New 1996-2004 boxster bike rack

[thstone]

As a multiple product inventor and seller, I would suggest the following:

1. Spend as little money as possible to build as few as possible and let sales (and sales alone) drive the number of units that you build. If the market gets hot and they sell well, you can always build more.

2. Start selling as fast as possible. Build one and set up a simple and easy website to sell it. Then build a second unit and sell it. Never have more inventory than absolutely necessary and don't invest anymore than absolutely necessary.

3. Figure out where to find your most likely buyers. Are they Boxster owners who ride bikes or are they bike riders who own Boxsters? You'll find Boxster owners here on the 986 Forum but you'll find bike riders on the Bicycling.com and other bike affiliated forums.

4. For every person in an online forum who says that they would buy one, multiply the total by 0.33 and you will have a much more realistic number of actual sales to expect.

5. Don't spend any money on a formal patent until you've sold enough units to pay for the patent from the profits.

6. When calculating profits, include ALL of the costs plus a reasonable value for your time and be sure to include taxes. Also include returns. When the math is done, if you're not able to make a reasonable true profit, then stop and figure out if can charge more or reduce your expenses. There is no point in working for free hoping that someday you'll figure out how to actually make money.

If you want to know about my experience with selling products online, using Google and Yahoo ads, and/or getting your product into retail stores (and their online counterparts), PM me because I've been there and done all of that.

[john90290]

The willwood system is great but expensive and I think more involved of an install plus it's pretty much always visible as is the bird rack system.

In addition the options that are out there are too expensive for me plus I like to weld and tinker. Ease of use is what I was looking for and I think this works. I've got ten coming in early July from a professional fabricator and plan to sell each with the folding license plate and all hardware for $150. It's still the cheapest out there and I think leaves no trace of a hitch when not in use. I won't get rich, just will offset my cost of development and maybe get a 220v welder for my other projects.

Website and product should be available in late August. (I'm moving in July so won't have too much time to complete.)

I like all the feedback, it was very helpful!!