For years now, I have been building furniture and home
accessories by hand. Each piece I have created has been
designed and put together by me alone and finished with the
utmost care. In today's highly competitive world, craftsman
like myself are unfortunately getting pushed to the side by
the "box furniture" we see in so many stores like Wal-Mart
and Kmart.
To the normal untrained eye, this boxed furniture looks
great. You can purchase a pine end table for around $50.00
to $75.00 that looks well made and has a decent finish on
it. You can purchase at the same store a table and 4 chairs
for $150.00 that will certainly hold up for at least a few
years.
So how do my colleagues and I compete with this? There is
no way I can buy the wood, put in the time involved in
cutting the pieces, assembling them and putting the finish
on for $50.00 and still make a profit. My table and chairs
wholesale for no less than $400.00 and that means they sell
in a retail store for $800.00. In other words, a true
craftsman cannot compete and this is the dilemma we are
facing today.
I am a firm believer in hand made goods, doing business
with a hand shake instead of a contract and giving to
people excellent quality in both my products and customer
service. This is disappearing in America quicker than we
would like. The hands on, old style, down to earth
craftsman is slowly being put to the wayside.
I remember back way back when, (much to long to admit to
you), when I started making my first products to sell. I
made a ton of birdhouses and a ton of twig baskets. I sold
these at a very reasonable price and it was a great
beginning to my future products I developed later. Now, you
can buy on many Internet sites birdhouses and baskets made
in China that are of good quality and are under $10.00
each. I couldn't even walk to my shop for $10.00 let alone
make a basket for that.
So what do we do? It is up to the people who still believe
in the true quality of handmade products and the
craftsmanship that goes into them to stay away from
Wal-Mart and Kmart for furniture and go back to buying
solid, well made, handcrafted goods. Not only will you find
the product you purchase most likely be one of a kind, but
it will also last your lifetime and more.
----------------------------------------------------
Michael Powers is an internet marketer and entrepreneur who
has owned and developed his own businesses for over 10
years now. Mike has two websites,
http://www.clearwatercabinliving.com , where he sells his
handmade lamps and offers information about cabin living
and http://www.solidbeginnings.com , which offers tools and
resources to help individuals with credit problems.
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