FrankenCutters - how I run this business

FrankenCutters Homepage

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1. Creating and maintaining a website

Without a website, there wouldn't be a FrankenCutters business, that's for sure. The process was:

Register the domain "Frankencutters.com". I think that costs about $15/year, and you can register for 5 years at a time.
Find a webhosting company (I use ValueWeb). That costs about $230 per year, including pop email hosting. I really have to have pop email, rather than just a free webmail account.
Setup a few email addresses for FrankenCutters.

2. Managing all the email I receive.

I use, and highly recommend Seamonkey as a web browser and email client. I know many people do email through Google or Yahoo, but web-based email would not do it for me. There's a HUGE amount of email to manage. Zillions of file attachments to send and receive. More about that later...

3. Creating price quotes

First off, most of the price is the labor.

Labor - To estimate labor cost, I keep a lot of records, especially for repeat order customers. On the work sheet for making the cutter I often write down how many minutes each phase of the operation took (cutting the copper strips, bending the cutter, soldering, adding a handle, cleaning, packing it up.) I can use those numbers to estimate similar cutters accurately. This is especially useful for big things like multicutters.
I also created a database template (Microsoft Access) which I use sometimes for bigger items. It gives me a template with a lot of entry fields. I enter how many minutes for each operation, how many square inches of copper, how many cutters (for multicutters), time to add the handle, etc... I also have fields for the current cost of copper, and for dollars per hour for labor. It then calculates a selling price for that particular item.
The copper (or aluminum) price is a small percentage.of the cost, even though the cost of copper has just about tripled since I started doing this. The cost of aluminum is roughly 1/4 of copper, but I can't solder it, and it's thicker, so it won't work for cookie cutters, just cakepans.
The cost of solder, propane (for soldering), plastic bags, rivets (for cakepans) - This is a tiny percentage of the cutter price.
Tools - Other than a metal shear and bar-folder, there aren't any big tools, just small, custom-modified handtools, and a lot of custom-made bending jigs and fixtures. So tooling doesn't enter into the price much at all.
Office expense - Again, not much. I have a few computers, printers, scanners. There are expenses for paper, ink, toner, blank CD's, etc... but it's not much expense at all. I don't believe in buying the latest version of anything. And computers and printers are very cheap at yard sales.

Custom cookie cutters, cakepans & more

FrankenCutters Homepage

Photo Galleries of some copper cutters we have made:

Photo Galleries of other products we have made:

Useful Info:

Other Links:

1. Creating and maintaining a website

2. Managing all the email I receive.

3. Creating price quotes

4. Making cookie cutters

5. Printing invoices

6. Packing them up

7. Shipping considerations

8. Record keeping

9. Doing taxes...