Fish On
Hot Rolled
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2014
- Location
- Foley, Alabama
Wheelieking, I'm looking at you.
Backstory, I run a small fabrication shop, currently in a leased commercial location. Been here since I opened in late '12. Pretty much a 1 man band, save for some part time (cash) help once in awhile, and probably plan to continue as a 1 man show. Every time I start thinking about employees, something happens that makes me quite glad to be solo. Current space has 1800 sq. feet of shop, and 600 sq. feet of office. Certainly don't need that level of office space, might could make do with a little less warehouse.
Wife and I have been wanting to relocate closer to saltwater for some time now, and had somewhat planned to start going down that road in 2 years or so. Tentative plan was to take the equity from selling our house up here, and use that as the down payment on a small commercial building, and then buy a smaller house in the new area. I've also toyed with the idea of having a shop on a home property, but that's down the road, so I haven't ever really looked heavily into it.
Unfortunately, it looks like I'm losing the lease on the shop I'm in, and there is absolutely nothing suitable listed for lease in our area, so our two year plan may have been pushed into a 2 month plan.
Given that it's pretty likely that I'm not wanting to grow this thing into something requiring employees, I'm wondering if I wouldn't be prudent to more heavily investigate the home shop plan.
A couple relevant details:
-If I went down that road, we'd be talking a county property for sure, outside of city limits.
-3 phase is not a concern. My current commercial property only has single phase, and I'm running everything via RPC as it is. I work with thin aluminum, so my stuff is smaller anyway - 66 ton press brake is my biggest machine.
-Over the past few years, I've gradually been transitioning to mail order projects, with the desire to ultimately be at 100% mail order. I have very little work left that requires customers to visit my location. Hence, the location change won't appreciably affect my customer base, and I won't have much need for customers to be at my shop.
-I'm looking at the idea of a metal building on the property, not sharing walls with the house.
Some of the questions I have:
-How are deliveries handled? UPS is obviously not a concern. Do metal suppliers have issues delivering to a home business? For outgoing motorfreight, do you eat the residential surcharge, or are customers okay with paying that? I'm split between sales that go to the end user (just standard UPS ground, no issue there), as well as providing components to a handful of OEMs (small to medium companies, not auto).
-Is there an image issue? Do I risk missing out on a new OEMs due to a non commercial address? I imagine most of my end user stuff won't matter much. For my OEM sales, I'm pretty much making semi custom stuff - my product, my design, but they specify their dimensions, their options, and their powder coat variations - not truly off the shelf stuff.
-What sort of risk do I face of a county property being annexed by a growing city? I've found a place that would be almost perfect (even has a pole barn with 3 phase on the property), but it's not far outside the city limits. Would I be grandfathered in, or SOL?
-How is insurance handled in this situation? Will commercial insurers look at me?
What questions should I be asking, that I'm not?
Backstory, I run a small fabrication shop, currently in a leased commercial location. Been here since I opened in late '12. Pretty much a 1 man band, save for some part time (cash) help once in awhile, and probably plan to continue as a 1 man show. Every time I start thinking about employees, something happens that makes me quite glad to be solo. Current space has 1800 sq. feet of shop, and 600 sq. feet of office. Certainly don't need that level of office space, might could make do with a little less warehouse.
Wife and I have been wanting to relocate closer to saltwater for some time now, and had somewhat planned to start going down that road in 2 years or so. Tentative plan was to take the equity from selling our house up here, and use that as the down payment on a small commercial building, and then buy a smaller house in the new area. I've also toyed with the idea of having a shop on a home property, but that's down the road, so I haven't ever really looked heavily into it.
Unfortunately, it looks like I'm losing the lease on the shop I'm in, and there is absolutely nothing suitable listed for lease in our area, so our two year plan may have been pushed into a 2 month plan.
Given that it's pretty likely that I'm not wanting to grow this thing into something requiring employees, I'm wondering if I wouldn't be prudent to more heavily investigate the home shop plan.
A couple relevant details:
-If I went down that road, we'd be talking a county property for sure, outside of city limits.
-3 phase is not a concern. My current commercial property only has single phase, and I'm running everything via RPC as it is. I work with thin aluminum, so my stuff is smaller anyway - 66 ton press brake is my biggest machine.
-Over the past few years, I've gradually been transitioning to mail order projects, with the desire to ultimately be at 100% mail order. I have very little work left that requires customers to visit my location. Hence, the location change won't appreciably affect my customer base, and I won't have much need for customers to be at my shop.
-I'm looking at the idea of a metal building on the property, not sharing walls with the house.
Some of the questions I have:
-How are deliveries handled? UPS is obviously not a concern. Do metal suppliers have issues delivering to a home business? For outgoing motorfreight, do you eat the residential surcharge, or are customers okay with paying that? I'm split between sales that go to the end user (just standard UPS ground, no issue there), as well as providing components to a handful of OEMs (small to medium companies, not auto).
-Is there an image issue? Do I risk missing out on a new OEMs due to a non commercial address? I imagine most of my end user stuff won't matter much. For my OEM sales, I'm pretty much making semi custom stuff - my product, my design, but they specify their dimensions, their options, and their powder coat variations - not truly off the shelf stuff.
-What sort of risk do I face of a county property being annexed by a growing city? I've found a place that would be almost perfect (even has a pole barn with 3 phase on the property), but it's not far outside the city limits. Would I be grandfathered in, or SOL?
-How is insurance handled in this situation? Will commercial insurers look at me?
What questions should I be asking, that I'm not?