Company History
We converted an implement shed on the old Latchford ranch to a wood shop.
There we designed and began to perfect the making of the Weeks Rocker.
With good fortune and good people, we made a business of it.
The Shop in the Shed
1986. The roof was falling in. I jacked it up, fixed the leaks, built some big doors, ran wire, ran pipes for dust collection, and moved in my machinery. Luckily, there was a concrete floor: soft, rough, and not flat or level...but not dirt.
This shop supported a design, building, and contracting business while I built some custom furniture and searched for a signature piece of furniture to anchor a line of production. When I found it, we refined the design and the making of the Weeks rocking chair and Wilson dining chair in this building.
An Early Chair Design
1990. For a patron whose house we added on to, I designed and built a set of dining chairs. Sanding until bedtime, I swore I'd never build another chair. One of these chairs and I were shown in the Wimberley View newspaper as a feature on the tour of artist studios.
The Weeks Rocker Design
In spite of my rash vow, I returned to chair design, figuring that any other backyard or commercial shop could build a table or cabinet, but few could build a chair.
I built a fitting booth with adjustable elements and invited dozens of people to sit and suggest adjustments. We found a set of points to take to the drawing board as givens, and I drew a rocking chair. When I built that chair of pine, I only had to saw the rockers off and put them back on twice to have the chair I wanted, almost.
the first rocking chair
carving a chair seat
front of first rocking chair brochure
A Surprise Early Success
Pecan being the state tree, and our market Texas, we started out making only pecan rockers--and got someone's attention.
The Rocking Chair Making
Between contracting and carpentry jobs, we'd make a few rocking chairs and try to sell them. I figure they cost us $1500 to make. I priced them at $800. They were hard to sell, but enough did that we got better and faster at the making. Slowly the cost came down to equal the price.
Capital
After the chairmaking became worth doing, a friend asked how we capitalized this business. I hadn't realized that was what we had been doing--capitalizing the chairmaking business by nibbling at our savings and working at night--at the time, I just thought we were working hard and losing money.