How can we make money?

No Judgement
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Hello Everyone!

We’ve been pretty consistently losing money, and I need to figure out how keep the lights on.

Generally the pattern has been that we’ll have a bunch of sales during the Kickstarters and not much in between which isn’t sustainable. This week for example we’ve sold just one Maslow 4.1 I believe which isn’t nearly enough to cover our expenses.

In the past we’ve been out of stock between Kickstarters so we haven’t been pushing much for marketing, but now that we have kits in stock and ready to ship we need to find a way to transition to being a sustainable business.

I think that what we have is really cool, albeit certainly still a very DIY project. I’m worried that I don’t want to make too slick of marketing which might convince folks to buy one who aren’t ready for the “step #1 build and troubleshoot a robot”.

How can we get the word out to the right people?

All of the best ideas for the directions to take Maslow in come from the forums so I figured I would ask here.

Does anyone have any suggestions for how we could work to make the transition to a self sustaining project?

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Interestingly I was pondering what the next iteration of Maslow could be (not very long ago while I was doing the linear rail stuff).

My take is - you could go the same route as V1 / low rider and go mostly printed.

I can’t easily make a PCB, and I’d rather buy most of the arms as injection moulded (for now) - but the less you ship the less shipping is, and the quicker hardware iteration can be.

Edit:

To give you some idea, it wouldn’t take much more for me to be able to build a Maslow 4.X with just these parts:

  • Control Board
  • 4 sensor boards
  • 4 Magnets
  • 8 rollers (I could actually do 4 myself but its splitting hairs)
  • 8 arm halves
  • 4 spools / belts
  • 4 gears
  • 4 idlers
  • 4 sensor cables
  • 4 motor cables
  • A PSU

And the PSU / cables are just convenience.

As a package, especially if you didn’t include the PSU, you could make a kit that was <500g i’d imagine, in a small box.

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Dave wrote:

but the less you ship the less shipping is, and the quicker hardware iteration can be.

While I am (obviously) eager to do hardware improvements, a sustainable business
is not going to be based on selling newer versions of maslow to replace their
old ones, not matter how they ar manufactured

in the US priority mail flat-rate boxes are fantastic deals if you can engineer
your stuff to fit them

Bar needs to sell kits to more people, or sell something beyond just kits
(classes, assistance, ???)

what can be done (I don’t have a good answer)

David Lang

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The Maslow is very close to being a “build and run” product, with a nearly stable standard software package. One thing I would suggest, if possible, is to build a test machine and run every controller board to ensure you are confident it leaves with all the functionality operational.

You probably should emphasise that it is not a commercial machine (yet), but is considerably cheaper than the cheapest commercial machine.

We need to develop and provide a minimum and maximum requirement for the frame, with size, angle (for vertical), minimum and maximum lengths of belt anchors from a central position.

Not sure how much help this is but I hope you can make it sustainable.

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I’m not saying it’s definitely the answer, but the initial high cost is a barrier to entry, and 3D printers are ubiquitous.

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I would add the bearings to your list and a power cable with plug for controller board and leave out the (heavy) PSU

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Yeah, that’s a good shout, i’d probably include the fan too for simplicities sake.

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@bar how about selling the Maslow on Amazon? You would have to declare the current status of the project, but it may increase sales.

You could also sell rights to other (bigger) companies to make your machine and receive royalities on their sales. Maybe even overseas locations.

I think there is probably a decent number of people that have put off purchases until the bugs get worked out. Marketing and getting the word out is probably a limiting factor as well.

You could take up ad space on social platforms, search engines, and Amazon. So when cnc is searched yours is the first to pop up.

Pivot to hardware only packages (as mentioned above post) with plans for 3D printing and have the user cut a plywood sled to reduce packaging and shipping costs and provide a lower cost option.

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Wouldn’t hurt to emphasis what people are actually making with their Maslow 4’s, such as furniture, Theatre backdrops and props, caravan fitouts, boats etc

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Accessories like different router bits, holders etc.
Spare parts of course.
Plans - both for different tables/frames/setups and things to cut. I would not mind paying for those.

And do remember the potential for the whole world when thinking about shipping. :slight_smile:

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First love the machine, love the concept and the countless hours of thought behind it. Appreciate all that help and have helped me.

So from my perspective there are a few things that could be improved to help with the money end.

The marketing end of things. Like others have post Amazon, web search top hits, maker shows, other maker conventions, etc. not sure of what all you currently do.

Of course you want to evolve the machine but this one should work well for each purchase before moving on to the next model. Work to get this flawless ish. Your after the sale service is great. Need a finished product that you still can keep under a diy and open source umbrella.

Next the build itself. DIY doesn’t need to mean you get so frustrated you want to punt the machine as far as possible. There were so many tips and tricks that were found only after finishing the build and fighting the problems. Not that the forums didn’t cover them it’s that you didn’t even know they were a problem. I’m sure like others I’ve dissembled and reassembled the machine more than a dozen times checking fits, tightness of screws, etc. making adjustments. Everyone’s take on free spinning, fit or how tight screws are can be vastly different. I’ve disassembled and reassembled this so many times I have it down like a pit crew. And I truly believe that 90 percent of all the trouble, frustrations and negativity are introduced through this diy element. So this would require more work on your end. Like the posts about testing the boards I feel the major component of this build and as well the most frustrating and potential for problems is the arms. I feel the arms should be completely assembled and yes tested. How you do that I’m not sure but if you could dream this machine up you should be able to set up an a test for the arms. That way the spools are all the necessary and correct looseness, lubricated, magnets glued correctly and in the proper position to the encoder, motor gear proper distance from idler and arm half, retracts with the proper current, screw properly tightened, etc. When some look at the amount of assembly and the amount of things that could go wrong with some minor assembly tweaks it could make them hesitant and then turn them off of the purchase. Need more problem resolved comments in the forums for those fishing around before they buy.

I think of why I purchased the machine. I didn’t need it but I wanted it so I had to convince myself that I could build it and get it working with little help. I’m not a programmer but can follow directions so even though I had a few hiccups on that end I was able to make it happen. Some may be a little more timid. Still can diy just a little less. Some of the fun is in the build process for some people. Some not so much. Maybe you have to charge a little more to do the upfront work and testing. Your machine is still priced far below anything like it. I don’t think less is more when it comes to this type of purchase. Too many things could go wrong and that leads to bad reviews. If you want to broaden the audience make it easier to assemble and interface with.

Yes it will change the shipping box size. I’m pretty sure I paid for shipping when I ordered this. not really a game changer for me. maybe for others? Maybe multiple smaller boxes if size or weight is the issue??

Narrowing the parts and pieces included in the kit down or have people spend hours and hours printing pieces only for them not to fit right or break I feel will also narrow down the people buying your product. You don’t want to make it more difficult it won’t lead to upselling to others.

The documentation for assembly, operation, troubleshooting, etc. need a little polishing. Forums are great and fortunately most have the same issues so it’s easy to search if you word it correctly. At some point you have to stop changing things to truly refine them. That is especially true for the documentation and operations of the machine including the programming.

So in summary….

Marketing (although as I write this I’m changing my mind) Amazon,top hit on searches, shows, expos, conventions

DIY involvement level to eliminate the human error for critical parts. Stick to known working frame setups like the default one on the site. Any deviation from, although open source, could cause issues and is at your risk.

Documentation and what things should look/behaving and that you don’t have instructions from past builds that aren’t valid anymore. The forum’s are great.

Bryan

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Hi

I don’t know anything about having a business or marketing, but maybe you should try to get profits by pushing more sells of peripherals?

I got into Maslow about a month ago, I had to do a lot of reading to understand bits, dust collection (which I still don’t fully get), clamping, friction pads to the spoil-board, tools to remove tabs and more

Maybe you can create a list of all the recommended equipment and have affiliate links to all of them both for the states and for worldwide market, this can maybe help you have some income between batches without much work

It will be win-win for the customers as they will get sure and tested peripherals for a fast start without the hours of reading in the forums and you can make some profits without needing to invest in your own stock (although maybe you can create one later)

You can also mention said affiliate links in tutorial vids you can upload to your channel, for example make a short video about beginner tips and have the link in the description and tell the audience it will help keep making M4 better

Hope it helps, and thank you for Maslow being a honest business, can’t find many of those today
Eldar

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Ok, I also made this list for suggestions for affiliate items, It’s also good for me to get it all in one place

Please comment more ideas and corrections

P.S, it’s says sheet private but its public

Thanks,
Eldar

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how comfortable are you with 3d printing? would it make sense for you to print
and ship some of the accessories in the not shop?

or even setup affiliate links with places that do custom printing/manufacturing
(big names like cut-send-cut and jlcpcb can print and ship internationally),
thingiverse and similar have companies and networks of individuals that will
print and ship things to you.

you would have to order and test the models to make sure they are good, but it
would give people a way to order the things who don’t have 3d printers
available.

while it may seem like you are profiting off the work of others (the people who
designed the parts), you are providing a way to find tested models and a way to
order them, and the people providing the models uploaded them for others to use
them (if anyone specified a ‘no commercial use’ license, then you may not be
able to do this, but I doubt that many people did)

you printing and shipping could make you more money, but has the time and hassle
of doing the printing and shipping (and dealing with problems) that you would
not have with an affiliate setup

David Lang

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Send ones to famous YouTubers. Adam Savage Evan and Katelyn, Nerd Forge, Matthias Wendell, Simone Gertz, you have some Internet street cred already. I think some of these might work.

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Yes. Better documentation. You have a good community in the forums. You have built social capital. Can you give us a wiki version of the manuals to refine and help make them better?

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On of my ideas that I want to pursue with my own Maslow is designing and making printing presses that are cheap and easy and accessible. I have a far fetched plan to go to universities and offer workshops for money to help students in printing programs make their own portable and accessible presses. People go through these programs and come out without the tools to do the thing.i have done a lot of printing related things in the past 20 years but have never again done the lithography that I trained in.

I think there might be an opportunity for you to do this sort of thing. Offer a workshop at a university to art students especially sculpture, architecture, design, and engineering students for 1400 dollars for a week. They will get a Maslow, put it together, and then do a cool project. People have money for this kind of thing, you sell machines, you get them into use at key places that train other people. You give direct support for successful startup and projects. You could even charge to train affiliate trainers to go do this.

I wonder if you could even get robot research labs at universities to partner with you for research. You are a well established robot research and development lab.

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Can you approach universities and offer a talk to engineering students about your decade of robotic research and design?

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Are there makerspaces nearby or ones can travel to where you can offer robot plus class packages?

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Ah - hahh, perhaps a bit time consuming. But consulting on setup and use. Might be a bit of a minefield and take more time than it is worth away from developing the product. But if money is scarce..

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