I too am looking at this. For me, the question is about which direction to take my fledgling business.
I currently make a small number of kitchen islands, a larger volume of butchers blocks and cutting boards. This produces lumpy demand which I would like to in-fill with something else.
I looked at 3 options:
1. I also trained to fit kitchens but this is hard work on your own, and it seems to be a very emotional experience for the customer - lots of scope for grief for no more return than more creative woodworking can provide. However there is plenty of work out there and I also have the ability to work with a more experienced carpenter to help him on jobs. I see little scope for Shaper here
2. I would like to produce higher-end furniture with more interesting shapes and complex angles. With a son trained in CAD I can get the files easily and the Shaper looks good for this. The downside is the need to build a portfolio of items which takes space, time and cost
3. I could also make smaller items for the gift market. Bath trays, signs, etc. A saturated market online but relatively easy to produce for when craft markets start up. Shaper again would work well here
My calculation is that I need to make about £150-200 pm to depreciate the investment over a few years so the risk is not high. The decision I have to make is where to invest my time as I am currently the bottleneck in my business.
I do not want to spend hours learning CAD, I don’t have space for a gantry CNC, and although one of my goals is to produce better results by hand, I feel the Shaper Origin could provide a turbo charge.
So in summary, the question is not whether the Shaper is worth buying but more how to best deploy it to grow my business. Does anybody have experience of doing this for their own which they could share?
Many thanks.
David.
