Good news! I sincerely hope the best for you and your experience.
I guess case makers are all too busy for my $$
- Thread starter cbi1000
- Start date
Good news! I sincerely hope the best for you and your experience.
You’re in the system. Here’s to a great transaction.
Let me ask you a question if I may. If you had received an email from one of the cue makers explaining that they have a backlog right now, appreciate your inquiry, etc etc and they will contact you when they have caught up a little, would that have been an acceptable response and would you like to do business with such a cue maker?
most of these custom guys are monkeys and stuck in the pre internet era
spend your dough on the high end production stuff, not personalized obviously but almost always better
spend your dough on the high end production stuff, not personalized obviously but almost always better
Here's to blue skies and green lights.
BRAZOS! let us know... :thumbup:
soo true:frown::frown:
well written.
If you don't like your Job or your work, PLEASE stay away from me and not waste my time and Money again (more).....
RG
I was contacted by one maker. Hope we can get the idea from my head to the case. Should be amazing.
Absolutely. I have waited years for cues, and I would again. I just want to know they have read my email, listened to my design and tell me if it’s somethinf they can do. If so, then I wait. If not then I can go onto the next.
The case of missing time...
Heya Cbi,
I know we’ve talked in the past about your case idea. Sorry, I haven’t been on AZB
in a few years. For me, it’s been a matter of time. I’m a glazier by trade and construction here has been off the hook busy so leather work has just been a hobby. Believe me,
when you only get a few free hours a week, it’s tough to bang out 100+ hour projects. I
think I’ve made 4-5 cases in the last 3 years. Much more practical to do small items like wallets and stuff.
I do still love doing leather and have some incredibly patient people that I still want to make cases for. I just have to do them, and even my own case ideas, when I have time.
Anyway, not trying to make excuses. I feel your frustration. I wanted to at least reply.
I do think it would be a bad ass case.
~Rex
Heya Cbi,
I know we’ve talked in the past about your case idea. Sorry, I haven’t been on AZB
in a few years. For me, it’s been a matter of time. I’m a glazier by trade and construction here has been off the hook busy so leather work has just been a hobby. Believe me,
when you only get a few free hours a week, it’s tough to bang out 100+ hour projects. I
think I’ve made 4-5 cases in the last 3 years. Much more practical to do small items like wallets and stuff.
I do still love doing leather and have some incredibly patient people that I still want to make cases for. I just have to do them, and even my own case ideas, when I have time.
Anyway, not trying to make excuses. I feel your frustration. I wanted to at least reply.
I do think it would be a bad ass case.
~Rex
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Totally understandable. When you have time hit me up.
None of those methods worked quickly but they eventually replied. End result, I got my case and I love it. The replying via any method took weeks at times. I do love the case though.
still waiting my Hellboy Case:boring2::wink::wink:
Don't you mean green grass and high tides?
we have talked and are on track now.
I just want to add a little perspective from my position. This is probably not going to sound great but it's how I really feel.
I want to build cases and make stuff primarily because of the fun I can have doing it. The fun for me comes in the creation of useful stuff and finding new ways to do things. I set this business up to provide a stable income for my family and allow me the freedom to create.
When I did Instroke cases in 1991 I quickly amassed an order book filled with more than 100 orders. At first I thought it was awesome that people wanted to have me build them cases and I didn't say no to any requests. To be fair I was the one taking those custom orders and was excited to be doing so.
But I also had my own ideas of things I wanted to do. As the months went on and orders continued to come in I found myself increasingly pressured to get the orders done even though at that time I didn't even take deposits. Each morning I would come in and start working on other people's dreams.
So one morning I quit. I said we are not doing any more custom orders. We will make what we want to make and make a line of cases and that's it. And that's how the Instroke cases that most of you know came to be. I focused on creating production lines and did limited custom work. This allowed me to be able to let others handle sales and logistics and let me focus on quality and innovation. The word "custom" wasn't even in our company name after that.
Honestly when you build a little company like this in the billiard industry by yourself you're in kind of a catch-22 because there simply isn't enough business to hire much support staff and thus you find yourself trying to balance the actual building/creating with the order taking/logistics/shipping/bill paying/supply ordering/repairs etc... and it wears on you.
In 2003 I walked away from Instroke after 13 years. In 2006 I went to work full time with Sterling Gaming and they sent me to China to do quality control and sourcing and consulting for the stuff that they were selling. Part of my job was to help their case suppliers build better cases.
In 2007 I started building cases again in my apartment in China. I cleared out the living room and bought a sewing machine and a work table and started creating again. I was helped by my then girlfriend's mom, who is now my mother in law, to do the sewing. I hired a full-time seamstress and taught her leatherwork. I hired a full-time tooler and taught him design. And we started to slowly put out some cool cases that were concepts we thought of. And I once again put it out there that I could do custom work. And once again I got lots of interest. And once again I ended up working for everyone else and losing touch with why I wanted to build in the first place. The next catch-22 in this business is that it's hard to develop enough interest to fund the creation of art made for general sale but too easy to get bogged down with custom work and have to deal with a constant stream of people who want to talk to you.
So once again I created some standard cases to have a way to generate revenue and fund creativity. But, again I started to feel pressure to be at work every day making other people's concepts come to life. Along the way though we grew until I had a real business with up to 20 people working for me. So now it's serious, not just me anymore dependent on this.
But now a whole new set of issues come with so many people in the shop. Quality control, training, drama, lunch.... And each issue, each small fire to put out consumes the day and no time or energy is left to create.
So rather than continue to make this into a whiny bio I will just say that there are many days when I really don't feel like talking to customers about their dreams. I like to create and I like to see people happy with the case when it's done but I really don't like the sales process, I don't like the details process, the order taking, ringing up the sale and all that goes with it.
I like to build and don't like to sell what I build. Which seems SUPER contradictory considering the amount of promotion I did/do in various mediums. Marketing the cases is therapeutic for me, easy distraction. But sitting down to write up an order is torture for me, primarily because I don't have the shop set up the way I want it to be set up where my whole focus is ONLY on custom builds and creating new stuff. So I already know before I talk to you that what's going to happen on "big" builds is that you're going to be excited and I will have lots of ideas and creative suggestions that will leave you feeling awesome and that feeling will turn sour as the project stalls while I spend my days putting out fires and withdrawing into escapist activities like arguing about the social structure of binary political systems......
In other words, the thrill is gone sometimes. That's not your problem. It's mine. And I am working on it. But if you can be persistent and patient with us then the end result usually will be well worth the wait.
I just want to add a little perspective from my position. This is probably not going to sound great but it's how I really feel.
I want to build cases and make stuff primarily because of the fun I can have doing it. The fun for me comes in the creation of useful stuff and finding new ways to do things. I set this business up to provide a stable income for my family and allow me the freedom to create.
When I did Instroke cases in 1991 I quickly amassed an order book filled with more than 100 orders. At first I thought it was awesome that people wanted to have me build them cases and I didn't say no to any requests. To be fair I was the one taking those custom orders and was excited to be doing so.
But I also had my own ideas of things I wanted to do. As the months went on and orders continued to come in I found myself increasingly pressured to get the orders done even though at that time I didn't even take deposits. Each morning I would come in and start working on other people's dreams.
So one morning I quit. I said we are not doing any more custom orders. We will make what we want to make and make a line of cases and that's it. And that's how the Instroke cases that most of you know came to be. I focused on creating production lines and did limited custom work. This allowed me to be able to let others handle sales and logistics and let me focus on quality and innovation. The word "custom" wasn't even in our company name after that.
Honestly when you build a little company like this in the billiard industry by yourself you're in kind of a catch-22 because there simply isn't enough business to hire much support staff and thus you find yourself trying to balance the actual building/creating with the order taking/logistics/shipping/bill paying/supply ordering/repairs etc... and it wears on you.
In 2003 I walked away from Instroke after 13 years. In 2006 I went to work full time with Sterling Gaming and they sent me to China to do quality control and sourcing and consulting for the stuff that they were selling. Part of my job was to help their case suppliers build better cases.
In 2007 I started building cases again in my apartment in China. I cleared out the living room and bought a sewing machine and a work table and started creating again. I was helped by my then girlfriend's mom, who is now my mother in law, to do the sewing. I hired a full-time seamstress and taught her leatherwork. I hired a full-time tooler and taught him design. And we started to slowly put out some cool cases that were concepts we thought of. And I once again put it out there that I could do custom work. And once again I got lots of interest. And once again I ended up working for everyone else and losing touch with why I wanted to build in the first place. The next catch-22 in this business is that it's hard to develop enough interest to fund the creation of art made for general sale but too easy to get bogged down with custom work and have to deal with a constant stream of people who want to talk to you.
So once again I created some standard cases to have a way to generate revenue and fund creativity. But, again I started to feel pressure to be at work every day making other people's concepts come to life. Along the way though we grew until I had a real business with up to 20 people working for me. So now it's serious, not just me anymore dependent on this.
But now a whole new set of issues come with so many people in the shop. Quality control, training, drama, lunch.... And each issue, each small fire to put out consumes the day and no time or energy is left to create.
So rather than continue to make this into a whiny bio I will just say that there are many days when I really don't feel like talking to customers about their dreams. I like to create and I like to see people happy with the case when it's done but I really don't like the sales process, I don't like the details process, the order taking, ringing up the sale and all that goes with it.
I like to build and don't like to sell what I build. Which seems SUPER contradictory considering the amount of promotion I did/do in various mediums. Marketing the cases is therapeutic for me, easy distraction. But sitting down to write up an order is torture for me, primarily because I don't have the shop set up the way I want it to be set up where my whole focus is ONLY on custom builds and creating new stuff. So I already know before I talk to you that what's going to happen on "big" builds is that you're going to be excited and I will have lots of ideas and creative suggestions that will leave you feeling awesome and that feeling will turn sour as the project stalls while I spend my days putting out fires and withdrawing into escapist activities like arguing about the social structure of binary political systems......
In other words, the thrill is gone sometimes. That's not your problem. It's mine. And I am working on it. But if you can be persistent and patient with us then the end result usually will be well worth the wait.
I have no idea if any of this is BS ( though I strongly suspect none of it is ). I have no idea who the person who makes these cases is. Other than the few ( very positive ) comments about these cases I've heard, I am really not more than marginally familiar with them. But, I have to say, this is one of THE most honest, dispassionate and perfectly sensible and reasonable dissertations I've read. There is no pleading for understanding, no far-fetched reasons for actions taken and not taken, no *overly-ceative* ( read: BULLS**T ) "reasons" why expectations by overly-expectatious-people are not met.
Everything said here is life laid bare. Bulls**t, while most often very pretty with a very nice sound to it, is, upon close inspection, bulls**t. The truth, however, while at times ugly, or hurtful or not something you really want or need to hear is, at the end of the day, still the truth. And, I've found, is almost always easier to swallow than the pretty, lovely-sounding line of bulls**t someone's just ran down on you. The world is, sadly, much in need of more of this type communication.
I had my own business, working in leather, for about 20 years. I worked alone, except for the help my ( now "X" ) wife offered. As I read through this post, a lot of memories flooded back. And almost everything in there, to one degree or another, I experienced. I am now retired from making the things that brought me a lot of joy to make. The reasons for that are physical more than anything else. But the issues inherent in doing this type of work, of creating artistic, beautiful things that people are actually willing to spend a fair amount of money on, are taxing. To the mind, the body and, yes, to even the soul. One of the worst feelings, for me, when I was doing this work, was feeling I had let someone down. That I had helped someone believe they were going to catch a small piece of a dream they had, only to see it crash and burn once the rubber of reality hit the road... it was tough to swallow. And those were the orders I almost ALWAYS lost money on. But I didn't care. I wasn't in it for the money. But losing money is not fun and, financially, not healthy. And it will only last so long before it begins to take a serious toll on the ability to continue. So I had to pull back on sacrificing for someone else's feelings and expectations.
Anyway, wow... this post rang a lot of bells. I can clearly see why this person has been monumentally successful building cases.
Hey john, I wrote your support and sales a couple months ago about building a custom case. Then somebody said to pm you, which I did.
Hope to hear from you sometime in the future, no hurry.
All the best,
Darrell Abolit