I was out and about and checking out some nurseries in town and I saw this mega five foot wide by two foot tall planter. I asked the owner how much and she said 3000 bucks. This was a month ago and I have been toying with the idea to try to make this a big selling point of my business, or even to transfer over completely if possible... But I don't know the market yet.
What I do know, is that it would only cost me about 150 bucks in concrete, rebar, form release, and glass fiber reinforcement(obviously not counting labor or cost of the form) and that I would be spending around $1000 plants and another $2-300 on small boulders, rocks, soil, etc... So maybe around $1500 (minus initial mold) and then 1500 would be my profit.
The idea I've been playing with is that since it costs so much to move, I would cast these in people's yards or patios and have a form that I can take apart in a couple prices and then now it's there. It can costs hundreds of dollars to move these, maybe up to another grand.
I could design these as desert native, Mediterranean, with waterfalls, who knows, I haven't started sketching these up yet. I figured I would run this by on here and see what everyone thought. Again, I only know roughly what I would make on these, but I have made a very small one and I learned alot, and am hoping to begin designing a larger mold this week in CAD.
Anybody have an input on what the market might be, or maybe something I haven't thought about. Anything helps, atta he'd below are some pics of the one I saw at the nursery and the process of the crappy very small one I made with dog bowls as a form.
I am also really fishing for ideas on how to make this and have been struggling on it. I can't find someone else's very large plastic version that I could use as a mold, and I was going to try to use sheet metal over wooden bucks, but I don't think that's the way to go either. There is a guy on YouTube I found who's making them upside down on a rotary table and using a form that spins around a pole slowly forming sand, then he pours cement on top and does the same, but I don't think that would work for a 1000lb plus bowl
![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
What I do know, is that it would only cost me about 150 bucks in concrete, rebar, form release, and glass fiber reinforcement(obviously not counting labor or cost of the form) and that I would be spending around $1000 plants and another $2-300 on small boulders, rocks, soil, etc... So maybe around $1500 (minus initial mold) and then 1500 would be my profit.
The idea I've been playing with is that since it costs so much to move, I would cast these in people's yards or patios and have a form that I can take apart in a couple prices and then now it's there. It can costs hundreds of dollars to move these, maybe up to another grand.
I could design these as desert native, Mediterranean, with waterfalls, who knows, I haven't started sketching these up yet. I figured I would run this by on here and see what everyone thought. Again, I only know roughly what I would make on these, but I have made a very small one and I learned alot, and am hoping to begin designing a larger mold this week in CAD.
Anybody have an input on what the market might be, or maybe something I haven't thought about. Anything helps, atta he'd below are some pics of the one I saw at the nursery and the process of the crappy very small one I made with dog bowls as a form.
I am also really fishing for ideas on how to make this and have been struggling on it. I can't find someone else's very large plastic version that I could use as a mold, and I was going to try to use sheet metal over wooden bucks, but I don't think that's the way to go either. There is a guy on YouTube I found who's making them upside down on a rotary table and using a form that spins around a pole slowly forming sand, then he pours cement on top and does the same, but I don't think that would work for a 1000lb plus bowl
