From the workshop, Sunday afternoon #11

I’m tired this week. July was our best month ever, and August is tracking similarly. This is amazing - my exhaustion is temporary and not a complaint, it’s just a fact. We ordered in some more Australian made dry canvas last week, and we’re finally receiving a new batch of Australian made wool batting for our Mariners Roll Mats. The mats are quite popular, materially expensive and tricky to ship. I’m often conflicted with some products about whether to continue making them - it’s a funny thing, demand, you want & need to make the sale as a business, but sometimes it’s derailing. 

One of the changes I’m currently working toward is streamlining a core range of products/designs made from materials and notions that are easily accessible in Australia. The oilskin canvas we have is rapidly dwindling and resupply from overseas is extremely expensive and slow, with high minimum order quantities. As a small business, it’s stressful having tens of thousands of dollars tied up in materials locked in a shipping container somewhere at sea for three months. 

To help resolve this materially, mentally and financially, the strategy going forward will be the core range, made in colours and materials that are locally accessible, accented by what we’re calling Workshop Editions. The first Workshop Edition will launch this week - these labeled editions will be small runs, sometimes numbered, sometimes not, using small batches of limited materials we source from around the world. Instead of buying 1000m of material to meet a minimum order quantity from another country, we’ll purchase a small amount for a specific product/design. This isn’t manufactured scarcity, it’s manufactured reality. It allows Kohutt to still be experimental, play with new designs, materials and ideas, without turning everything into a production line.

This methodology also allows us to test new ideas - if a Workshop Edition is successful, we may move that pattern into the core lineup. Or, if it’s successful but difficult to continue producing (like the Mariners Roll Mat), at least we know and maybe we’ll run the edition and call it a day? 

For the last 18 months we’ve been building products made from a burst of materials purchased at bankruptcy sales. This has led to an unusual palette of both materials and colours, because different lots were full of different things. This has led on to many SKUs and a lot of photos. As those materials wrap up, consolidation will occur, the core range will develop and Workshop Editions will become the flourish.

The first Workshop Edition is cut, numbered, sewn and sitting on the bench. There is no practical argument for it. I've looked. It's perhaps the least useful thing we've ever made and I've enjoyed making it, which of course is the ever present tension between utility and art.

In summary: fewer things, made properly, from materials I can actually get without opening a line of credit. Then a handful of odd & interesting ones each year, because otherwise there isn't much point. Let’s talk more about this in a year and see if it was the right call!

With happy tiredness and appreciation,

Nick.