You only need one wheel to have fun...

So, I want to build a frame/start a bike company - can you help me?
I get these types of questions a lot, so here are some quick answers:

-I am not looking for an apprentice. Nor are any framebuilders or companies that I know of.
-I am not interested in letting you build a bike under my supervision.
-I am not going to let you use my tools or materials.

But (sob) I *really* want to build a frame!
I'll start by pointing out something important - you do not need professional instruction to build a safe, fun, quality bike frame. You DO need some basic mechanical aptitude, lots of spare time, and a willingness to work hard. If you have these things, you can certainly teach yourself to build frames, especially with the numerous resources available online. Frameforum is a good place to start - it has discussion lists and links to lots of other sites and resources. A number of "big name" builders frequent Frameforum, and they tend to be quite friendly and helpful about answering questions from novices.
So if you want to start building frames, and you don't want to spend a fortune, start reading and buy yourself a few tools and some cheap tubes. Then hunker down and start messing around. Hey, it's how I got started!

Wait, you didn't apprentice somewhere/go to UBI?!?
Nope. Waste of money and time, in my opinion. If you want to spend the bucks, UBI is a great way to get a fast, competent introduction to framebuilding. But it's $2000+, and a week or two of your time, plus travel costs. For that price, you could buy yourself everything you need to build fillet brazed or lugged bikes. Seriously. I'm certainly not going to knock the quality of the instruction at UBI - from what I've heard, it's top-notch. But if you like to learn stuff on your own and are intelligent and mechanically apt, just give it a try on your own first.

Ok, I also want to sell frames/run a bike company for a living. Any advice?
Here's my first piece of advice: Forget it. Freakin' bank tellers work shorter hours than I do and make more money. Really. If what you love about bikes is *riding* them, realize right now that when you start building bikes for a living, your riding time will DROP DRASTICALLY. Yes, that's right. I don't know of a single framebuilder around who rides as much as they'd like to or has tons of free time. If you want to make decent money and ride your bike a lot, there are TONS of jobs that pay as well or better and have shorter hours, especially if you've got a degree in something vaguely useful.

To be successful in the custom bike biz, you'll need to:
-Be ready to spend $10,000-$30,000 in startup costs. You'll need tools, materials, insurance, workspace, a website, tax licenses, and lots of other stuff. For a serious business, startup costs are going to be at least $20,000. And if you've gotta go into debt to swing that, you'll be adding the interest on that debt to your overhead.
-Be willing to work weird, long hours for limited pay.
-Be good at dealing with 20-50 phone calls and emails a day, most of which will NOT lead to a sale.
-Be capable of keeping your own books and dealing with taxes, business liceses, and insurance.
-Keep your overhead low - you'll need to work from home or from a very low-cost industrial location.
-Be willing to deal with seasonal fluctuations in orders/demand - you'll need to have some dough saved up for the slow times of year.
-Be a very competent to expert metalworker and welder.
-Carry comprehensive liability insurance. This costs me upwards of $3000 per year - if you are not willing to cough up the dough for insurance, you should forget about building frames for anyone but yourself - because no matter how good or careful you are, shit happens. Period. Sooner or later, someone is going to take one of your bikes and do something unbelieveably stupid with it and get hurt. And maybe, just maybe, they'll decide they want to sue you. So be insured.


So here's the bottom line: building bikes is really fun. For the right kind of person, it can be a very rewarding career. But the best way to find out is to build *yourself* (and friends and family) some bikes first (I probably did 20 before I sold any) to see if you really like it. Then consider your financial situation (kids going to college soon? Wife just lost her job? Forget it!) and either jump in with both feet, or don't do it at all.