If you don't do something that nobody else does, you're going to be very hard pressed to make a profit. In desperate times, "gravy work" is the last thing you want to bet your business on because there's too many starving for any kind of work they can get. I love skullworks idea of the dual tiered approach. That's the way to take down gravy work in a can't lose sort of way rather than a "bet your business" way. But you still need a main line where you have the edge over others.
Instead of gravy, make a product that nobody else makes, or run a job shop that has some advantage the others in your area don't have. Maybe you've got a machine with a larger capacity than any shop nearby. Maybe you can turn around a job faster than it can be sent to China and the jobs change so often they never get sent. I know a guy doing both. He lives in a port city and gets a lot of business because he can do rush jobs on machines that are bigger than the competition. If you need 60" of travel to get something fixed before your ship has to sail, you're gonna talk to my friend.
There are basically 3 profitable business strategies:
- Your product is the best. Great. Peeps still buy Mori Seikis or Mitutoyo or name your favorite "best" product. There will always be a market for it.
- Your product is the cheapest. This is a tough spot against the Chinese, but not impossible. You better be super highly automated and able to do things they just can't do and do them a lot cheaper and faster too though. Think Japanese car factory. Robots out the wazoo. If you're here, you've probably got a special talent with fixturing and you just know things the other machinists don't about how to get it done faster.
- Your product serves a special niche better than the best or cheapest can. For example, that port city is located in Hawaii far from competitors. Or, you're building a product for a small market that just isn't worth the Chinese trouble to knock it off.
It can be done, Yankee ingenuity is alive and well. But it takes a lot more than being just another guy with a couple Haas CNC machines.
Best,
BW
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