www.missionliving.com

[justin waldron]

I love checking out this site for ideas, passing it along.  Definately inspired by how expensive it all is, I wouldn't pay $400 for a nightstand, but it sure is a great way to tell my wife that we can afford to buy new tools when I save us so much money!!!!

[Don Clark]

That type of thing is one of the motivations that got me started woodworking. The wife found a plan for a bunk bed that looks like Cinderella's carriage. If you have it built for you its $5K...the plans are $150. I may have to buy a ton of tools and learn a lot, but it is worth it to give my girls something like that that I made them.

[Levi Lester]

It has been costing me as much to build as to buy lately, But that is because I have been buying tools. I believe you will enjoy something a whole lot more when you build it yourself though. Besides, I get tired of buying something just to find out it is a piece of junk.

[justin waldron]

As far as the cost association, if you can find a sawmill or lumber distributor close by you can build furniture much more inexpensively than buying. The oak blanket chests that are on my page were right at $150 a piece, $60 being oak from my local lumber yard and the other from the cedar lining that I had to get from Lowes. I am in the process of building a cherry bed, made from solid panels of cherry and I will have a totaly of $200 invested in it, all thanks to the folks at the mill. If it weren't for them I wouldn't be able to do many things that I can do at this point. The little quartersawn white oak table that I have listed cost me around $50 for materials.
It is much more important to me to know that what I make can be an heirloom that they can remember me by. On one final disheartening note, I live in Va. and we are famous for Lane furniture, chests etc.. I was in furniture store the other day for ideas and noticed that the blanket chests were made from 7 ply and not solid. Let us all keep plugging forward, keep our fingers and enjoy the time we have with what we enjoy doing.

[justin waldron]

One company to check online that are reasonable are www.bairdbrothers.com, they are out of ohio I believe.

[David Dean]

Well I got one for you hal about cabnet shops around you just go in and ask them if they have any off color oak they cant use it becouse of the color but they come in all diffent size's but I get oak for $ 1.00 a bround foot and hickery $ 2.00 a bround foot hey it doesnt hurt to ask ?
Dave

[justin waldron]

Well, I may be. I'm always trying to be the optimist...

Phillip said:

Justin:
I ordered the catalog. Though to be honest I hold little hope. The freight costs frequently are more than the product. When I had my shop going a few years ago, freight was 20% to 28% of my cost of goods sold. I have not noticed a decrease in the shipping costs yet. I will however look. My point was that some of us have had to be content with making a better product and not worry about the costs. Woodworkers Journal did an article about the same thing last year, knowing that the furniture prices at the big box stores were a large percentage below what you could buy the wood for. In the report there were prices taken across the USA and there were some variables, though the price of shipping was always a big issue. In the report quality was the one thing we can do better on. The author/editor was never able to beat the price. So I thank you for the tips, and I will follow up, but you just might be the luckiest guy on this forum.
Thanks,
Phil

[Jens Jensen]

I can even do better than that David.I have a friend who has a saw mill and I purchased 35 pieces of 5/4 x 6x8' rough cut on his band saw for 65.00.Oh yes I had lots of shavings to clean up but I have used it for many projects including a king size bed for us

David Dean said:

Well I got one for you hal about cabnet shops around you just go in and ask them if they have any off color oak they cant use it becouse of the color but they come in all diffent size's but I get oak for $ 1.00 a bround foot and hickery $ 2.00 a bround foot hey it doesnt hurt to ask ?
Dave

[chris nowacki]

i might even do 1 better than that lol. my dad lives on 12 acres and every couple of years or so he has a ton of tree's that have fallen due to storms and we get woodmizer to come out with there portable saw and have 'em cut up into all different size boards for bout $200.we just did about 12 logs last fall and already have a huge stack thats been drying for round 5 or 6 yrs.so for awhile i can have all the red oak i want for free.which will keep my prices down and hopefully keep my business up.

Jens Jensen said:

I can even do better than that David.I have a friend who has a saw mill and I purchased 35 pieces of 5/4 x 6x8' rough cut on his band saw for 65.00.Oh yes I had lots of shavings to clean up but I have used it for many projects including a king size bed for us

David Dean said:

Well I got one for you hal about cabnet shops around you just go in and ask them if they have any off color oak they cant use it becouse of the color but they come in all diffent size's but I get oak for $ 1.00 a bround foot and hickery $ 2.00 a bround foot hey it doesnt hurt to ask ?
Dave