"KS cost planning experiment" Topic

I wonder how small/indi companies come up with their success point and next levels; and what I'd have to do with my stuff. It is kind of answer to the question of where/price of the shapeways printed models I have had done in this thread: TMP link

So far I have had 8 miniatures done (5 viewable in the previous thread for aryiki.com/soluna/Game.aspx), artwork and rules.

Producing 1 miniature costs $500 USD, broken down as:

$250 USD 3D model.
$100 USD artwork
$100 USD painted
$50 USD 2 samples printed and adjustments

8 therefore has is $4,000 USD, and I'll add another $1,000 USD for other artwork and production expenses for a total of $5,000 USD in investment.

Ignoring hard plastic as a material (no research done into it) the miniatures will be 3D printed. Sticking to the 1 unit (for this purpose) printing cost a model averages $9. USD Let's bump it up to $10 USD for some other sundries that may appear like packaging and some per unit marketing costs for the KS. First-in and discounts will be ignored.

The miniatures will be sold as 2 faction teams of 4. Each backer is averaged to order 6 miniatures or 1.5 teams (assuming all do for this process).

If each miniature had $X margin then Y units would need to be sold to cover the investment cost.

X = $1 USD = 5000/1 = 5000 units /6 = 834 backers
X = $2 USD = 5000/2 = 2500 units /6 = 417 backers
X = $3 USD = 5000/3 = 1667 units /6 = 278 backers
X = $4 USD = 5000/4 = 1250 units /6 = 209 backers
X = $5 USD = 5000/5 = 1000 units /6 = 167 backers

The total pledged amount for each X is:

(1 + 10) x 5000 = 55000
(2 + 10) x 2500 = 30000
(3 + 10) x 1667 = 21671
(4 + 10) x 1250 = 17500
(5 + 10) x 1000 = 15000 (or 167 x 90 15030)

X=1 requires a huge number of backers. Making X=2 halves the number but has a high Target (30K). X=5 looks like an achievable number of backers, a Target that is not that high. The question is what is the price limit potential customers would expect to pay for the models/packs. $44 USD for 4 is a bit higher than a freebooters fate or infinity box of mold cast models. $60 USD (X=5) is appearing RRP, or slightly under Arena Rex KS individual price, and still well below GW character models (which would be double at least, in price and mass).

X=3 is the half way point, the Target is only 5k more than X=5, but needs another 100 backers to meet. Those 100 extra backers at the X=5 level would go a way to unlocking the next level (2 more miniatures, one from each team).

Stretch goals need to recover $1,000 USD (2 x 500) to break even. That's 1000, 500, 333, 250, 167 extra units and a goal of 11000, 6000, 4329, 3500 or 2505 respectively.

Many other things to factor in, the $100 USD pledge sweet spot, affect of postage add-on… but that's enough for now. hope the math is right.

Hello,
This may come off as a pretty negative comment and I hope you don't take it that way as it is intended to be constructive criticism. You have some pretty nice miniatures BUT if you are paying about $10.00 USD to produce them you are in serious trouble. I pay roughly $1.00 USD – $1.50 USD to have a 32mm produced in metal depending on the bulk and whatever odds and ends are added to it.

You simply need a larger profit margin as I don't think too many people will think $11.00 USD – $15.00 USD is a good deal for 3D printed models. They tend to be lower quality than metal, resin, or plastic and frankly your miniatures look like they are pretty high quality. I would suggest going to metal or resin.

If you take your numbers with metal you get a much more attractive scenario.

X = $1 USD USD = 5000/1 = 5000 units /6 = 834 backers
X = $2 USD USD = 5000/2 = 2500 units /6 = 417 backers
X = $3 USD USD = 5000/3 = 1667 units /6 = 278 backers
X = $4 USD USD = 5000/4 = 1250 units /6 = 209 backers
X = $5 USD USD = 5000/5 = 1000 units /6 = 167 backers

(1 + 1) x 5000 = 5500
(2 + 1) x 2500 = 3000
(3 + 1) x 1667 = 6668
(4 + 1) x 1250 = 6250
(5 + 1) x 1000 = 6000

I don't think $44 USD for 4 miniatures is too much to ask BUT if you change your material you can charge $24.00 USD and bring in $20.00 USD in profit as compared to $44.00 USD and bring in $4.00 USD in profit. My opinon is that producing 32mm miniatures at $10.00 USD a pop is not evne close to a sustainable business model.

hi LeadLair76,

Absolutely a mold based production would give economy of scale and would be preferable on cost to produce volume, and also lower price for customers – both win.

I have to inquire with shapeways (or other 3D printers) if they do volume discount. It wouldn't reach a mold economy but there might be something there.

Also have heard of one company giving using a cleaned up 3D print to make a mold. That would interest me – if someone knows more about it…

Another option is plastics. That would have a big cost. Again haven't inquired about it.

I really like the translucent/transparent material as a base. Thinking future wise when a printer can be as sharp as hard plastic and mix colours in a single run we are going to see some incredible designs, and all single piece.

I don't know the process involved in taking a 3D print and making it mold ready but I would assume you could get a sculptor to "finish it off" for you relatively cheaply. Considering you have done most of the heavy lifting already.

It looks to me like you have a lot of talent in making the 3D sculpts and it would be a shame if you werent' succesful because of the medium used for the models.

Drop me a line –

Darren.webber@btopenworld.com

I would suggest you mould them and spincast them.

I think the guys talking about casting are talking a lot of sense.

One other negative about 3D printing, is production time. How long will it take to get 5000 minis printed?

Yes, don't even think of trying to do a KS with mini's fulfilled via 3d printing.

Your never going to see an end to waiting for them to be made in enough quantity to meet your needs and frankly the public will never support it.

If you have to do that just post them in shapeways and take your commission when/if they sell.

As others have said, moulding and casting them in metal would be a lot more viable for you here. You would need to do some work on the prints though to get them ready.

There are several companies already using 3D prints as masters for metal casting, but they require a lot of work cleaning them up, and getting rid of the grainy texture on the 3D print. Once that's done, they can go straight into a mould.

You'd have added mould costs (we charge £40.00 GBP per mould), but once you've got a production mould done, you could have them cast up at a cost of between 30-50p per figure depending on the size/metal involved.

We offer a contract casting service in the UK, drop me an email if you'd like to chat more about it: pendraken.co.uk

Creating a sprue of 8-10 (at the material cost of probably another miniatures worth) would reduce print swap time. You could probably create a tower sprue to do a big batch. Unfortunately it would require a lot of extra material for this use case, but it does showcase again the flexibility the technology has.