Wolfman Business Model

Charge a premium in a niche market, raise prices a bunch, more will come...... Repeat.... This guy is the Steve Jobs of wet shaving...... Here's my big problem with WMR.... There are a few "heirloom" quality producers out there that don't make me wait 9 months to get the same shave...... I'm sure the razors are great... But isn't this the iPhone phenomenon wet shaving equivalent? I waited in line for three days so automatically what I have in hand due to the wait is better than the competition? Everyone that has one will blast this post and defend "it's hand made, it's custom,.... I'd gladly give the guy 300 for one of his razors but I'm not waiting a year to do it.

You won't catch me waiting years or paying $300 for ANY razor.

All evidence has been buried, all tapes have been erased.

You won't catch me waiting years or paying $300 for ANY razor.

All evidence has been buried, all tapes have been erased.

My sentiments exactly.

This my friends is the absolute beauty of a free market! Rather than take on more debt, human resource costs, larger facility, IT infrastructure, etc. He decided to maximize the value of his time. It's either going to continue to provide a stable living for him or he will find another means to make a living if his orders stop coming in. Time will tell. I wish him the best. Takes a lot of stones to do that. Many people are unwilling to value there time and work at the very top of the scale. Not my thing though so he won't get an order from me either.

I don't see the issue, personally.

1- creator makes a beautiful razor
2- razor is introduced to the market
3- people love the razor and the orders start coming in
4- creator gets backed up with orders, but because his operation is very small, the orders are slow to get processed
5- people continue to order more razors, even though they know there's a wait

quality takes time. what's the issue? if people expect top notch products that are manufactured on a small scale, they should expect delays.

I agree with andrewjs18,

I am still on the waitlist at WMR , but even communicating with James is a pleasure, he is polite and prompt and has been kind enough to explain the amount of time that goes into each razor
give the man credit he has orders backed up till God knows when, he makes each razor as per the clients requests, quirks etc, that all is time consuming again
after all that he still finds time to reply to all his potential clients and that too being a SINGLE man operation
it is fair if you do not want to buy a $300 razor but that is an individual choice
I have friends who own a wmr and they speak glowingly of the razor,

and as said in the earlier post quality takes time and time is money,

warm wishes
raj

Also, be mindful of the fact that razors are not James' "bread and butter". As a part/spare time avocation it is both a blessing and a curse. He has the freedom to craft his razors however he wishes and to take as long as he wishes. That said, the press of a vocal backlog demanding to know what's going on and where is the product is telling on a single proprietor enterprise. Communication time takes away from production!

Ultimately, the market will be the final arbiter. Once the initial orders from the diehard enthusiasts subsides, James will determine what his future direction will be. In anticipation, we wait!

Why jack up the cost though?, especially in today's economy?. I would have kept the price the same and just kept an order list of however many razors that I could complete in a given time. When customers signed up on the list I would keep them updated as to how far out the orders were. I would only raise the price if the material costs went up. I would want average Joe Shaver to be able to afford one of my razors.

Clayton

Why jack up the cost though?, especially in today's economy?. I would have kept the price the same and just kept an order list of however many razors that I could complete in a given time. When customers signed up on the list I would keep them updated as to how far out the orders were. I would only raise the price if the material costs went up. I would want average Joe Shaver to be able to afford one of my razors.

Clayton

Jacking up the price is usually about how much you value your time. Some people are happy to work for $20/hour, some people $100, some a lot more than that...

James makes great razors and frankly they are cheap for what goes into then. If they were fully valued or easy to make there would be ten others selling then for half the price.

Hand made products, especially when dealing with some of the best artisans are expensive. A hand made pipe can cost $5000 to $10000, or more and the input (briar) is less than $100.... Hand made automatic watches can cost $50000 to millions.

At $300, I doubt James is making more than $50 an hour and I'm not even factoring in the cost of the equipment. For example, a 5 axis machine can cost in the neighbourhood of $350k.

Will the WMR shave better than $50 razor, maybe marginally or not at all but that's not what you are paying for.

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Hi, I'll try to address this.    My business model is to make high quality machined razors.   There doesn't seem to be any question about the quality, so I'll talk about the price.  

There are plenty of ways to go here.   I could make a very cheap (quickly made) product, or very expensive (time consuming), or something in between.   I started with a level of quality that I was happy with, and set a price that I could work with.    A few things changed after I got started:

1) I was asked to keep a "Wait List" instead of just using the website (adding to the inventory whenever I had some finished razors)  
This meant I would need to start doing a lot of emailing.   I didn't plan for this extra time.   I now have almost 3000 emails since February.   It slows things down because I need to be at the computer or at the machines or finishing/polishing, or packaging and shipping, but only one place at a time.

2)  People wanted custom options.   I like doing this, but this hardly makes things quicker.   I do have a very good machining background, so I am able to take most requests.   But that wasn't factored into my original price.   I considered charging extra for this, but I held off so I could think about it more.   A typical custom request is to make a handle that's a bit longer or shorter.   Sometimes it gets more complicated.   My original price was for something I could produce in batches, but this is made to order.

3)  I found I could do a better job with finishing if I took just a little more time.   I had expected to get faster, not slower.   But the pieces became better if I did not hurry.

So,  I decided in June to adjust prices and commit to even higher standards.   I decided to encourage customization.  This makes more sense for a one-man shop than it does for a larger shop.  (A larger manufacturer has departments that need to co-ordinate for this)  With a higher price (I'm still going by the old prices until I catch up with orders) I can do a better job, offer custom options, and communicate by email with each customer.   It's a premium product with premium service.   If the market doesn't want this,  I'll certainly understand.   I made these choices based on what I think is actually wanted.  

Also given the availability of so many other nice razors and accessories, it doesn't seem like there is anything wrong with offering a high end product.   I'd rather make nice stuff, and so far it seems like some people want that.   The market already has a lot of economy items, and I'm just one guy so I don't see myself getting into high volumes of quickly made razors.   I've been enjoying this and I'm glad there's interest.

James