First Responders getting a Longmill! So excited!

[Chyren]

1st customer

[gwilki]

@Chyren Congrats on your first sale, Gary. That’s one more than me.

[Chyren]

Update: 2020-07-13

Longmill has been running great! Made a couple of signs for new customers and have inquiries all over the place. Join us as mclaughlinwoodcraft on instagram and our website (under construction) www.mclaughlinwoodcraft.ca

Things I have learned so far…

1. If you are considering a dust shoe just do it. The amount of dust in our shop was intense. Got the dust shoe and it is a thing of the past using a basic shop vac for now.

2. Learn your feed rates for each wood type. We’re using Easel Pro for our software and it does most of the thinking for you but I’ve had to dial down the feed rate on a couple of cuts.

3. Painting sucks. There’s no nice way of saying it but it does. However in the end things looks great. Painting does such though.

4. GET EYE AND EAR PROTECTION. The noise is pretty nuts. We’ll probably be building some type of enclosure in the future but for now we wear ear and eye protection. Don’t skip this step. Do it.

[Chyren]

[Dhk]

Looks good, what kind of wood is that?

[Chyren]

Pine with American colonial stain.

[ArchiesWoodshop]

Fellow Police Officer here. I ordered my Longmill 30x30 last week. Can’t wait for it to show up. I hope to get a little woodworking business going before retirement from the PD. Good luck with your projects. @ArchiesWoodshop

[Chyren]

Archie congratulations! Any help I can give you let me know

[Chyren]

Hey folks been a while since I’ve set up an update on our business.

Got our provincial business licence, municipal licence, as well as tax forms all set up. Actually all in all it was very easy.

Been building inventory in the shop for an upcoming farmers market and our instagram has been very active. @mclaughlinwoodcraft is our instagram.

We’ve just completed a 33 sign order from Cops for Kids which was a big job and the family got together and put in the work but we did it.

Working on building a few local customer projects and having a blast.

Will be posting a “wish I knew that” segment on our Youtube channel soon.

[ArchiesWoodshop]

#35 on the latest order fulfillment list. I need to get working on a table…and I just liked @mclauglinwoodcraft.

[chrismakesstuff]

Been following your progress on Instagram and can’t wait to see the YouTube videos also! So great to see

[SteveP]

GREAT JOB on all your signs Chyren!!!

[Chyren]

Our first Youtube video!

Fun sign and not too shabby for a guy who learned how to make a video in his long johns…its cold here today!

Click Here to View

[Chyren]

Twitter @mclaughlinwood1 Instagram @mclaughlinwoodcraft

[Chyren]

Update: December 2020

Ok so we’re through the Christmas rush. Let me tell you when I say we’re WAY overwhelmed with the local response of our business that we’ve seriously been lacking in the website department (www.mclaughlinwoodcraft.ca) and have been relying heavily on our Instagram (@mclaughlinwoodcraft) and Facebook pages.

Here’s a bit of an update on our journey as First Responders trying to start a small local wood sign business.

1. Stay in your lane! We’ve been asked several times if we could “engrave” things like wood furniture and the such and if we said yes to everything then we’d learn nothing about our core reason for being here. Wood Signs. Looking back I think we should have named ourselves McLaughlin WoodSigns or something. 20/20 vision looking back.

2. Start small. I’ve seen videos online where people out of the gate try to go big. Don’t. First cut we did broke a bit because we tried something we didn’t have any experience trying.

3. BUY GOOD STUFF! Trust me when I say if you spend any of your hard earned money on knock off bits or products YOU WILL LOSE YOUR MIND. Sienci has a ton of quality bits for very affordable prices. If you get your bits from Wish or such places trust us when we say you’ll WISH you didn’t. They absolutely suck. Period.

4. Get the new dust collector option. The old one came apart on us (user error) and looking at the new design will be purchasing it asap. DUST sucks.

5. RESIN signs are challenging. We will be doing them and are working on them as we speak. Its an expensive addition to your business and messy and time consuming and messy and expensive and messy and time consuming…you get the idea. We will be posting some stuff on our youtube page (McLaughlin Woodcraft) Watch LOTS of videos.

6. Learn from others. Take the time to watch hours of videos because the CNC community is fantastic.

As always we’re here to help! Wish us luck!

[chrismakesstuff]

These are some great learning points here Gary, great to have you share your experiences and learnings so far

[Chyren]

Thanks @chrismakesstuff Having a blast and happy to help anyone