10 Hard Truths About Starting A CNC Woodworking Business

I’m about 7 months into my CNC woodworking Journey. It all started when I came across this video on YouTube and pretty much instantly thought this was going to be my big side-hustle-turned-business-windfall idea. CNC also seemed like the perfect marriage of technology and tangible durable goods which checked a lot of boxes for me.

I TOTALLY jumped in and ordered a OneFinity Woodworker X-50 last November after extensive online research. It’s been an incredible machine so far. At this point I’d say it’s been a great learning experience peppered with an extensive series of realizations and reality checks so far. Here are a few things I have learned along the way which might help you if you’re interested in taking the leap:

1. Building the enclosure is “kindof” a big deal. I built mine from scratch using about $350 worth of supplies from a big box store. I could not find plans online that really worked for my situation, and many of the enclosures you see out there are built by people who already have an extensive woodworking skills, no other job, and full woodworking shop. Not the case for me. I had about a 5’ x 5’ corner of a garage to work with and no shop space whatsoever to do any fabrication. I knew I had to fully enclose the CNC machine for dust and noise suppression. I also wanted to be able to heat it in the winter to some degree. It took 4 solid weekends to fabricate -In December- so it was a fairly cold and miserable process. Pretty big buy-in to just get to using the machine in the first place. I’m fairly creative, resourceful, and fast-moving with this sort of thing so if that’s not you this part could be really hard.
2. Your designs and creativity –the product– are the most important thing. By far. None of that feeds-and-speeds stuff is super important to get started. Running the Makita router on 2.5, and 100 IPM for most things on the OneFinity is really fine for almost every single application from bowl bits to V-carving. If you’re stressing out about this technical stuff early on, you’re worrying about the wrong thing. Same with getting super technical with toolpaths and whatnot. I design everything in InDesign and I use Easel to spit out the G-Code. On most projects I use the two-bit option on Easel, a 1/8” end mill combined with a 45 degree V-bit for almost all sign and engraving work. The software figures it out magically and it’s fine for me. I use a 1/8” downcut more than any other bit. The bits I have are: 1/8” up and downcut end mills, 45 and 90-degree V bits, 3/4” bowl bit, 1/4” up and down cut end mills. That’s really about it.
3. The second most important thing is getting really good at holding down material. Figuring out where and when to use what types of clamps and other methods like double-sided tape or masking tape & CA glue. These are hard-won lessons as wrong moves here are usually pretty catastrophic. Proper securing of your material is absolutely critical to your success on the CNC router and will be the single thing that determines how many bits you break or projects you ruin. For the record I most often use the masking tape + CA glue technique combined with wooden clamps just butted up to the sides of the work piece for extra lateral support. That’s about it.
4. A hardwood store is way different than a big box store. Holy cow. I learned pretty quickly that I love the hardwood store and everything that goes along with it. A lot. It’s one of the most fun parts of CNC woodworking. Make sure you have one nearby and you visit it in person, maybe before you even get started.
5. Think hard about winter, if applicable. Running the machine in an unheated garage in the winter is possible, but not fun. Numb toes and hands are vivid memories from my first few CNC projects. Maybe start this journey in the Spring if you have the choice. This also makes wood storage and any finishing process really tough/impossible.
6. I do not like finish work. At all. This is something that I didn’t realize at all until I started doing it. Paint, oils, epoxy, tinted CA glue, stains, sanding. All of this stuff sucks to work with, big time, and I’m not interested in it at all. Any CNC product I make, ultimately, must have most of the work done by the machine itself and minimal finishing or I’m not doing it at this point.
7. You really need shop space. My house has no shop space. The corner of the garage occupied by the CNC enclosure is really the extent of my shop space. We have no basement, we have no shop shed. This makes it REALLY tough to: Finish, sand, cut, drill, dry, assemble, route, or lay out ANYTHING. I’m typically spilling out into the driveway with tools and saw horses to do stuff and that’s really annoying.
8. Many of the YouTubers you watch doing this stuff are literally in the business of creating content and are really good at it. Creating the content, and you viewing it, is literally a nontrivial part of their income and focus. There’s nothing wrong with that. I love most of these creators and their content. It’s amazing. I’m not doing, it, though, and I know now that I’m not them, they are not me. You’re seeing a sliver of the big picture of their lives and how they got where they were. Don’t assume what they’ve done is easy or try to guess what’s paying the bills exactly.
9. You most likely will NOT have any giant Etsy overnight successes. I got to watch my Etsy store sales be a giant ZERO, even with tons of research and testing, for months and months. Single digit views, too. So, manage expectations right away on that so you’re not disappointed. Again, this goes back to how important the product and design process is.
10. If you DID have an overnight Etsy success, think about what that REALLY MEANS. Your living room stacked to the ceiling with boxes. Your entire family working day and night to sort, finish, and fulfill orders. Constant running to the post office. Dealing with returns, complaints, and eventually running 24/7 to keep up. Is that something you really want? I banged out 16 copies of one of my products on a Saturday and it took the whole day. It was not fun. I very quickly realized that designing and making something is a heck of a lot different than “making thousands of that thing over and over”. I don’t want to make thousands of a thing.

I’m going to bookend this piece with another video very recently released by the same guy, Ryan, that created the initial video mentioned in my the opening paragraph above. This second video goes WAY MORE in-depth to show what it REALLY TOOK to scale his CNC business up into the 7-figure range. It shows in detail what it took to ramp into it from those first few sales to thousands of sales. Family pitching in. Boxes filling the family room. People staying up all night to mail stuff out. This would be a living nightmare at this point in my life and I didn’t see any of that side of this initially.

Based on all of these real-world learnings, I’ve completely re-framed my view of my CNC business journey. From now on I’m thinking of it as a low-volume hobby business that may, if I’m lucky, pay for itself at some point. At this volume it’s still fun, it’s still really satisfying, and should really fit in well with the rest of my day-to-day life.