Been giving thought to moving my rod shop from my basement to a small room (14'x30') at a retail location. Thoughts? Pros and cons?

Be very careful to consider the actual cost of keeping a retail shop open. There are a lot of expenses that won't immediately be apparent. I know very few rod builders who can manage to keep the doors open based on custom rod sales alone. Most supplement with general fishing tackle out of necessity.

If you can justify it and think the additional exposure will offset any increased cost, then it's worth a shot.

................

Years ago, I was offered a free space to make custom rods a Shooting range/gun store that had plenty of additional rooms. It was a beautiful set up with excellent security and the room I was offered was 40' x 40' and good access. I was tempted, but at the time I was a full time Seattle FireFighter who worked a 24 hour shift, had 2 days off and then another 24 hours then 4 days off. I would have had to be closed 3 days out of 8 and then only be able to take customers by appointment. I would seldom have seen my family. I had to turn down the generous offer. I have left out the B&O taxes etc.

I managed to talk myself out if it. Gonna take the rent money and get my home shop in order. Build a dirty room for the lathe, drill press, saw and glue-up and add a couple more benches for dryers.

I think that is a good idea, and will avoid a bunch of headaches.

Scott,
If you are pressed for room and don't want to have another drying bench in your shop, get a drum dryer and mount it on the wall.
With a dryer like this, you can dry a dozen rods at a time and not take up any bench space by mounting it on the wall in your shop.

[www.rodbuilding.org]



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/06/2014 06:09PM by roger wilson.