I'm ready to begin the journey....free help

metalcobra23 said:
After reading all of the posts, and thank you for all of the responses by the way, I have heard alot from many who have been there before. Some might question motive and others might see legal liability and others might even see it was stealing food. The one thing that truly stood out to me is that my friend Kent davis learned from Ariel carmeli and then adapted his own techniques and they are great friends and wonderful things have come from that. Also if anyone knows jazznpool' Kent like I do there is a huge benefit the cue maker receives. the first thing is sharing his passion for making pool cues and allow someone to see into the mind to understand what love and care comes from these pieces of work. there were things that i learned that are never to be shared with anyone, and there are other things that i learned like being a perfectionist and knowing how dangerous the equipment is and so forth. He showed me how much he loves the game and how much he labors for those who buy his product. I worked an entire semester just so I could recieve my cue, put in timeless hours and produced things that he to this day still uses to assemble his cues. he saw the look in my eyes when I tirnedmy first forearm and put that coat on it to see the wood shine. I had people purchase the forearms I turned so that they could use it in their work. that was a great feeling. If it were about robbing the teacher I would pollute the sanctity of the art that cue making actually is, and I am not about to be ungrateful to someone who is willing to really show me how the basics are done. I have the same passion for pool that i do for baseball and I am just putting myself out there to see what someone might want to get. Im a broke single kid in his mid 20s that loves pool and worked just so I can be a part of something great. I even hot to help with the cue that made it in billiard digest, and it was an honor. If I were in the buisness of ripping off people I would sell cars not cues.
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I want to add a couple of things to what I already said. First it seems like you have a great attitude toward the love of cuemaking & I congratulate you on that...outstanding. You must have a real love for what you are building because you certainly aren't doing it for the income. If I figured up what I've spent on equipment, wood, and parts over the past 10 years vs. what I've made selling cues....I seriously doubt I've broke even yet.:o
Secondly...when all of us here all speaking bad of hired help...we are in no way speaking of you personally. No one meant to imply that you have any desire for "ripping people off". We were just speaking from past experiences with shop helpers...no bad words were intended to be about you. If you really want to learn the "basics" as you stated then there is plenty of learning material now that wasn't available years ago. Start with Chris Hightowers book...his tapes/dvd's are excellent too. Unique Products has an entire line of videos that will teach everything needed to install wraps, ferrules, even make complete hustler cues. If you bought their small Cue Companion repair lathe (package 3) and then watched their videos...you could immediately build a nice sneaky or j/b. This is the best advice I can offer. Get your own lathe...then use the material available to teach yourself.
Best of luck to you in whatever career path you may choose.:)
 
macguy said:
Really? If the guy lives in the cuemakers area it will be just a short matter of time before he has no more interest in working for you and will be out stealing your repair work and what ever other business he can, exploiting contacts he got through you. I am not saying this is the case here, but almost all cuemakers will tell the same story.

A lot of these guys will work for you just long enough to learn the bare minimum before it happens. I had a guy once doing a delivery to a condo with a batch of house cues I had done give them a business card he had printed up tell them to give him a call next time. HE DIDN'T EVEN WAIT TILL HE QUIT BEFORE TRYING TO STEAL BUSINESS FROM ME.
Again, I am not saying this is this guys intentions but it will happen never the less. That is just what happens if he lives in your town.
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Sad but true. All good points.
 
Thanks for the insght I cannot wait to be able to get my own equipment that is the route that I would truely like to go on, I must only wait for the time for me to get enough capitol for me to be able to get started, and I was also looking at hightowers stuff to go that route if i cannot get into another shop[ for the time being
 
On the other side of the coin

I have had good experiences with the people that have apprenticed with me. I have had 6 helpers that stayed for various lengths of time.
The first stayed for about a year and never took up cue repairs or building.
The second stayed about 11/2 years and now has a thriving full time business of cue repairs, cue building, installing pool tables, etc.
The third only worked a few months and lost interest.
The fourth stayed about a year and is now building and repairing cues part time.
The fifth has been with me 2 years and is still working with me regularly and is also doing cue repairs on his own.
The sixth is still working with me and has no interest in repairs or cue building but helps me build cues and sells some of the cues.

All of these helpers have been from different cities around me and they have driven up to an hour and a quarter to work with me. Some did it one day a week and some did it a couple days a week. They are all still friends and we talk regularly, share stock orders and help each other. The only pay was that I usually sprung for lunch.

Would I have other people in to work with me, yes. My experience has been very positive. Do I worry about the business they take from me. No. The majority of my customers are very loyal and will drive past a another cue maker or repair person to come see me. This is also not my only income source and although I do it full time my standard of living does not depend on it.
 
I have two people who come and help me once a week each currently. They turn shafts, cores, handles, cut wood and do some other boring tasks. As far as building the cues go, I don't let them do any work on my cues. Sometimes I'm busy and need to use the machine they work on, so they stand around and watch me. Both seem to enjoy it. They are working on building their own cues.

One lives 10 minutes away and he's already bought a deluxe from Chris and a ton of other stuff. I doubt he'll ever be doing it full time as he owns a pretty busy company, but if he does, I don't really care. I don't do repairs, so that's not taking anything away from me. If he builds cues and sells them, I don't have a problem with that either.

It really doesn't matter if the cue maker is 10 minutes away or 100 hours away. If somebody wants to buy one of my cues, they will call me. If they want one from somebody else, they'll call him. If they don't know what they want, they'll probably decide based on price. Either way, I don't care. I get orders and inquiries every week. If 10 guys started doing the same thing on my street, I don't think it's going to matter one way or the other.
 
for what its worth

Kent Davis has given me permission to work as a reference for me and anyone willing to have me come on board I can give you his contact information, thanks KDcues
 
metalcobra23 said:
My name is mat and I am from northern California. I had the pleasure of working for Kent Davis helping as a shop hand helping him in his work for a little while, and of course I lived in southern California to do this . Now that I live in the San Francisco bay area I am no longer able to perusue the interest of cue making in the capacity in which I would truly like to enjoy. I am writing now because the eager to help in the cue making process has truly grown to almost unmanageable levels and I am offering myself a hard working your man of no cost to help a California based cue maker until I can save up enough money to be able to start in my own workshop. I could not tell you how how much this would mean to me. I would be so thankful if someone might be able to send me in the right direction so that I may grow in the love for building cues. Thanks and I hope to hear from you soon.
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