Help me find a niche

[wash]

So I'm going to become a Techshop member soon and I want to find something to offset my expenses a bit.

Membership is about $100 a month if you sign up for a year at a time but I don't want to spend all my time there working to pay for the membership.

I would like to spend about one weekend every six months making parts to sell, netting a roughly $600 profit.

I don't want it to turn in to something that I have to do every week (unless the money is really great).

That means I'm looking for a small market for a part where tooling and labor are the main expenses (I don't want a lot of $$ in inventory) and people won't ***** if their order will ship six months to a year out.

I would like to keep the price fair and the value high but I don't want to sell a widget that is worth $2.00, I would have to sell and ship far too many to make $600.00

I am open to ideas but I'm not going to do anything that I think is lame, legally risky, carries liability or copies an existing product unless the design is in the public domain.

One project I would like to do is Saiga 12 flats and bending jigs. They wouldn't be cheap but they would be perfect for people who want to make an AOW.

Right now I don't even know what it will take. Don't ask to be on a waiting list.

Any way, tools, accessories and gun parts are all possibilities, I just want to find the right niche.

[straykiller]

make a psl flat that will work with the ak-builder jig

[nick]

+1 on the PSL flat. I'll take 3.

[shotcaller6]

PSL flats

+1 on the PSL flat. I'll take 3.

You would be very busy!

[goober]

How do you like Techshop? I've always wanted to check one out...

[Arisaka]

Oh man, if you're into making flats, the HK33 (.223) flats are pretty hard to find and really expensive. you could sell them for $100 all day... and it would be the best deal out there.

[goober]

Oh man, if you're into making flats, the HK33 (.223) flats are pretty hard to find and really expensive. you could sell them for $100 all day... and it would be the best deal out there.

there's making flats and then there's making HK "flats" (which aren't really flat at all).

stamping out HK flats takes serious dies and such. the tooling costs just to get set up to produce them would far outweigh what one could recoup if the business model was to stamp them out in one's spare time at TechShop & sell them to friends...

there's a reason HK flats cost more than AK, or MAC, or other stamped receiver flats.

[wash]

How do you like Techshop? I've always wanted to check one out...

I'm not sure yet, I've just been helping build one so far. I've seen the one in SF but haven't done any work yet.

If I make a flat, it's going to be a Saiga 12. PSL is probably too big of a niche, Saiga 12 is only for people who want to de-mil a perfectly good shotgun and make an AOW. They also won't shy away from an expensive flat because they have a tax stamp to buy also.

I'm pretty sure that there won't be huge hydraulic presses at Techshop, an HK flat is totally out of the question, sorry.

[AJAX22]

There are a bunch of guys who have the tooling to do s12 flats and dies, if your plan is to do it with a high profit margin I would rethink it. If you show that there is a high markup potential, a bunch of other players are going to make entry into the market.

I would suggest doing low margin high volume and approach middle man distributors for large initial orders.

[wash]

Ok, who's got it?

I want a flat.

I've never heard of flats for sale, I think it's because the people with the tooling just want to sell really expensive AOWs.

If I sell 20 flats a year, that won't cut in to their volume enough to want to flood the market and remove my profit margin.

Maybe I'm wrong and they will sell me a flat but I haven't seen it so far.

[AJAX22]

There are three companies I know of that have them, and yes they mostly want to sell aow's, but if you show them that they can make a large markup simply by taking what they already have and putting it on their website then they'll do it.

I'm just saying that if you jump into the game, you might want to go for volume right off the bat, that should mitigate the risk of competitive entry

[thedrickel]

Make sheetmetal bullet buttons for guns that need them.

Can you do any bbl work?

[wash]

I mostly want a membership for barrel work but I don't think that type of work has a lot of margin.

It's also probably easier to mess up a barrel than a flat.

Lastly blanks, reamers and indicators are expensive, a lot of investment with little profit is not a model I want to go for.

Sheet metal bullet buttons might work but I might have to make too many.

I might entertain other local projects if you just need to do some gunsmithing you aren't equipped for. There is a Techshop in Menlo Park if you want to meet up and get some work done.

[nick]

You would be very busy!

And that's a problem how?

[straykiller]

PSL is probably too big of a niche

and a saiga 12 i would be to small. not to many people want to destroy there gun to rebuild. psl is still a small nitch but it has the numbers of people wanting to build to make the money your interested in. lets say 60 bucks a flat all you need to do is sell 10 to make your 600 and i wouldn't doubt if you could sell them for more because nobody makes them. i don't know why you don't do both types, by having both you broaden you potential to sell more product and it wouldn't take up to much of your time. once you get the design and layout figured out and possibly a stamp for the flats them you contract out to another company to build the flats for you to your original specifications. when someone orders one you grab one from your stock and ship it and if you run out order more from your manufacturer. meanwhile you could be building and designing new parts and things to sell with all your free time