Scaling up niche handmade product side-hustle?

[Sam Kennedy]

I’ve found myself in a situation where there is some entrepreneurial opportunity, however I’ve stumbled across it by chance.

I’m a big fan of the 1996 blockbuster ‘Twister’ and so I joined a few of the Facebook fan pages. The movie revolves around storm chasers attempting to get sensors into the path of a tornado to take scientific readings.

There is a lot of demand for replicas of these sensors (originals are extremely rare and sell for $1500+) so I started making and selling some. My first batch was more of a learning experience and I just about broke even. Since then I’ve managed to source components and get the actual schematics for the PCB that was used in the film, so my replicas are 99% accurate and there is only one other person who occasionally makes replicas which are maybe 60% accurate, so there is very little competition.

I’ve been able to sell several of these replicas and there has been a lot of interest and engagement with my posts sharing photos and videos of them. One of the repeated bits of feedback I’ve had however is that the price is beyond what most people can afford. The price is high because of the amount of time it takes me to build these sensors by hand. I have to solder, dremel and airbrush each sensor, so I price this time into the total cost of the replica.

If I could get the amount of time it takes to produce each sensor down, I could then charge less and reach a wider market. It’s a great example of how violating the commandment of time really limits scaling. For me this isn’t really a fast lane venture, more of a hobby that has some earning potential.

I’m looking for any suggestions or ideas on how I could scale up / reduce the build time for this side hustle?

The sensor is essentially a PCB that is mounted inside a plastic sphere, with one half of the sphere chromed. Soldering the PCB takes up the vast majority of the build time so that’s where I’m open to suggestions.

 

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[AppMan]

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