Engraving businesses are popular because they are customer-centric businesses. Personalized, functional, and decorative items are designed to meet specific needs for people and businesses. While the popularity of starting a laser engraving business is high, the market isn’t saturated, making it a wise investment of equipment and time.
If you can operate a desktop or laptop computer, follow directions, use your imagination and creativity, and you possess superior customer service skills, you can start your own laser engraving business with a smaller investment than you might imagine.
Learn to engrave. Laser engraving requires some knowledge of using the laser machine and the software used to create designs and setup fonts, texts, and the like. You can attend a local trade school to learn these skills, or you can teach yourself using free resources online like training videos. You will learn how deep and fast to engrave various substrates, the proper sizes of cutters, and other fundamental elements of laser engraving.
Prepare a business plan. The organized business mindset is to write a viable business plan to follow. You should include a business description, your marketing plans, financing, and management solutions. Be as detailed as you can because this will be part of your business loan process in the near future as well as your own guide for your business.
Fund your business. You may already have enough on hand to invest in the equipment, supplies, tools, materials, and education you need. That’s great! Otherwise, you will want to obtain financing from a reliable and fair lender. If your credit is good, you can almost write your own rate with the competition that will be after your business.
Obtain the appropriate licensing. Most countries, states, territories, or suburbs have licensing requirements. Find out what kind of licensing you need to start your business. It may not be necessary to do more than getting a conventional, general business license to operate a laser engraving business in your home. Whatever is required for where you live, abide by those regulations to protect yourself and your new business.
Determine if you want to specialize and set your prices. Look at what’s trending in the laser engraving industry to decide if you want to specialize in a specific area. At the same time, you should look at the average prices and set yours accordingly.
Get your equipment. Once you decide what you want to engrave and what you will charge per piece or for bulk orders, it’s time to invest in a laser engraving system. Laser systems range in cost from between $8,000 and $45,000 or more. The price depends on the size and wattage of the system. Keep in mind, you need a system with at least 25 watts. Take into consideration the size of the products with which you will work and rely on expert advice before making an investment.
After you have your laser system, pick up any accessories you will require to specialize in your business, the engraving items upon which you will be engraving like glasses, mugs, plaques, business cards or other engraving items, and make sure you have compatible software to use for designing and creating various patterns and such on your products.
Article by Needham Coding
