how much does it cost you to build an amp?

[dartanion]

Selling kits is a losing proposition, with selling amps being only marginally more profitable unless you can build them quickly and cheaply. There's always ways to do this, but you can't reasonably charge $5000 for PCBs and ribbon cables, unless you have such a huge ground swell of interest in your product such as a celeb endorsement.

Here, there a lot of places to gig, but like everyone has said, not much $$$ in doing so. We're a 5 piece band and have been gig for about 5 years, have enough material to play for numerous hours, yet no one wants to pay anything for club gigs. Oh well. We have taken a different approach and have been booking private parties. These have been a great source of decent pay for 1 to 2 sets. That, and we have never been stiffed by these folks. More than I can say about some clubs.

[nickt]

my kids listen to Cat Empire (jazz) - things change.

That's great but how often to they hear Cat Empire or other jazz "live" compared with the recorded stuff?

Well that would be next Saturday - the under 18's show 2pm at the Metro

BTW the refrigerator manufacturer here has recently shifted production to China.

Sorry to hear that

[skyboltone]

To make a million dollar business building amps start with a two million dollars and wait a while . Seriously I think it's really hard to even make a profit let alone a living building amps.

Like the story I heard about the farmer that won the lottery. They asked him what he was going to do now that he had won millions and he said "Keep farming until it is all gone."

The sad thing is that Randall Smith probably has a net worth much more than Alexander Dumble and Ken Fischer combined.

The other sad part of building boutique amps, is that the people that could really benefit the most from your amps are usually the people least able to afford them; the upcoming musician ("What do you call a musician without a girlfriend? Homeless", "What's the difference between a musician and a large pizza? A large pizza can feed a family of four.")

Sorry Lefty, didn't see your post before I blurted the same sentiment.

[CaseyJones]

Selling kits is a losing proposition, with selling amps being only marginally more profitable unless you can build them quickly and cheaply.

I disagree. Selling kits is a quick way to make a few dollars at something that's generally very time consuming and not very profitable. There are a couple big vendors of amp kits who will hook you up, then it's up to you to move the merch.

There's a downside. Times have changed. Towards the end of the Hair Band era Gerald Weber started Kendrick Amplifiers and built primarily vintage replica Fenders. Kendrick was the only game in town when it came to simple amps with solid tone, it was a "build it and they will come" situation. Handcrafted tweeds were an attractive alternative to a rack full of tone sucking processors so tweeds were the right product at the right time. Geographic location plays a part in marketing, it helped that Kendrick is in Texas and Texas is right in the middle of the country.

It was a good idea and, judging from the sentiment here, any good idea is considered to be public domain. Which brings us to the downside... any market is about supply and demand. The boutique amp community is tiny and the demand for high quality amplifiers is relatively small. What happens, then, is every time a new builder pops up the "pie" that represents market share is sliced into ever smaller pieces. How small can your piece of the pie be before you go hungry? One could follow market trends and guess that eventually in a competitive market one would have to offer a flawless product at a bargain price. If there are similar products available in your market either with better features or for less money that's where the market will go.

There's always ways to do this, but you can't reasonably charge $5000 for PCBs and ribbon cables, unless you have such a huge ground swell of interest in your product such as a celeb endorsement..

Celeb endorsement is one asset. Another trend we see in the amp market is... trendiness. For a while it was tweeds, then once everyone had a tweed the market moved on. Then 18 watts, at the moment power scaling is hip. Multi channel setups with three or four channels are the mainstream, perhaps it won't be long until rack mounted rigs are the only way to get all the tones you need onstage... again.

There are some bizarre micro-fads out there. At the moment there's a modest but measureable demand for field coil speakers. Go figure!

Here, there a lot of places to gig, but like everyone has said, not much $$$ in doing so. We're a 5 piece band and have been gig for about 5 years, have enough material to play for numerous hours, yet no one wants to pay anything for club gigs. Oh well. We have taken a different approach and have been booking private parties. These have been a great source of decent pay for 1 to 2 sets. That, and we have never been stiffed by these folks. More than I can say about some clubs.

Again, it's supply and demand. There are a lot of bands who are willing to play for free just for the exposure. When it comes right down to it the phenomenon of musical stardom is a construct of the music business. There are certain musical products (like Elvis for instance) who had something before the industry gets involved, then the industry "discovers" them, packages them and markets them. Like any other business the music industry wants to make the most money for the least work. If "stars" pop up like mushrooms after a rain what is to prevent the industry from creating stars in a controlled environment? That's what gave us Madonna, that's what gave us Britney. It's a capricious market, as long as that particular "product" is popular there's a market for that product.

Back to amps. Price to beat per amp: I just managed to get my cost under $100 each for a small batch of simple single ended combos. 90% U.S. made content, I can't argue with Alpha pots and Xicon resistors.

[dartanion]

I used to sell kits and got out of it because it was very labor intensive for very little monetary reward. I spent more time hand holding people through their builds than focusing on the business side. This is what makes it a losing proposition. Yeah, it sure is easy to make a buck if you abandon your customers after POS. Not the way I operate.

As for gigging, we don't do it for fame or fortune. We do it for the fun of it and the pure enjoyment of entertaining others. We have done plenty of free gigs in the past, plenty of benefit gigs too, now we ask for a small amount to cover our expenses. Everyone's time is valuable as well as the wear and tear on equipment. We never went into this expecting fame and fortune, just gig frequently and have a lot of fun doing so.

The amp market is fickle and pretty saturated at this point. You need something to set you apart from the rest whether is pure marketing or gimmickry, or something truly special. There are just too many tweed and plexi clones out there being marketed as boutique brand x, y, and z. Not much interesting happening in the mass market.

[LeftyStrat]

Sorry Lefty, didn't see your post before I blurted the same sentiment.

No prob. I liked the quote.

Let's see musician, amp builder, farmer, day trader, gambler, artist, woodworker...

Thank god I never had an interest in farming, or I would really be broke...

I notice a trend though. All up them usually require a substantial up front investment, with little chance of return.

I use to joke and say the only people that got rich off of the '49 gold rush were the ones selling mining tools. Hmm, would anyone here pay ~$300 for a bias probe that interfaced to your computer via USB? Might be the only of my many projects that might make money.

[CaseyJones]

I used to sell kits and got out of it because it was very labor intensive for very little monetary reward. I spent more time hand holding people through their builds than focusing on the business side. This is what makes it a losing proposition. Yeah, it sure is easy to make a buck if you abandon your customers after POS. Not the way I operate.

Ah, yes. VERY good point!

Having been at this for quite a while I lose sight of the fact that many people haven't. Some of the kits out there are in fact inadequate when it comes to documentation and customer support.

As for gigging, we don't do it for fame or fortune. We do it for the fun of it and the pure enjoyment of entertaining others. We have done plenty of free gigs in the past, plenty of benefit gigs too, now we ask for a small amount to cover our expenses. Everyone's time is valuable as well as the wear and tear on equipment. We never went into this expecting fame and fortune, just gig frequently and have a lot of fun doing so.

It's tough for me to justify the amount of time gigging requires if the money isn't there. It's fun to be the center of attention for an hour or two, it's not as much fun to rehearse week in and week out for months to get an act ready for the road. Meeting new people in places I haven't been is fun, driving for 12 hours to get there isn't fun.

The amp market is fickle and pretty saturated at this point.

You think?!

The part that gets me is that I bought amp after amp and guitar after guitar looking for something special back when I was buying gear. I'd like to think that's not unique. I've plugged into other builder's amps and every so often I come across one I'd buy even if it was just to take home and take apart! There are guys out there who have dozens of guitars, why not dozens of amps? That's useful in the studio, just break out all your toys so each cut has its own special flavor and vibe.

You need something to set you apart from the rest whether is pure marketing or gimmickry, or something truly special. There are just too many tweed and plexi clones out there being marketed as boutique brand x, y, and z. Not much interesting happening in the mass market.

There may be a lot of them but it's easy to pick out the good ones, there aren't that many really high quality amps out there. Beyond the hype, a quality build that will still be rockin' 40 or 50 years from now like my old favorites is what I'm interested in. You can stick your rig in a fancy cabinet covered with ostrich leather and come up with cute names for proprietary features, if you still dig the tone you get from it next year and it performs flawlessly gig after gig then it is what it's supposed to be.

[dartanion]

I only gig with amps that I built myself. No pedals. Guitar straight into the amp. I'm pretty happy that nothing I have built so far has failed on me or my customers. My own amps get used almost daily and gigged many times per month, so they have been toted around all over the SF Bay Area.

I used to have a whole mess of guitars and 2 amps. Now I have 4 guitars and about 15 amps. I think I have my bases covered

[CaseyJones]

I only gig with amps that I built myself. No pedals. Guitar straight into the amp. I'm pretty happy that nothing I have built so far has failed on me or my customers. My own amps get used almost daily and gigged many times per month, so they have been toted around all over the SF Bay Area.

That's the real payback for me. Money is nice but there's nothing like grabbing a tone by the neck and saying, "Gotcha you little sonofabitch!"

Once you've got that tone you've got that tone.

I used to have a whole mess of guitars and 2 amps. Now I have 4 guitars and about 15 amps. I think I have my bases covered

I'm not even going to admit to how many amps I have at any moment. Please don't make me count! That's the other payback for being an amp builder, every so often the stars align and one turns out much better than the rest.

[nickt]

Selling kits is a losing proposition, with selling amps being only marginally more profitable unless you can build them quickly and cheaply.

I disagree. Selling kits is a quick way to make a few dollars at something that's generally very time consuming and not very profitable. There are a couple big vendors of amp kits who will hook you up, then it's up to you to move the merch.

Kits seem to be attracting lawyers these days. s2 at 18watt apparently got sued by someone who got his doodle caught in a selector switch or something. However it seems you can get around the lawyers by supplying no instructions - tough call if you're actually a nice kinda guy - which seems the norm around these parts.

Back to amps. Price to beat per amp: I just managed to get my cost under $100 each for a small batch of simple single ended combos. 90% U.S. made content, I can't argue with Alpha pots and Xicon resistors.

Wow! I'm impressed! What volume did you need to purchase parts to get that price?

[CaseyJones]

Back to amps. Price to beat per amp: I just managed to get my cost under $100 each for a small batch of simple single ended combos. 90% U.S. made content, I can't argue with Alpha pots and Xicon resistors.

Wow! I'm impressed! What volume did you need to purchase parts to get that price?

I purchased quantities necessary for 100 amps. Transformers are of local manufacture, chassis are of local manufacture, cabinets are our own. There's a little magic involved as some of it was opportunistic buying and some of the quantities were much more than necessary for 100 amps, the rest goes in inventory. There's no hocus pocus in the bottom line, though. I've been working to beat a lowball number and I did it.

[nickt]

Wow! I'm impressed! What volume did you need to purchase parts to get that price?

I purchased quantities necessary for 100 amps. Transformers are of local manufacture, chassis are of local manufacture, cabinets are our own. There's a little magic involved as some of it was opportunistic buying and some of the quantities were much more than necessary for 100 amps, the rest goes in inventory. There's no hocus pocus in the bottom line, though. I've been working to beat a lowball number and I did it.

Hey cool - presumably you're selling the extra parts as kits and well parts. How on earth can you include a speaker and cab for $100 cost?

Anyway good luck!

[lastwinj]

I agree that it's tough to make any $$ gigging. Here in Charlottesville we suffer from "post-Dave Mathews Band Syndrome." Every band thinks that tonight is the night Coran Capshaw (DMB's manager) walks in and falls in love with their band. Consequently, most venues pay peanuts, and the bands are desperate enough to take it. For example, one local club pays $50 for a weeknight show (that's $50 total!) and $150 for the 10pm - 1am Fri/Sat show. Another well-known local place pays $40/man, up to 4 members.

yikes!!!!

germ

[lastwinj]

if all the holes are done in the chassis by metal shop, i can put an amp together relatively quickly.

2 channel 50w, maybe 4 hours
single channel true point to point, 2 hours or so.
3 channel rack preamp, about 10 to 15 hours.

germ

[s2]

Kits seem to be attracting lawyers these days. s2 at 18watt apparently got sued by someone who got his doodle caught in a selector switch or something. However it seems you can get around the lawyers by supplying no instructions - tough call if you're actually a nice kinda guy - which seems the norm around these parts.

I didn't actually get sued. The guy had his atty send a letter of intent to sue. I have a mean and nasty lady as my atty. She responded with a "bring it on" letter, an intent to countersue letter, and an invoice for her time plus damages for my mental anguish from being sued. They dropped the matter.

The experience did put selling kits into perspective for me. They are extremely time consuming to put together. I was spending all my time sitting in the living room floor counting resistors and sticking them into baggies while my family lived their lives around me. It became clear that those meager profits were not worth what I was missing.

Now I make pretty decent spending money doing repairs, mods, and rebuilds. They are quick to do and pay much better than kits.

I also build amps for Category 5. Each one takes between 4 and 5 hours if I have everything together. We aren't making any $$ at C5 yet, but we sure are having fun losing it!