Want to Start Building Cars? Here’s How
There are a lot of car manufacturers out there. But car owners are notoriously picky. They have every right to be, of course. After all, a new car sets you back thousands of dollars, at least! If you’ve found yourself with somewhat of a niche desire when it comes to cars, then you’ve maybe dreamed about building your own. Thankfully, it’s nowhere near impossible to set up your own car plant!
And by “plant” I, of course, mean a manufacturing plant. I’m not saying you can grow your own cars.
Of course, setting up an entire car manufacturing plant to make cars for your own personal collection isn’t exactly feasible. If you’re going to do this, it’s best for you to make this into a business.
Gauge interest
Sure, you like the car-building ideas that you have at the moment. But that might not do you much good if others don’t share your enthusiasm. You want to make sure your target niche actually gets potential consumer excited.
Get a comprehensive business plan together
Whenever you read up on starting a business, you’re going to see those two words. Business plan. There’s a good reason for that, of course. If you don’t have a strong business plan, then you may find yourself a bit lost when you start putting things into action. Your business plan is also what’s going to help you get capital.
Your business plan should include details on your initial car designs, as well as the other services you plan to provide. Marketing and projected earnings should also be included. You should also assess the potential strengths and weaknesses and include them as part of the plan.
Getting capital
You’ll need to contact a financial institution. In fact, you may need to contact more than one. Setting up a car manufacturing business is going to be expensive. You never thought it was going to be cheap, but you may have underestimated the expense nonetheless! If you want investors to have a keen eye on you, consider gauging interest through crowdfunding.
The right building with the right equipment
You’re going to need a place big enough to, you know, build cars in. Consider all the equipment you’re going to need. I’m guessing you’re going to need to get your hands on a medium-sized warehouse, at least.
One of the things you need to account for here is that fact that you’ll have to get your own equipment. It’s very unlikely (although maybe not impossible) that you’ll find a place with all the stuff you need already installed. But this means you have more freedom to choose new and more efficient production methods. For example, you can invest in powder coating facilities instead of traditional wet paint methods.
The A-Team of designers and engineers
You may have thought about what you want your car to look like. But do you know the ins-and-outs of how it’s going to run? Chances are you only have a vague idea. You’re going to want to hire some designers and engineers!
Look for people who have strong industry experience. Designing a car isn’t just a case of establishing the aesthetics. It’s a very complex thing. They have to work closely with engineers to design inner workings of the vehicle as well.
Tesla auto bots photo by Steve Jurvetson. License: CC BY 2.0.