if whipmakers were paid per hour then everyone would be making a LOT less then minimum wage. I highly doubt that you spend 555$ worth of time on one hat. I amnot sure how you calculate my time.
Why is it that Steve is able to offer such a quality hat at such low prices and you offer a hat of equal quality for 500$ or more.
That would be a good question for Steve. It certainly is a question he would have to answer as I have no intention of answering for him. I think I may know the answer but do not think it proper for me to answer for my friend. I think if you were to talk to Steve privatly you mayfind some of your answers you seek and possibly learn abot more about me as well.
Ive reblocked a few hats and have tried to re"ferbish" a vintage one using the same processes to make the hats. I am sure there are many processes to make hats and having made them for 30 years I continue to learn new processes all the time but find the old ones serve me best.
I think that in the end if all customers made the hats for them selves that they would be saving a bundle.
Could not agree with you more as the majoirity of hats I have seen are made from 8-12 dollar hat bodies.
your hat materials only cost you 125$ why are you charging about 380$ for your time?
I am not sure whee you get mymaterial cost from but mysterling beaver bodies and hat materials cost just over 425.00 for a hat.
you spend 10 days on 1 hat? how much of that time are you actually touching it? Each hat differs in time required touching it. Much depends on the customers needs or wants. I often times will spend 20 or more hours pouncing a single hat body. Probably a simple hat will require an additional 20 hours of finishing time maybe 15 hours on some. A complex hat may take 50 hours additional time.
I have spent 2 days straight without sleeping to get a whip perfectly made. And after that its not even done. i still have 8 days to go after that. And i work constantly. I highly doubt that it takes 10 days. i only sell my whips for 145$ because my materials only cost me 60$. Why would anyone want to buy your hat if they can get one cheaper for the same quality, and it holds up like a tank?
I am lost here now if you are comparing whips to hats in general your whips to my hats or what youare asking or if you are just trying to compare something to somehthing else.
It just doesnt make sense, why people would strive for cost instead of practicality.
Practicality is a good thing but little of in in america do you not agree. I am sure it would be hard to convince a starving man that a whip is a practical thing to own unless you lived when I did and found you need a whip to keep stubborn mules ploughing th ground or pulling giant mature timber from forrest
Please dont attack me for this gladdhatter. Im just stating my own thoughts and want to remain civil. I dont want to get into a heated fight. I just want to know why pick your hats over someone alses.
Heavens I have no intention of attacking you and I do not reccomend you pick my hats over anothers hats. in fact I have only reccomended you pick Steve Delks hats at all. I fell very comfortable saying that Steve can surly make a hat that pleases you well and I wholly support him in his hat endeavor and wish him the very best and suggest all may give him a try and buy his hats. I am sorry you have misunderstood my intent . I cmae here to talk and not sell hats. thee are plenty of heads to cover all over the world . We hope to cover any head that comes to us to buy a hat but we do not sell hats on chat forums. We sell hats direct to a customer wwhen they contact us to purchase one we try our best to educate them on our hats and find thier needs and sell them the least expensive solution for thier needs.
You have asked me to not attack and I hoe you do not preceive my words as any attact. I will now ask you to consider your words. you have stated bluntlythat you think I am lying about taking 10 days to make hat. You have stated my cost of materils for my hats. I really ask you to think about how bold you are making statments you cnanot possibley know and trying to support them with your knowledge of making whips.
No attack here but using your logic a person making widgets in China could say that GM should sell all cars for 10 cents each because they only spend 1 cent on a widget and only 1 second making it so a car cannot cost but 10 dollars and cannot take more than 5 minutes to make.
Kindest Regards
Adam
Adam you are very kind to inquire about making a hat and to challage me on my skills, methods, time, cost or any thing else is a bit short sighted. I make custom hand made hats of highest quality materials and I use antique tools and methods. I occassionally take on a student and help thiem learn basic hat making and then continue with them as they grow in the business. I am sure you may well know of at least one of the people I have choosen to help.
Thank you for inquiring but I really just came here to talk not to give training nor justify my business practice. Finally I have never found it practical for a single person to make verymany quality hats so I do not do all the touching of a hat as often there is 2 touching it at once in many stages of it. there are also several that touch one of our hats before it is released. I just completed a fairly simple hat yesterday that took nine days. It also took 47 emails and much touching. now it will take about 2 more hours of fluffing up final setting of stlye, packaging properly and then shipping out .
The final email was in part: Wow! The hat looks gorgeous, I can tell by the photos that it really is a blue navy, not a dark navy. The brim looks great at 3 inches, and the ribbon is perfect. It certainly looks like the hat I wanted and could not find. (Or, when I did find something close to it, it was the wrong size.)
