of doing business with them.

Dave had me do the math for how much money I would make building and selling guitars only. Can't remember exactly but it was about $1 an hour.... Mind you this factors in how I work, how much time I take to build a guitar, etc. AND the materials that I was keen to use back then, very expensive woods, etc.

As such after I did the math I changed my own dream to be centered with the repair side and have building remain more of a hobby. So I built a few or so a year now and only when I feel like it. I make no effort to market my guitars and even took down my website not having the time to keep up with all the questions from the tire kickers.

These days when I complete one and don't have anyone targeted for it it may get hung in our repair shop and sold that way. Or, in other words repair can be a decent stalking horse for selling guitars too. One difference may be though that if someone has already been impressed with how you saved the day for them and fixed their ax they likely have more confidence in your chops as a builder too since they have some experience with you, money has changed hands, etc.

Now I hate being a wet blanket but I also hate not being completely honest even though this can rub some the wrong way....

Lots of folks have come and gone from this forum and others. They too had aspirations of endlessly toiling by candle light with sharp chisel in hand and making a living solely.... from Lutherie. In reality this is a very tough business to make it with.... There are jokes such as how to make a million dollars from Lutherie, start with two million.....

It's rare to find folks who solely make their living from Lutherie.

Most of all though before making the decision to become a Luthier as a day job be sure to visit some of the better guitar shows and get a feel fro where the bar is.... In the states the bar is very high, and not the one with a pint available either but the general expectation of what a well made custom guitar is is what I speak of by the bar, for now....

This trade has no shortage of well known, established builders who have worked very hard to make a name for themselves. They've earned it and sacrificed much to be Luthiers.

If you are aware that it's a tough slog, you are dependent on the disposable income of others making economic downturns potentially dangerous for any resulting Lutherie business, maybe have another source of income, and you are the sort who won't quit it can be done. But it is NOT easy....

OTOH it can be infinitely rewarding, being surrounded by great music and the wonderful folks who make the great music can and in my case be a very beneficial thing.

Step one though is to get more experience, build all that you can, consider doing repairs - there is no better data on how guitars fail than to be a repair guy and see for yourself and that will influence your building as well. Consider getting a mentor, being an apprentice, etc. to gain experience and have someone that you trust to help you.

I'm in my late 50's and this is my last ride until I'm too shaky to be trusted with the valuable personal property of others. It's a struggle to limit my dust exposure these days too in that I've developed a sensitivity to some wood dust..... But I love the people contact, keeping my wick dipped in striving for business excellence, and making people happy telling them that the guitar that was under their dearly departed Dad's bed for 40 years is worth north of $26K.....

Good luck to ya CP!!

Hobbyist here but I have a four year waitlist. I hope to transition into building and repair full time after I get my house paid off and get more money saved up. Four or five years or so...I'm not ready to subject myself to poverty just yet.

I lived the dream but it turned out to be more of a nightmare

Well, I got tired of eating beans and rice and depending on my girlfriend

I have a day job but still manage to sell about two guitars a year and earn about $200 bucks a week doing repairs. So it's a paying hobby of sorts and something I plan on taking into retirement. I have not built a guitar in over a year as I am still building a new shop, it's close now. All the repair money is going into the shop. It doesn't have to be expensive though. I built guitars for ten years in a spare bedroom converted to a workshop in my old farm house. I made all the saw dust outside. Now I'm putting over 5 grand into converting an old barn to a shop.

This is spot on.

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George :-)

Cablepuller,
Surviving with lutherie is one of the most difficult things you can do. Listen to Hesh's post especially -- there's a lot of good advice in there. I will come at this from the perspective of a full-time builder who doesn't do repairs. The bottom line is that in order to really survive, you need to be earning north of $5.5k base price for your builds. When you factor in the expense of running a business which is different from running things as a hobby, you will find that just over $5k is really the goal in terms of just barely being able to pay your bills. On $7k to $8k base price with a full wait list (think approximately 8 commissions a year plus 2 instruments for high-end guitar dealer), you can make a decent low middle class wage (think teacher). The nice thing is that if you can move past the $8k category into the $10k+ category, then you can make some very good money. However, even then it can be difficult especially if you suffer a decline in orders.

But here's the hard part -- there are so many good builders that enter the sub $5k market. You have to be better than them and you have to have a killer aesthetic and wonderful sounding instruments. You also have to keep at it for many years -- you can't just have a great product and raise your prices. I have essentially lived in poverty for about 10 years -- my base price has just been raised to $6.8k and I have a very solid reputation BUT it is still difficult and I have sacrificed my 20's and early 30's to get where I am. IMO, very few individuals when really put to the test are willing to walk this road. The other present reality is that unless you devote yourself to this work, you will never get good enough at it to ever reach that masterclass level.

I love guitar building and derive a lot of satisfaction from it. I don't regret my path but it has been difficult. So many individuals start into lutherie with rose-colored glasses and it seems that only those of us that are too stubborn to give up ever make it past the 5 year mark.

My compliments to Simon for one of the very best posts that I can ever recall about the realities of making a go as a builder.

Simon my friend I hope you don't mind if I discuss your post and some of the things that you shared with us.

Simon has a very good handle on his "true" costs and that is pretty rare in my experience when forum members share financial data about their own experiences with selling or repair guitars.

True costs are not always easy to determine either and can include every single thing that one uses or does including where they do their Lutherie activities as well. When we factor in our true costs most of the time the numbers will not work for folks who want to make a living with Lutherie. As Simon indicated there is often lots of sacrifice and years of austerity as well before one starts to get enough of a name and positive reputation that they can be successful.

Our repair business is centrally located in a very expensive district that is actually a historical district which makes it even more expensive as well as restrictive and regulated in terms of any mods that we may want to do to our building - no such luck, use it as is according to the city..... It was a 1.5 year exercise in frustration as well as over $1K to simply get a sign made and put up where we are located.... These are the kinds of things that are difficult to know until you get slapped with it.... making forecasting realistically always half scifi half reality....

Two other important topics are the economy and your location - super important by the way, and the idea that Simon brought up of hobby builders selling for peanuts turning a blind eye to any realistic notion of compensating themselves for true cost including labor as well as opportunity costs.

Lots of folks who have come and gone on this forum have sold some of their creations usually to friends, family, fellow worship band members, etc. They frequently will sell for very little as well which is somewhat problematic to the industry in so much as it leaves the impression with some that a $3K instrument is priced high when in reality most $3K instruments for newer builders won't recoup actual costs....

I've personally never been concerned about the low balling going on because I have always questioned if the market for new builder instruments is actually the same market as for a high-end, custom built guitars crafted by a Luthier who makes their living in trade.

My impression is that the early instruments from the hobby builders go to folks who are not qualified for one reason or another to be a true prospect for say a $5K or more instrument. Instead they see an opportunity to get something unique and special for little money and jump at it.

Something that I have talked about more often than not too is when I was a new builder I kept getting approached by folks who wanted something for virtually nothing.... OR they wanted some odd-ball 9 string triple cut-away with Kim Kardashian silkscreened on the back, likely not an OM....

Seriously though with these kinds of clients I don't really see the harm in the commercial aspects of this activity beyond the potential for opportunity costs to the builder. More specifically when a builder is new and needs to spend time in the trenches so-to-speak Kim and her image can be a distraction to building the next one as a mule to test out this idea or that idea....

I call it going ugly early meaning the idea of being compelled to sell even the first few instruments. I've been here for around 10 years now and can recall countless posts about new builders having commissions or sales go south very quickly. Some common elements of these stories are highly personalized instruments with expensive inlay with someone's girlfriend's name on it or of course there is always Kim too.... What's wrong or potentially dangerous to the new builder about these sorts of requests is that the resulting instrument can't be sold to anyone else and may, if the deal goes south, be something that one gets stuck with.

For me commission work was always dangerous too... My reasons include retaining my own creative instincts, the notion of selling futures meaning a deal is being struct for something that does not yet exist. If you get sick, the client dies, the economy tanks, etc. a lot of time and effort can be wasted. Instead I've always favored building what I am interested in and if someone wants it, great, if not, next.

Do get out to some guitar shows and look at the competition. In the states many of us use Martin as a measure of a bar of sorts and you will have Lowden, a likely higher bar in many respects to compare your stuff to. More specifically look at what other small builders are doing and how well they pull it off.

Funny thing - on new builder forums folks often puff out their chests and exclaim Lutherie purity because they do their own finishing.... Then they attend a custom guitar show and we see their stuff waiting in line at the pro finisher's place in a few months because they realized just exactly where the bar is in terms of the expectation for the quality of the finish.... Reality can suck at times....

Above all for anyone who wants to make a real go at the trade and working in the trade expect to be humbled.... an understatement.... expect that 99% of your best new ideas are only new to you and someone else has likely done it prior. Expect that no matter what aspects of your creations you are most proud of that someone will find some small, inconsequential aspect of your instruments that they focus on and it will have been the last thing that you may have expected. Also expect that everyone will think that what you do is pretty cool and few will cough up some cash to help keep you doing it....

These days too there is lots of snake oil in the trade as well. From fish tank motors repurposed to be a "playing in" device augmenting the opening up of an instrument to $20 orange drop caps that some folks believe will make them a better player snake oil is everywhere in this trade and attempting to not get any on us is always a struggle....

I have not even approached the market, how good a business person one needs to be, the economy and how Luthiers are at the wrong end of the disposable income spectrum..... I also have not addressed the notion that although guitars may be pretty cool to us these days an entire industry may be an IPad away from obsolescence....

I love what I do even more than annoying people on forums and it was and remains my personal dream that I am living as well. But as Simon indicated so very correctly it can be very tough and take years to start to get one where they believe that they need to be.

By the way repair guys have competition too. We can be low balled by some hack in a garage with no insurance for other people's personal property and a penchant to want to charge half the going rate and likely do less than half the expectation for quality work as well. Just like with builders who can't seem to see what's lacking with their own creations, finish, fret work, etc. the repair side has lots of the sorts as well.

The good news is that they tend to both come and go and time has a very good way of setting many, many things straight if you give it a chance.

Good luck to you - it's certainly something that can be done and can also be very rewarding as well. Remember too it has to be fun and when it's no longer fun time to do something else.

Thanks for replies and honesty (toonces, hesh and others). .. a REAL eye opener and really makes me realise what you guys go through to make a living in it.. for me its always been a dream to just make a guitar and always assumed i would never be able to through lack of gear and knowledge but am part way there now so well happy and there will probably be plenty more newbie questions i will ask ( sorry )
Also been a good distraction for some stuff thats going on at the moment.
Thanks hesh for your post will stick in my mind for a long time..
I would be happy to just be a hobbyist like many others on here..if i made some money then that would be cool..
But for now just need to make number 1 guitar

Cheers

Guitar building is a wonderful, albeit expensive hobby. Right now, the market isn't able to bare the number of builders that are out there, and as Simon says, you really have to be able to keep your prices very high in order to make any sort of living wage.

Speaking recently with someone who has been pretty successful at it, the market is very different now than it was ten years ago.
The Baby Boomers have stopped ordering and collecting instruments since the economy tanked, and the newer people entering the market to buy instruments don't seem to have the appreciation for what goes into the building of a fine quality instrument.
There are also buyers out there who will get something great in their hands and think nothing of sending it back because either they change their mind or run into financial difficulties, and it is easier to dump the instrument back on the builder than to stick to their commitment on the purchase. Then they will blast the builder online and make them look bad...

Many of the folks who have been very successful are now struggling, and a few have called it quits.

Enjoy the hobby. If somehow you end up with a career down the road, great. But meanwhile, get a good degree and a decent job so you can afford the hobby. It will suck you dry!

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

For me i just flat love guitars. i was lucky enough to be able to collect them and dabble in playing for the last 37 years. I'd break a string take it to the tech and have a new one put on,play another while i waited. I took somthing apart it never came out well. First off i have a 4th degree black belt in dyslexia. Lets just say i dont learn from the book well.

8 months ago or so i started an apprenticeship with Steve Helgeson at Moonstone guitars. Learn hands on, thats what works for me. I drive 3 hours a day to work. I can build anything i want but have to pay retail on finish. We are a Martin repair shop. uesed to be a gibson and fender,but i hear they dont pay enough to make it worth our time. Steve builds top notch guitars. With his help ive built 3 pretty nice guitars, i was offered 5k for my first(it cost me 4600$) , I would never sell it and it is one of my favorite to play. I was offered 8 for my 12 string i just finished it plays and sounds great. easy to bar all the way up the neck. I payed 7450$ for the 12 string, i would have sold it but it was going to be a wall hanger and would not have been played much. My first electric has been in the case since i finished it. i dont know whats up with that.

long story short ;am i living the dream heck ya. Making any money not in the near future. Ive put a few bucks into wood (ok my name is Jeff and i,m a wood addict). i,ve been away from the shop for almost a month and its killing me. Gotta keep the bills paid and the exotic wood rolling in. Im going to have to sell a lot of guitars to pay for my wood stash.Now lets talk shop. Whats it take to build a shop and tool it. I hope i can still build when i break even,but thats not counting the pleasure of when you get to string that baby up!

CP our friend Jeff brought up a VERY important point that the rest of us neglected to address.

When the neck is on, the fretting is done, the finishing is done and all you have to do is make a nut, saddle, install tuners, strings, and tune her up for the very first time ever. When you hear the first notes it's an incredible experience.... and makes any issues along the way be forgotten. Kind of like that one golf shot that actually goes in the intended direction is enough to forget the sand traps and make you want to come back for more.

More specifically you will be very proud and also likely amazed that building a guitar that sounds as good as many of the f*ctory guitars out there is not at all difficult. The f*ctories have been pulling the sheep over our faces for a very long time....

Jeff, "breaking even" is a fallacy, a lie we say so often that it becomes a quasi-truth! When you are this close () to "breaking even", you buy that little specialty tool that you've been lusting for, but would only purchase when you are "breaking even", and all of a sudden "breaking even" is no longer on the horizon because you're $800 in the hole.
I've been augmenting my pension doing cabinetry for the last 5/6 years, grossing around $100k, and I'm this close () to finally "breaking even". Well, that just this fools take on it! Individual results may vary!

Alex

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"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Cablepuller,

I don't know your age or where you are starting from but here are my thoughts...

I started building guitars maybe 8-10 years ago. I work full time at a conventional job and only complete about one guitar a year. My builds get better with each one, but I haven't felt confident enough to ask someone to pay me for them (quite yet). Not to mention that I get attached to them...

When I was a kid I wanted to be a rock n' roll guitar player and make a living playing guitar. My dad objected to that idea and encouraged me to continue to go to school and be more conventional. Although that sounds boring, I think it was good advise. Now, at 59, I've enjoyed playing guitar through the years for fun with other folks and recording myself. At the same time I was able to make a decent living, buy a house, and save for retirement. Now I enjoy building guitars (as well as still playing them), but I'm in a position to retire early (in April) and build guitars all I want. I am fortunate to have a very supportive wife with a well paying job (who plans to continue to work) and having agressively saved for retirement (and not having kids...) I can afford to induldge myself.

I guess my point is that you can still be into guitar building and get a lot of satisfaction out of it even if you do something else to pay the bills. Hopefully, that would be something you also get some pleasure from.

Keep in mind that when you make your passion a business you could be sucking the joy out of it. ...when you have to get your bills paid, when the customer is not satisfied, or you have to redo something that deducts from your bottom line.

I don't mean to be a buzz kill, but if you build on your own terms, nothing gets in the way of the joy. I think about building all the time - what wood combination, the design, the construction. It's a great hobbie for me. I love doing it, talking about it, and sharing stuff on this forum. I could care less whether I make any money or not. ...but, that's just me...

Best of luck with whatever you do. What are you building next?

(I'll go back to my shop now...)

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Steve Sollod (pronounced sorta like "Solid")
www.swiftcreekguitars.com

Sdsollod some very good points thanks
Agree paying bills would spoil the joy if it was a full time business (got wife and kids to support)
Building from a kit (martin dreadnought)
Great hobby. loving it

Cable guy thought I/d throw my 2 cents in . Besides all the lutherie skills one must acquire,it is also important to keep in mind business skills,and that is where a lot of luthiers tend to get in trouble Even if you love your work you must approach it in a very professional and business like manner .No matter how much one loves their clients, or work conditions etc etc .the bottom line is cracking that nut every month.For me it was roughly $1500 us in LA back in 94, my rough monthly expenses before I earned 1 cent. Finally , I sold the store , so I could live a quiet lifestyle and help my wife raise our 2 kids and pursue luthiery on the side. So yes I/m livin the dream and have all the toys , and wood one could wish for .It/s taken me 40 years to get here. So please don/t be in a hurry just enjoy the ride.

My answer probably won't be helpful to you, but it might be informative. I am ABSOLUTELY living my dream. My dream has been to work from home, on my own time, as I choose, for a select number of clients in my chosen profession. Having achieved that, I can now devote as much time as I wish to my hobbies, one of which is to build instruments. I don't want my instrument building hobby to turn into a job. Ergo, this answer is not what you were searching for. I'm just reminding you and all other readers that there are lots of ways to live one's dream. ...and one's dream might be to have time to build as a hobby. That was my dream, and I'm livin' it!

Yes agree cphanna ...if i can have building as a hobby and keep my job (which is a good one really) im happy...this thread has made me realise that .. profit from anything i might make in the future although nice drains any fun out of it and adds unnecessary pressure.
One day at a time