Free Idea: Caststone Fireplace Business
December 21, 2007
I am always telling people ideas are worthless ~ execution is priceless. So I am going to start giving away my ideas (good and bad) to see if anyone will ’steal’ them (FYI - please steal my idea ~ oh and if you had it first, I didn’t steal it from you). I thought this one might be good, but I am too busy and I found a potential weakness. I will explain all below:
This summer I began renovation of an older home in the Preston Hollow area of Dallas (pictures here). All three fireplace mantels in the house needed to be updated and I immediately thought that caststone mantels might do the trick. After looking around I decided that the cost, between $3,000 and $6,000 per mantel was a little outside of my budget (especially since I planned to put a 50" plasma over each). More recently my Mom told me she was considering replacing her mantels (my parents are renovating a house as well) with caststone. Her research confirmed the pricing I had previously obtained. Then an idea struck me. How hard could it be to actually make a caststone mantel?
I began to research cast stone and realized it has been used in buildings since 1138. It can be made from white or grey cements, mixed with manufactured or natural sands and crushed stone (or natural gravel or mineral color pigments). According to my favorite source, Wikipedia, most ‘cast stone is a Portland cement-based architectural precast concrete product manufactured using high quality fine and coarse aggregate as its primary constituents. Simulated stone, or look-alike products made with alternative ingredients such as gypsum, lightweight products, glass fiber, calcium silicate, stucco and other materials are less durable and not nearly as well time-tested. The use of a high percentage of fine aggregate creates a very smooth, consistent texture for the building elements being cast, resembling natural cut stone. Other ingredients such as chemical admixtures, pozzolans, and pigments also may be added.’
Without too much trouble I was able to determine that I could make a cast stone mantel for around $500 in material and labor. Wow, the margins in this business are really good. The major costs are a) advertsing/sales b) shipping c) inventory and d) storage. My idea was rather simple. First, we would develop a brand identity i.e. Westminster Stone Works for example. Then we would build a website to drive Google traffic and other advertising traffic to. Then we would have ten negative forms built - i.e. our standard mantel designs. Next, we would contact small concrete contractors in each major market and offer them a turnkey business for a small fee - creating our ‘dealers’. Once someone in LA would order a mantel, we would sell the appropriate form to the dealer as well as our proprietary mix and the contractor would make the mantel and deliver it within a week (about the same time it would take to ship a pre-made mantel from Dallas). The idea is to eliminate all shipping, inventory and storage expensese, or at least push them to the edge and make them the ‘dealers’ problem. Dealers would be allowed to sell our mantels directly (without comission), as long as they didn’t use our brand or advertise (electronic, print, tv).
This sounded like a neat little business, but then my Mom found a small shop that would carve a real marble or stone fireplace for half the cost of the cast stone. What! You are kidding, you can get the REAL thing for half? Turns out they will customize the size, design ~ everything and deliver it in three weeks. WOW. They are made in Mexico. The only issue is that they can only handle a limit number of orders (I bet I could come up with a way to increase their production capabilities). In the meantime, I decided not to pursue the cast stone fireplace business, so you are free to steal it ~ Westminster Stone Works = $0.00.
