Chance_Taker4 Posted June 23, 2016 Report Share Posted June 23, 2016 I normally make and sell spinnerbaits and shakey head hooks. However I pour plastic baits for myself. I have had a lot of my customers ask me to start selling plastics. For the most part I have but my products are limited since I only have the baits and colors I use. My current list of supplies are as follows MOLDS 6" Senko 6" Trick Worm Jig Trailer 4" Beaver COLORS Blue Black Dark Grape Watermelon Strawberry Green Pumpkin Pumpkin GLITTER Black Red Green Gold Silver Orange Chartreuse I also have sent that I add. What other molds, colors, and glitters should I have to grow my plastic business? I have decent sales but feel that if i was less limited sales would improve. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alsworms Posted June 23, 2016 Report Share Posted June 23, 2016 You'll probably get TONS of opinions here, but I'd start with adding a white or pearl coloring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Travis Posted June 23, 2016 Report Share Posted June 23, 2016 (edited) I would start out with defining business and what that really means to you. A lot guys have businesses....translation hobby that looses money. Sit down and really look at your costs, time, etc... Once you do this (be as honest with yourself as possible) order product that best fits your intended market and expand from there to meet your needs. You may find that in reality you are just offsetting the cost of your hobby by a given percentage and that is fine. Buy molds and colors that you will use in that case. Edited June 23, 2016 by Travis 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
biggun Posted June 23, 2016 Report Share Posted June 23, 2016 What is it your customers want? Are they going to buy enough to offset the cost of new molds, colorant, glitter, plastisol, shipping, labor? I got thousands in molds, glitter, colorant, plastisol. and I'll grantee you what ever somebody calls and wants, I wont have it made.lol I just make lures for fun. Tried the whole biz thing. Took all the fun out reel quick. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chance_Taker4 Posted June 23, 2016 Author Report Share Posted June 23, 2016 That is one of the issues I am facing. I got 50 different people asking for 50 different mold and colors. I don't find it feasible to buy a mold for one customer to order one or two times. This is kind of the reason I never sold plastics. There is just way too much involved with trying to make everyone happy. My website stats are saying 20% of the people that click on the plastics section orders. I would like to get that number up. I was thinking maybe it was because I wasn't offering the right colors or molds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Basseducer Posted June 23, 2016 Report Share Posted June 23, 2016 You could start by making a list of the most requested baits and get the #1 and maybe the #2 most requested mold(s). Then select the #3 most requested and say that it is coming soon or get more specific with the date. You may be able to buy more than one or two at a time. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goldenshinner Posted June 24, 2016 Report Share Posted June 24, 2016 I pour a few jigs and worms for myself..and somehow my pals gets many of them to the point of almost all of them.anyways when I add up cost, these baits, cost me almost what I can buy them on clearance for!!. That's whithout spending hours in my garden properly ventilated. I think without spending many thousands on duplicate large production molds,at least for me in a big city,I can't make as much as minimum wage we now have $15hr for many entry level jobs in service industry.. Making my own is just fun way to put custom touch on my fishing. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
majic man Posted June 24, 2016 Report Share Posted June 24, 2016 And you factor in the 10% excise tax trying to compete with 3.00 a bag sencos, and your making even less per hour. If your going to start a business, get a tax number for the excise tax, Make a good product, Price it accordingly, not at Migrant worker labor rates. And market them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hpssports Posted June 24, 2016 Report Share Posted June 24, 2016 Having your state & federal tax number is the biggest step in making soft baits in order to make any money at it. Your biggest cost comes from the molds in which the tax numbers really don't help much. Where they help is in supplies. Your biggest cost after molds is plastic. Having your tax numbers, you can go factory direct on your plastic & glitters and cut costs in half. As for colors, we sell lots of baits on our web site but most of our sales come local from custom orders. The most base colors ordered are green pumpkin, watermelon, junebug, black, blue, red, white, & silver. The two other requested colors are orange & chartreuse for colored claw tips etc. It's always good to have some white pearl powder on hand just in case someone wants pearled baits. For glitters you can start off with the normal red, green, black, gold, silver, & blue in large & small sizes. One of the most popular glitters for us here lately has been the small holographic silver. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Driftwood Posted June 25, 2016 Report Share Posted June 25, 2016 When it comes to taxes, check with your state as any finished product is taxable as salable inventory. As long as you have raw material, you can take a tax deduction. Just don't hold a lot of finished inventory at the end of the year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
majic man Posted June 25, 2016 Report Share Posted June 25, 2016 I was talking excise tax, not income tax. I heard the minimum fine for evading excise is $10,000.00.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MonteSS Posted June 26, 2016 Report Share Posted June 26, 2016 You make jigs, swim jigs, chatterbaits, spinnerbaits, buxxbaits etc. Get a couple four cavity 702 craw molds. Make them in exclusive colors that match your jig skirts Get some swimbait molds (Like a Keitech, or skinny dipper) for trailers and do the same to match your baitfish skirts Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JBuff Posted June 26, 2016 Report Share Posted June 26, 2016 I'm going to convey some of our experiences over the last almost 8 yrs. 1) Customs are a no bueno for a number reasons, a couple being that even club level anglers will ask you not to produce it for anyone else and there's the issue of the amount of time you'll tie up to produce it which in turn this could happen...they don't like it. Of course you can probably sell it to someone else and recoup a little bit but you don't get the time back...losing end game. 2) If you like to fish and you get off work early (assuming you have a day job) and know you have orders to fill and molds to pay for...chances are going fishing goes out the window. 3) Know thy limits based on time to produce, time available and what thy time is worth. IE. $20.00 per hour net is what you set for yourself. In each mold do the math and discover how many of that product you will have to produce in an hour for that net based on a cavity count available. You may discover it's not possible within the criteria of cavity count and process. These are 3 and there are more that are equally important. As mentioned previously the legalities, plus competition and so on all factor in to the equation of profitability, not to mention the intangibles such as materials cost increases and of course the big one that being the economy. Food for thought 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
