I have long wondered how to become filthy rich from woodworking. I believe I have found the answer. I was in Beverly Hills last week and it hit me: the answer is MOVIES. Unfortunately most of the woodworkers I know don’t have any real acting talent. Then I realized, there is big money in one genre of films that doesn’t take any talent — Horror Movies. It really began to fall together at that point. All woodworkers are really nice people, but suppose that one of them went really bad. Can you imagine the horror that a woodworker could inflict with the tools of the trade.
The really big money is in series of horror films. Who could forget Freddy, or Jason, or Chuckie, and the sequences of movies that followed from each.
So how about a sequence of horror movies based on a woodworker gone bad (I know that you are having a difficult time believing that such a thing could happen.) The series could include:
Woodworker I – The Horror begins
Woodworker II – The Mutant Sawblade
Woodworker III – Little Shop of Horrors
Woodworker IV – Chuckie gets a Domino
Woodworker V – Norm VS Godzilla
etc
You can just imagine the money that can be made from “woodworking” using this venue. So if any of you want in on the millions to be made here, send in some ideas.
Mel
Measure your output in smiles per board foot.
Replies
At my last job, I often joked about making a film showing someone being forced into the cabinet of a fairly large CNC lathe we had. With a 12" chuck spinning at about 3K RPM, and the big turret slowly pushing the victim into it as they pounded on the window screaming. Cut to a big splat of blood against the inside of the window . . .
Of course, I had a few people in mind . . .
Don
The big money is in plastics, plastics! Sorry, can't help it -- I just read an article yesterday about ketchup of all things, and how getting just the right valve on the upside-down ketchup bottle has saved the condiment from obscurity. It was invented by a determined chain-smoking guy sitting in a dingy room playing with silicone. The patented valve has been used by such disparate bodies as Gerber and NASA. He sold the company in 1995 for $13 million.
Mel,
If you got filthy rich you would probably indulge yourself in this way and that. I know I would. This can destroy one's character and then the wife murders you for your wrongdoing. No one films it however; and anyway you are croaked so the money woud be useless.
I find the pension is just enough and am frightened to have more. Who wants to be a Holtey addict, which would require the riches from at least 2 filums per year?
And what other appetities might you fulfil with all that dosh? (Bizare Leather stuff; shudder).
Lataxe the replete.
Sorry, but I just don't believe that it would do well at all.
You see, the horror flicks that make money all have scenes in them, in which the lead actor -- always a good looking twenty-something female -- is being chased around in her underwear by something horrifying.
Don't know bout you, but I'm not payin to see any of us runnin round in scivvies. In fact, I might pay to stay away.
Politics is the antithesis of problem solving.
Yes,Hey who knows, maybe Paris Hilton might be looking for work! After her stint in the slammer she might need a new thrill. I can see it all now; Paris skewered by her SawStop, riving knife failure!Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
"...maybe Paris Hilton might be looking for work! " She's hired Rush Limbaugh's Image Rescuer guy. Sheesh, I can't believe they put that in a report on NPR!!! She's turning all philanthropic on us. forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
How to make a small fortune in woodworking:
1. Start with a large fortune.
2. Keep woodworking until most of it is gone.
An insider once told me the world was full of ex-custom furniture makers that were paying off IRS debts.
In a magazine I read a couple of days ago, another of the major furniture makers was closing their last US factory. Seems the US labor rates are 28x the Chinese labor rate. And people wonder why their furniture is not the quality that they remember from their parents' days. Duh.
byhammerandhand
Well luckily Stickley is still made in New York. I don't think it gets much finer than Stickley (at least that's what I told my wife when I presented her with a bedroom set in mahogany made by Stickey.
Mel,
First of all, what is a nice Virginia boy, doing in Beverly Hills? I'll tell you what the real horror story is. It's how quickly a well grounded, well educated, intelligent and articulate person such as yourself can be drawn in by the trappings of that place.
Mel, here is what I want you to do, assuming that you are back home in Va. Make a cup of coffee, go out to the workshop, put your favorite music on the radio, chuck a blank in the lathe and start turning 1" dowels. After about a hour you'll be ankle deep in wood chips and BH will seem a distant memory.
-Chuck
P.S.
"Chuckie gets a Domino"? ROTFL
Chuck,
Good to hear from you. You are right. I am back in VA from Beverly Hills. So was I drawn to BH by the bling? Nah! I was at a four day, 8 hour-a-day meeting at UCLA. It was a "Complete Design Review" for a satellite under development.Measure your output in smiles per board foot.
I saw from your first post that you wanted to become filthy rich doing woodworking. I have solved half of the problem. I am definitely filthy from woodworking. It is the other part I am having trouble working on now. As I used to say that I was trying to solve the problem of the Philosopher's Stone of turning lead into gold. I figured out how to turn gold into lead. Now all I needed to learn is how to reverse the equation.
dherzig,
Well, none of is likely to get rich in this field, but we do know how to have fun. I do wish that I had founded the Festtool company. I understand that there are four woodworkers who do not yet have a Domino. They are probably somewhere in a third world country. When we die, the person with the most toys wins. Surely it will be a woodworker. Probably Norm.Have fun. Thanks for writing.
MelMeasure your output in smiles per board foot.
Chuck,
Just came up from the workshop, where I am finishing up a carving. I cranked up the computer and there was your message. You are right. I am back in VA after a week in Beverly Hills. Actually that was a bit of an overstatement. I did stay in a hotel that is within the Beverly Hills city limits, but I spent four days (8 hours a day) at a meeting at UCLA with about 60 other nerds. It was exciting if you enjoy "Complete Design Reviews" for large aerospace projects. There are some great aspects of living in the Los Angeles area. Back here in Virginia, I can't see the air. So when I go to take in a breath, I don't really know if there is any air out there. But in Los Angeles, you know that you are surrounded by air, because you can actually see it!!!Good to hear from you.
By the way, I had you picked to play "Chuckie the Woodworker". :-)
Have fun. Thanks for looking after my well-being.
MelMeasure your output in smiles per board foot.
Very good, Mel.
Building satellites are ya? Well now that you have come back down to Earth, maybe you can answer a question for me: How is it that we (well, guys like you) can invent thing-a-ma-gigs that can travel to outer space and do all those neat things, but you can't find a remedy for the flu bug that has "grounded" me for the past three days! I want to tell you I haven't been this sick in years.
Anyway, thanks for thinking about me for the "Chuckie" part, but compared to me "Chuckie" is a pretty handsome dude. I mean there are horror movies and then there are HORROR movies :-)
Regards,
-Chuck (never confused for "Chuckie")
Hi Mel,
You want to get rich from woodworking? Sell Festool :)
Paul
9619
I have one name for you, Harrison Ford.
It seems he was a wood worker working on a producers place who hired him for a movie called American Graffitti.
Today he just stands around while they get the lighting just right and everything perfect, he then walks in says, a few lines, some one yells cut and he walks back into his trailer so he's not bothered by the riff-raff.
When finished he takes his 20 million dollar paycheck to the bank.
Basically he gets paid 20 million for what amounts to about 2 hours worth of work or 10 million dollars per hour..
Now 10 million dollars per hour seems like a decent version of rich to me.. I wouldn't even mind the standing around part.
frenchy,
You'll like this, I read somewhere, that before James Bond, Sean Connery earned his living as a french polisher.
joinerswork,
So I should stop using shellac with my ultra thin method and start french polishing? That will ensure that I make 20 million per picture? I don't have to worry that I'm old and fat, simply start polishing away in a french manner?
Gee Thanks I'll head right out to hollywood,, uh one question, can you front me the money I'll need? I'll pay you back with my first movie contract..
No, No Frenchy! Don't abandon your madthod! We'll do Chapter VI - Frenchy, and his Little Mop of Horrors! ("That's IT Igor! Just SLOP it on....booo ha ha haH!") Traditional finishers will faint in the isles.
Mike D :)
Wow, you folks actually make money doing this? Never thought of that before...
Oh, and as far as woodworking being a horror flick, I don't know about that. Making money with wood sounds to me more like a comedy.
Why couldn't I have been born rich instead of good-looking? (Actually, I would have been satisfied with either).
Ray
Surely you know that the Skotchh achtor polishes of all nationalities withour fear or favour, not just the French - at least in his guise of knowing Edinburgh hardlad with a twinkle in his eye (the only guise he knows, I fear).
In "real life" which may have faded away to nowt, as fame has created the usual problems, I doubt he polishes off anything except those fine meals, wines and girlfriends.
Of course, his best role was in Hell Drivers and it has all been down hill from there. (He drives off a cliff, or was that Patrick McGooghan)?
Lataxe, a film critic (anyone can do it).
Lataxe, meduck,
" I doubt he polishes off anything except those fine meals, wines and girlfriends."
Possibly also, his spectacles, and his bare pate?
And Frenchy is it true that to French polish, you have to use your tongue?
Ray
DON"Y TAKE ANY WOODEN NICKLES. They're Chinese coins.
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