Sell it to the buyer again, but this time on Ebay for something like $1 with free shipping. Ebay will then give you the ability to print a shipping label getting THEIR rates. For some reason they get an unbelievable discount with FedEx. I sent a giant guitar weighed over 20 lbs all the way to Washington state for $18.50 Congratulations, now you know the ultimate shipping hack. Btw, with my account through UPS, they wanted $59 to ship it.
Damn, that almost seems too good to be true. But hey, if it work it works. Thanks man!
I guess I'll definitely owe you one of each!
Yeah, I guess they need to charge the average person substantially more to offset the discounts provided to bigger businesses. I fall into the latter category but the shipping rates I was getting pretty much ate my profits by 50%. At an hourly rate, I could work maybe 3 hrs of ot at my normal job to net the same profit as what 10 hrs would get me on one of my products, before subtracting shipping. So that being said, I was really only offering my product because nobody else makes it and there's a reasonable demand. I'd reevaluate my prices but I don't think my average customer would be willing to pay an increased price so retaining current demand plus increasing profits by 50% seems like the logical answer. Also doesn't help that I have very few repeat customers (honestly surprised I have any) since it doesn't really ever need to be replaced so I'm basically relying on new customers for every sale.
It's a pedalboard for guitar effects pedals. Plenty of companies make them but the one I make is a replica of a somewhat famous guitarists board that was homemade to begin with, hence the demand but no commercial availability.
Dad has made plenty of those for personal use and his friends. He has owned music stores, amp, speaker and guitar companies, etc... Its always interesting to see other products down those lines. Very cool setup
Thanks man. Of course, I built the 1st one for myself. Was more of just a neat little project but then I got commissioned to build another, and another, etc. I should've known that these would've blown up now. Gibson just released his (Adam Jones) signature model and almost immediately they were being resold at $20k. Maybe I should up my price.
