$2.50 Stummels

[Briar Lee]

On eBay there are sets of 4 roughly turned pipes for $10, or $2.50 each.

Maybe some of our pipe making friends here can elaborate on the raw material cost of a machine shaped briar pipe.

I’d bet that pipe making is a lot like the idea of setting up a bar.

There are 25 shots in a fifth of whiskey.

Lower shelf bourbon is about $10 a fifth and makes maybe a hundred dollars worth of mixed drinks.

Like one bar owner told me, it’s so profitable on paper a lot of folks go broke trying to prove it.

 

[bassbug]

With relatively few exceptions such as jewelry, material costs rarely play a major part in the final price of a product.

 

[fireground_piper]

Depends on where it came from. A factory that deals in the thousands, someone who bought inventory of a factory that closed, or a single individual buying singular blocks all have different costs.

Someone getting close out lots of stummels is probably getting them dirt cheap. Compared to buying singular blocks which can range from $15-$20 up through $100+ if you are buying something large and high grade, it does make an impact in the material costs of a product at the singular level.

Then consider if you hit 2, 3, 4 bad blocks in a row with major flaws. You might have $150 into your wood stove just to get a good stummel shaped for the day if it’s a bad day.