Sawmill Business Podcast

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Today, we're talking to Steve Timmermans from EverWoods Designs. Starting part-time in early 2000, Steve decided to acquire his own logs for lumber at the same time that live edge was making a comeback. As a former biologist, with a background in ecology, he transitioned from this profession into the woodworking career by gradually building his business over the past 13 years. Steve started sawing slabs back in 2002, and in 2014 he decided to go full-time with his business, EverWoods. Starting with a staff of two additional employees to help build the business, they were off to a great start. In the beginning, they were milling mainly for their own supplies. It came naturally for them to source their own logs and this kept them pretty busy. Staying primarily on site, they were able to saw enough logs to sustain their own sales and furniture division. ESSENTIAL TOOLS The first piece of equipment that Steve bought was a Granberg Alaskan Chainsaw Mill. Using a double ended bar with

On this episode, we’re talking to James Vann of Summerhill Woodwork. Based in the south east of England, James diversifies his business by utilizing his wood skills in several areas. When he’s not running his sawmill, he also does tree and forestry work.   HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED When he was fourteen, James started selling firewood as a side job. With a carpenter for a father, James was also brought up around woodworking and using the tools in his dad’s workshop. While selling the firewood, James kept coming across pretty pieces of wood that he started picking out for projects. This is where his passion was cultivated.   As he grew up, James knew that he wanted to be an entrepreneur and run his own business, free from working for other people. At first, he would underbid and take on projects that he wasn’t sure if he could do. However, the work he did was so well-done that the customers asked him back for more. Things took off from there!   GROWING HIS SKILLSET Since learning new techniques and evolv

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED. Today, we’re talking with Bryce Mann of Wolfbear Wood Designs. About two years ago, Bryce started as a woodworking hobbyist. As he started piecing small projects together and began to learn more about the work, he soon felt confident enough to start selling.   DEVELOPING AND MARKETING THE BUSINESS. The main marketing mediums that Bryce uses are social media and word of mouth. So far, Wolf Bear has gained enough traction to start started selling in a local store!   FAVORITE ASPECTS OF THE BUSINESS Bryce loves the learning aspect of the work. Looking at what he’s learned and how far he’s come, inspires him to keep creating and growing. Without a business background, Bryce is working on expanding his marketing skills and business skills.   CURRENT PROJECTS Recently, Bryce has been working with live-edge products. Specifically, a computer desk that was originally supposed to be a coffee table! Excited to make things that he never has before, his excitement about this challenge

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Located in North Central, New Jersey, Scott started Nature’s Fell with his stepbrother, Bob Snyder. With a background as a professional chef, Scott spent years in the foodservice industry. After Hurricane Sandy hit and wiped out the restaurant where he worked, Scott bought a sawmill, learned how to use it, and grew his hobby into a business. Back in 2012, with the hurricane destruction providing plenty of lumber, there was a huge learning curve on Scott’s end when it came to using the sawmill. Over the span of 6 months, they milled enough lumber that they needed a place to store it. After acquiring a storage space, equipment such as a kiln and other milling materials started filling out the shop.   GROWING THE BUSINESS For the last four years, Nature’s Fell has been working on tapping into the demand for slabs and unique pieces. Using word of mouth, Instagram, and other forms of social media they’ve grown the business quite a bit. Along with being a sawmill business, Nature’s Fel

How He Got His Start Today, we’re talking to Justin Pruitt of Knock on Wood Custom. Justin came into the ownership of Knock on Wood by happenstance. It was four years ago that he met with an older gentleman to help him with some sawing work. It was at this moment that he fell in love with the work. Seeing the light in his eyes, the older man (and original owner) invited him back and started training him on the milling process. After some serious health issues came up for the man, he gave Justin the reins and lead in the business. Passion For The Business Justin started his career in construction, but running Knock on Wood is his true passion. From the customers to the work itself, he loves everything about it, especially the “organically unique” projects that they do. These are projects that can’t be reproduced because each and every slab is unique. Knowing this, Justin doesn’t look at other woodworkers and think of them as competition. He sees them as fellow craftsmen making their own unique projects. In

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Today we’re talking with Michael Veneziano from Ponderosa Millworks! They are located in Oakland, right across the bay from San Francisco. At seventeen, Michael was busy landscaping when a tree service worker came up to him and asked for his help “wrangling” some trees. The worker turned out to be from Ponderosa Tree Service, and in 1991, Michael bought the company. After 35 years in the tree service, Michael retired last year. PONDEROSA MILLWORKS When he sold his tree service last year, he left a clause in the contract that he would continue to receive all of the logs. With an endless supply of slabs, Michael finds his niche in this area. Coming in faster than he can mill and sell, he mostly sells slabs in his showroom, showcasing hundreds of slabs all on display. Architects and designers bring in their client to peruse and purchase the wood. PARK COMMISSIONER EXPERIENCE For many years, Michael also worked a volunteer position as a park commissioner. In this position, he was abl

Background Starting off as a hobby, Jake Latvala started making coffee tables. As his products started to sell, he would invest the profits into new tools or equipment he needed. Jake liked what he was doing so much that he invested in a sawmill as well. Realizing that he wanted to make a career out of his passion, he started taking all of the bonuses that he would get from his full-time job (of 20 years!), paid everything off, and started working full time for his company, Ol’ Loggin Sawmill, with barely any overhead. Getting his name out there After putting his first ad on Craigslist, Jake sold out of everything he had made in less than 15 minutes. On the wave of this momentum, one thing led to another and soon, out of necessity, he was buying a forklift, truck, and a pole barn! Once Jake posted an ad on Facebook and started utilizing social media, everything really exploded. Besides social media, Jake explains that word of mouth is huge for him, as well as business cards! Initially, he assumed business

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Now a family business, Big Beaver Co. started out as a hobby. Owner, Jay Butler was tired of paying big money for the same items that he was passionate about creating himself. Jay started this business with his family. His brother is his Arborist and co-worker and while leaning on family and friends, Jay hasn’t been let down. INCOME GENERATION From a hobby to a business about a year ago, Jay is 100% self-taught. Specializing in live edge milling, He takes Urban Lumber destined for the chipper and turns it into something beautiful. From start to finish, he’s involved. He knows the wood, cuts it, and puts it in the kiln. Jay started out milling for other people and soon realized that it was much more profitable to mill for himself. Jay figured this out by breaking metal on other people’s logs and losing a day’s profit on logs for other people. Realizing that it made more sense to keep the profits, he began mill for himself. Currently, Big Beaver Co. is linked up to sawmills on the

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED. Today we’re talking with Stephen Beaulac of SB Design Co. Stephen has always been interested in building things with wood and loves spending hours in his shop creating. Planning to retire from his day job in November, he plans on pursuing his woodworking business full time. Stephen says that the look on someone’s face when they see something that he’s created is one of the things that truly inspires him to continue doing what he does.   DEVELOPING AND MARKETING THE BUSINESS. So far, all of SB Design Co. clients have come by word of mouth. Even without a website, he’s still been able to sustain his business by selling direct and having a stand at large craft shows. Stephen uses chainsaws and sanding when he sources his wood. Stephen finds the reclaimed wood that he uses through ads and by following leads.   FUTURE PLANS. SB Designs is going to grow! Beaulac says he plans on setting up his website, developing his sales team, and using good old-fashioned cold calling. Stephen ca

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED. Today, we have Dan Pottage of Pottage Sawmill. Dan started out as a landscaper, but being based in Alberta, Canada the cold wouldn’t allow him to do landscaping as much as he wanted. Instead, he took classes and started working in tree removal. Starting with the Grandberg mill, he began milling and drying the slabs in less than a month’s time. DEVELOPING AND MARKETING THE BUSINESS. Currently, he’s milling, drying, and selling slabs. Still keeping the Grasberg mill, Dan also set up a dehumidification kiln to dry his slabs faster as compared to air drying. Even though the business still young, Dan’s use of Instagram and Facebook has helped to grow his business and connect him with other people in the industry. FUTURE PLANS. Through social media, Dan has found amazing people that he plans to connect and work with. He also will continue doing more slab work as well as making tables. ADVICE. He advises people interested in the business to set up a dehumidification kiln because of i

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Today, we have Danielle of Sail Cargo. She started out as a tall ship sailor, then later came up with an idea to build a full wood cargo-only sailing vessel. This was an inspiration from another vessel she experienced in which she loved their concept and mission. She went ahead and started the project. The vessel is one of its kind, coming in at 150 ft. Danielle's vision is to nurture traditional woodwork skills in the timber industry, while at the same time conserving the forest. CHALLENGES OF RUNNING THE PROJECT The project has been pretty smooth sailing for Danielle and her team. Her only issue is getting people to understand the concept of the project since it’s a people funded project. HIGHLIGHTS OF THE BUSINESS One of Danielle’s exciting moments was when she got large amounts of a Del Monte hardwood. This was perfect for building the core part of the ship, but most importantly, it was a great way to help Hurricane Otto victims by purchasing the wood from that area. She also

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Still working a day job, Jarrod Rodgers considers himself an “extreme hobbyist”. Completely self-taught, Jarrod deals in woodworking, commision work, and also chainsaw milling. Chainsaw milling was something that Jarrod stumbled into almost by accident. When asked by a client for a “live edge” coffee table, Jarrod made his way to the local slab supplier. When they couldn’t meet the slab needs for the project, Jarrod decided to start producing his own. A miller was born. INCOME GENERATION & WOOD SOURCING With a day job, Jarrod has to manage his time extremely well and limit the side projects that he takes on. Aside from this constant balancing act, living in a “tree desert” also creates more hurdles for Jarrod. It’s only through time spent on scouting areas, working with local tree services and wood shops, social media, and continuous networking with other millers, that he is able to source the wood that he needs to continue producing. THE VIRAL VIDEO Jarrod also has one of

In an effort to save our natural resources and cut down on waste, Jennifer Alger started the Urban Lumber Network. The Network is a coalition formed by people who share the same idea of not wanting to see the wood and natural resources that we have current access to be chipped or sent to a landfill, while we still continue to import other hardwood from overseas. PEOPLE WITHIN THE BUSINESS People in the Urban Lumber network include landowners with wooded acres, sawmill owners who repurpose the trees, woodworkers who turn the wood into pieces of art, and laborers who can take part in the process of removing and breaking down the trees. IMPORTANCE OF THE BUSINESS As part of the “Urban Tree Rescue Program”, Urban Lumber uses any wood not harvested for their timber value (such as “beetle kill salvage”), repurposes it, and then markets it to the American consumer- all while maintaining the philosophy that not only is wood one of the greenest options that you can choose, but every time we can save a natural reso

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Joshua Blewett is an artist who has been creating wood carvings and sculptures as a side hobby for 25 years. As a kid, he used to love drawing and painting. His stepfather is a wood carver and was the first professional artist he’d ever seen. Joshua used to help him with carvings and this type of influence helped grow his love for carving. BUSINESS MARKETING & IDEAL CUSTOMERS Joshua mostly finds his clients from word of mouth and referrals, but lately, he’s been using Instagram to market his work. Instagram is his favorite marketing channel since it's incredibly visual. Aside from that, he also goes to carving shows and exhibitions. CHALLENGES OF BEING AN ARTIST One of the most challenging aspects of Joshua’s business is that each piece is handmade and a one-off. Remaking every piece to order requires an intense amount of precision and attention to detail. Getting logs for these carvings can also be quite a hassle. In addition to that, they're heavy to transport or lift aroun

HOW HE STARTED THE BUSINESS On this episode, we have Evan Lanterman of Lanterman Woodworks. Evan’s college education was in Industrial design and he wanted to have hands-on experience after he finished his schooling. He started out by building timber frames, general contracting and the carpentry business. In 2011, he slabbed a tree that had come down at a nearby park and this turned out to a game changer for him. After opening the tree up, he discovered a new way of working with wood. He obviously didn’t want to waste the products and this is how he shifted from the type of work that he was doing. At the moment he’s focusing on ways to utilize the mill and the material that comes from it to create furniture although he minimally still does residential carpentry. PRODUCT AND SERVICES Currently, Evan is focused on building pieces through his creativity hoping clients will be impressed and will buy them from him. He has a network of local designers and a few homeowners that he’s been working for over the year

Today we have Sean O’Brien from Pacific Coast Lumber. The business is located in San Luis Bispo, California right between LA and San Francisco on the Coast. The business has been around for almost 23 years but Sean bought it only 2 ½ years ago from Don Seawater. Dan owned a commercial lumber yard where he was selling commodity lumber until he realized it wasn't working for him anymore. He decided to generate a new industry of urban forested lumber. He had noticed that bio mass resources were being underutilized. They were left to decay or were used as firewood or wood chip which was a high waste of resources as far as Dan was concerned. He then bought a lumber mill and started retrieving the materials locally and developed the demand for it. When he was ready to retire, he approached Sean and his wife to buy off the business which they gladly did. Before buying the business, Sean had been a software engineer for 25 years with no milling background. His wife on the other hand was an auditor for about 23 years

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Today, we have Matthew from Of Earth Furniture. Matthew has been in the wood working industry for over 20 years now. At 17, he started doing custom wood turning while working under a certain gentleman for 4 years. He acquired great skills and work ethic from this mentors experience. After turning 21, he left the job and begun hunting for another. He checked out a few shops but wasn't impressed by how they worked. He was more of a hands-on man but all he saw around was automated processes. He picked up a few jobs here and there until he broke off to start his own business, Of Earth Furniture. Of Earth Furniture is just a small company of two people at the moment. It has been a lifelong dream for Matthew to do custom solid wood furniture and that’s what Of Earth Furniture deals in. He sometimes does commercial work, but mostly custom does wood work. His work consists of his own designs but he’s very open to a customers’ design and custom tailor pieces. CHALLENGES OF RUNNING A BUSINE

HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED Today, we have Kevin Scheimreif from Steel and Grain. When Kevin was a kid, his dad had a construction business and he would go help him. He worked in the shop and on the jobs during summer break, where he learned how to do everything from electrical, plumbing, additions etc. He vividly remembers how he built his first nightstand when he was 11. After high school, he realized he really didn’t like the business. He then went to work for someone else for a couple of years as a mason. He left this job and took many other jobs but he never quite felt satisfied with himself. One of his friends, Kevin, later asked him to help build his house. This wasn't something Kevin knew how to do but was up for the challenge. He did this work for some time but construction still wasn't satisfying to him, so he decided to start building custom furniture. He started the business in his garage and inherited some woodworking tools from his dad after he closed his business a few years before. This is how

Blaise Brogan started cutting trees when he left school at 16 years. He was working for various tree companies and eventually started his own. He first bought a middle skid steer boxer machine which he’d imported from America. He was impressed with the first product he made and decided it was something he could actually do. HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED He was working for a firm on week days and then work on the weekends cutting trees. He’d just bought a house and was working on it every evening trying to completely renovate it. One day in 2001, he decided to quit his job and just do his own thing. Blaise has only been serving clients in his little village in North London. They love him because he creates unique products and is quite affordable. When he started, he was trying to save the wood by cutting the hedges since there is a big reduction in trees. Afterwards, he started cutting the trunks in the yard after which required him to buy a milling machine. He mainly does tree trimming, but also does milling.

Thrane Axe and Sawmill company is all about axe restorations, making blanks for people who want to curve their own handles and making wood wedges. HOW THE BUSINESS STARTED. In the beginning, Nick had never used axes before and was curious of where to buy. He found old ones from different marketplaces and started collecting them. It reached a point where he felt as though he was hoarding them and he slowly began selling. Because he was frustrated of buying factory made handles which only fit certain size axes, he started Thrane Axe & Sawmill. He knew there are so many different axes and sizes of the eye where the handle goes in and that’s why he decided to start making his own. He would buy wood and cut it himself using an lt10 sawmill but he’s now upgraded to a powerful hydraulic sawmill. He’s been in business for about 4 years now and the reception has been great. The wedges have been selling so fast because no one else makes the variety of wood types, of wedges. ROLE THE SAWMILL PLAYS IN THE BUSINES