Hamster Business

Yes I think it could be competitive price-wise as there are quite a few small "cottage industries" for hamster items now. And the Honeythreepaws ones are very reasonably priced and with individual designs. Maybe a usp for a product? (Unique selling point). Rodipet used to do houses with an inset food dish for example. But I can see you have a lot of great ideas and enthusiasm! And there is always room for another hamster store.

I think wheels would be a good option. Silent wheels that attach to bars or to a stand for example. Not sure how difficult those would be to make. But there is still a limited choice of wheels and if the price was pitched right that could be a popular item.

I agree about people maybe not wanting to pay extra for plastikoting, but it would be good as an optional extra. I've sometimes used things without plastikoting anyway.

Other paints and sealants I am quite cautious about. I'm quite cautious about paints anyway. Plastikote is tried and tested. A lot of things are labelled "non toxic" but non toxic for humans isn't the same as non toxic for small pets. I did quite a bit of research into normal household paints a few years ago, being asthmatic, and many that describe themselves as "VOC free" are just as bad. To be able to remove most of the VOC's they increase the level of formaldehyde (I had a couple of paint pots that smelled like cat pee!) and that is harmful too.

However I know you're not talking about general household paints. I would probably find one safe one and stick to that.

I'm also cautious about colours. Even food dyes can also be E numbers which can affect some people (and maybe hamsters) if ingested. And I'm not so sure about tempera paints either. Traditionally tempera was a natural product but the commercial ones now aren't.

Even if the paint is non toxic, it’s not something that you want to ingest.
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What Is Tempera Paint? Everything You Need to Know

Find the answers to the most common questions about tempera paints: what is made from, what you can use it on, is it non toxic/washable etc.
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I think one selling point could be using natural dyes for colours (ie plant based like from tea or nettles) and focusing on the natural element. With a petsafe waterproofing clear coat.
 
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Something a lot of furniture makers found helped with success was having a unique emblem on their wood products. If you've heard of mousey Thompson :) Robert Thompson made hand carved, solid oak furniture and every piece had a little mouse carved on it. You can find them on some church pews as he made those as well. Obviously human furniture isn't the same as hamster houses! And hand carving something could be time consuming. But a unique little emblem on them (maybe a stamp you burn on?) that adds to the design might be an option.

What hamster owners tend to look for is:

Non toxic wood (eg formaldehyde-free plywood)
Easily attachable legs
Suitably sized compartments and entrance holes (obvious I know)

What you could do is give a few free mini ceramic tiles with them (so a toilet corner could be tiled instead of plastikoted?) They could be inexpensive.

With any business it's difficult to balance, time, effort, costs and covering costs. As a sideline it's a good option.
 
Hi Heidi your enthusiasm is fantastic!!
I think you’re on to something offering the convenience of plastikoting. I’m biased having spent £15 on the stuff and spending many hours waiting for it to dry… it helps that it’s the summer holidays and I could get the kids involved 😀
Unfortunately after 3 coats on the mch, the lid is too tight now so I need to sand down the slots which will be a pain to do without the proper tools😬
I guess you’d be able to use one of those paint sprayers to apply coats which would save time so maybe you wouldn’t need to charge that much more than the cost of the plastikote and brushes etc.
I think if I was buying a lot of items again I would rather pay someone else to do it to be honest. Also, you’d be tapping into the cash rich time poor market 👍
I’d really love to be able to buy good quality natural wooden items too!
 
I have had the same issue with a roof not fitting! I only plastikote the inside now, and the top of the roof, and stop just short of the top.
 
Maz said:
I have had the same issue with a roof not fitting! I only plastikote the inside now, and the top of the roof, and stop just short of the top.
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I’ve heard on reviews people say that with houses that need assembling, they’ve painted the wooden pieces but then they can no longer put the house together! So I think it is something people would want but I guess it’s all down to cost
 
Thank you guys so much!

It might then be worth not offering plastikote for hides that need to be assembled by the customer. I wouldn't want them to face any difficulty slotting things together, so it could be up to them at home to seal it properly.

I've had a look at Honey Three Paws, and I can't see anything on their pricing? Not sure where I am looking, but their instagram is just DM to order. We won't be doing anything like that, as I do want to focus it on being more natural(?). And if people want unnatural colours, then they can Plastikote it themselves. At least when we start up, as buying every plastikote colour would be quite expensive.

I was also under the impression aerosol Plastikote was unsafe - but is that just because of the fumes? If it was aired out properly at the workshop, would aerosol be safe? And does anyone have any idea, if this is the case, how long to air it out for before shipping? I wouldn't want to send anything that smelt fumey.

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We've also been designing an emblem to burn onto most of the wooden products we're looking at making! It won't be too animaly/hamstery, but we actually want to focus on it being Welsh! Nothing set in stone yet, but as we want to be sourcing as many products as possible from Wales, we want to keep in theme!

On the topic of what you mentioned here:
Non toxic wood (eg formaldehyde-free plywood)
Easily attachable legs
Suitably sized compartments and entrance holes (obvious I know)
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I made this 100% clear to my partner. He is not hamster savvy, so absolutely everything is double checked with me first. This started off as a birthday gift, as he wanted to make me a hamster hide. He found it so enjoyable that we now want to do it on a more commercial scale.

Because of this, the wood he has gotten was formeldahyde free plywood. I will be going over every single thing he buys before selling, to try and work out the most ethical places to source plywood.

I have worked on three designs of attachable legs, so we will be giving those a try next week or so! I've also been compiling costs from other creators, reviews from their stilts, and looking at different types of wood for stilts.

The hole size has also been made 100% clear. Cowboy is a huge hamster, and I've emphasised that there are even bigger hamsters than him. We've bought all the supplies to make proper sized entrances, also. We will make every ad clear if they are suited for Dwarves or Syrians.

The Mousey Thompson thing is quite interesting actually! Last week we were talking to a blacksmith who actually does something similar, by putting small snails on all of his pieces. I think it would be interesting, but perhaps not entirely viable for certain products. We've been looking into adding hand carved items to the shop (i.e; typical things like mushrooms) but not sure about the pricing or how quickly my partner can make those.
 
Honeythreepaws has her prices on one of the posts or stories.

I do not think the spray plastikote is animal safe.
 
heidi said:
I was also under the impression aerosol Plastikote was unsafe - but is that just because of the fumes? If it was aired out properly at the workshop, would aerosol be safe? And does anyone have any idea, if this is the case, how long to air it out for before shipping? I wouldn't want to send anything that smelt fumey.
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Yeah you’re right that the plastikote in aerosol cans wouldn’t be pet safe. What I meant by using a sprayer, I meant a standalone sprayer you can use for any kind of paint, varnish etc that people use when they‘re painting in bulk/ commercial painting.
Ive never used one myself but I’ve seen other people use them and they’re super efficient once they’re set up.
 
I can definitely look into that, but I don't think we will be raking in the orders. Maybe hand painting is more inconvenient, but it also ensures someone is looking very closely at the item throughout the whole process, and would be able to notice imperfections.
 
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