Somewhere around 60 to 80.I make a total of about 100 or so.Some to sell,some to keep,some to test, and some to give as gifts.At any one time I probably have 20 to 30 knifes in the works.Some just parts selected,others in various stages of completion.At Christmas I do fillet and kitchen knives in batches of 10 or 12 at a time.I have stacks of drawings and ideas that I haven't even started setting up yet.My wife says if I never buy another piece of wood or steel,I could make knives for a couple of years with what I have in the shop and in the workroom.(She doesn't know how much material I has stored in the wood shop!)
Lots of people think of going full time.That is a big step.If you sell 100 knives a year at $300 each,you only GROSSED $30,000.By the time you take out materials,utilities,taxes and the other expenses involved in a business, you may clear $10,000.Not exactly a big salary.To make a $40,000 income,you would have to sell about one knife a day for $300 year round.Last year I did about $10,000 in knives.That was enough to be fun,but not enough to become a time consuming problem.Because I run the knives as part of my business,it allows me to deduct everything like travel to shows, tools,supplies,narwhal and mammoth tusks,etc.This pulls down the profits from the jewelery part of the business and means less taxes.If it was just a hobby,none of that would be deductible.
