I called the IRS today and after a short 15 minute wait I actually got to talk to a human. I asked one person what to do and they quickly directed me to someone else. At least this time it wasn’t the back and forth phone toss. The second person actually spent a good deal of time with me and after talking to him I think I should be ok for now. Before I do too much more I have a ton of reading to do and a lot more questions to ask. I was hoping I could sell my cards retail and just charge sales tax but he did indeed confirm what was mentioned earlier about needing to collect the FET. I do want a clean cut and ligit business and after a lot of swearin’ and a few more lost hairs I think I’ll be alright. I’ve been wanting to get my tax number for a while now just so I can start buying some stuff at wholesale. I’m thinking the worse part will be getting into the business. I don’t think it will be as bad once I’ve been doing it for a few years and know how the whole process works. I think the first few years I’ll be lucky to make a few extra hundred bucks. I’m trying to imagine how many of these things I would have to tie to make $30,000 a year profit and be able to stay at home and work for myself. I’m guessing that I will end up spending 12 hour days tieing lures 6 days a week though just to make that kind of profit. Swizzle

Well it use to be the sacandaga river. In 1930 they flooded the valley and the surrounding towns and called it the great sacandag lake. Lately the pollution level in this lake has dropped it down to a class B lake. Which means its safe to swim and fish but don’t drink the water or eat the fish. I believe the record holders name was Peter Dubuc and I think it was in the 40’s that he set the record. I’ll have to look it up. This might sound crazy but has anyone thought about making a spoon that was somewhat skinny and maybe a foot and a half long and paint it the same color as a carps underbelly and troll that? It would probably need at least 5 large trebles attached to it. I think there’s a 15 point limit to how many hook points your allowed. Swizzle

Well I guess I’ll just have to pick and choice who I sell to since I can’t afford insurance. So if I get audited will I need to count each bead? Make sure each lure has the proper quantity of beads and so on? How does anyone start out in business like this? Man this isn’t gonna be easy is it. Swizzle

At first I only wanted to tie a few to fill a gap for a friend and now I think I might want to do more. Just starting out in a half arsed way and not really knowing what I’m getting into is the hardest part. I’m gonna eventually have to raise my price and pay the toll to cross into business land. I’m just confused on a lot of things right now. First, I can’t afford and accountant and I’m reasonable intelligent, can I set the books up myself? Do I need a tax number, a wholesalers license, a retail license, a manufacturing license or is there another license or 2 that is required? The laws here in NY might vary from your state. Also what can I claim on my taxes? The gas to drive these lures from point A to point B and back? The electricity to run my computer to make print outs for the cards, the ink for the cards, the cardstock that I buy to print out on? All of the components from staples and bags to blades and beads? I suppose the list could go on for a while. I’m sure I can do the books myself but its just another arse cramp I was hoping to avoid. I appreciate your trying to help me and I hope no one took my little rant personally. I guess it boils down to a somewhat crappy day. Another question I have is what is a reasonable price to charge for these lures? I’ve seen price vary from $9 to $13+ for simpler harnesses then what I’m making. I guess I’m afraid I will overcharge and lose a potential customer from ignorance. At the same time I don’t want to keep raising my price everytime I bring new stock to the person either. In all honesty I wish I was already on the books. I’m quite confused right now as to what I do with the stock I already have built up. Do I start keeping track now or not? If I get a tax number tomorrow do I try to find out the price of everything I bought plus the shipping? Its all confusing and I know the only way to get this worked out is to go ahead and start the process and see where it gets me. Keep my books as accurate as I can and try not to mess them up. How would this effect me and my wife’s joint return? I’m gonna go drink some beer now and think about this a lot more….tomorrow. Thanx for all of your advise and any advise that you can give me from here on out. Swizzle

I think I should clarify one thing. I’m just looking to get opinions and advise. I also want to apologize fr the little rant that I did earlier. Its just frustrating to be doing all of this work and if I want to go big then uncle sam wants to line his pockets. If I do decide to start a real business then I will do my best to learn the proper way to do it and go from there. Swizzle

I can’t afford an accountant. My electric was suppose to be shut off on the 20th so I’m still waiting for that, We’re about to be evicted, we have one working vehicle and that is going down hill quick. We get 1 check every 2 weeks now and the state takes out more in taxes because of the higher gross not to meantion the garnished wages. Our car needs to be inspected and it won’t pass. Until I get a stock built up I can’t afford to do anything else. I’ve had to turn down jobs because we can’t afford the $175 a week for day care and run 2 jobs with 1 car. This is just another punch in the gut. It doesn’t make any sence. They feds get 10% of my hard work and effort and then they get the addition 8.25% sales tax on top of that. Its insane. It really isn’t fair at all. Swizzle

10%?!? So I’d have to charge $9.90 a card and then try to hold on that money and pay in every year? I was only looking at selling to mom and pop stores for a little extra cash and maybe in the future tie more as a business. As it is right now I haven’t made a profit on any of these yet. Once I figure in the cardstock, the staples, the bags, the line, beads, blades, clevises, hooks, paint, wire leader material, sleeves and ink from my printer to do all of this I’m still in the hole. I’m still looking for places that will sell beads by the thousands at a reasonable price. The best prices I’ve seen are on lots of 50,000 beads but they have a minimum order of $250 and $150 order every month. I can’t keep books for crap but if I do start selling in larger volumes I guess I’ll have no choice. Basically all the time I’m putting into these is for free. Maybe I should just throw in the towel. Swizzle

Pardon my ignorance since I’m just starting out in the biz. But what is FET and why would I need to pay that? The only thing I’ll be doing in the near future is getting a tax number. I’m not sure about FET?!? Swizzle

Here’s my latest blade paint job. This is my first attempt at a 4 color design. The yellow doesn’t shine through super bright so I’m wondering if I should use the yellow at all. Swizzle

I sent you a PM. What\’s up with the forward slashes? It happened in my post to and I even went back and edited it and it was still the same. Swizzle

Last pic. Do you think I should try painting some spoons? Swizzle

pic 2

So far just spinner blades for night crawler harnesses. Here\\\’s a few others I painted. Swizzle

Hey all. I did some quick and dirty painting and tied a few dozen cards. With the money I get from these I’ll be buying the acid etch primer. Edit by Briank This is the first time I carded them on my own art work. I drew the trout pic and printed out all the cardstock myself. Tell me what you guys think. Swizzle

Thanx. I just painted 16 dozen today and have 3 dozen of the snells tied. I’ll tie a few dozen more tonight and then finish them of sometime tomorrow and start adding the beads and blades and get them packaged up. I spent most of the day working on a good system for painting the blades. Now that I have a system down I think I could easily paint 600 or more in a day. I really need to get a wider table for the paint station though. Swizzle

Do you think I would be better off packaging blades seperately and selling just the blades? I’m gonna get to work on tying 7 dozen crawler harnesses today. But I was thinking I could sell both, the harnesses and the blades. My other idea was to package a couple different blades and put them in with a crawler harness that has an interchangable clevis. Swizzle

Here’s the rest. Swizzle

Well lets see if I can add some pics. Here’s all of the color combo’s I created today. My air brush is busted so these were all done with a regular spray paint can. Swizzle

Thanx for the warm welcome. Swizzle

Hi, Im new to the forum and I have been tieing a few crawler harnesses for my parents baitshop. I noticed that the cost of painted blades is high compared to buying plain bulk blades. So I went ahead and purchased 4,000 blades. I don’t want to get into powder paint. I’d really like to know the best way to get a tough finish on a spinner blade. The biggest blades I’ll be doing is a size 6 and those will be very few. I’ll mostly be doing size 0, 2, 3&1/2, & 4 colorado’s. I don’t want to get super fancy and super artistic. The most I want to do is add a fish scale pattern. Nothing textured or sparkly. Just a plain 2 color design. The paint I’ve been using is the testor pain which says its for metal. These blades are polished so the paint doesn’t seem to take well. Is there a better paint for the job or do I have to hand sand each blade and add a primer coat? The less I have to do the better but if I have to do an extra step to make a better paint job then I’ll do it. Thanx, Swizzle