A guy likes to whittle. He has a good eye, good hands and sharp tools. He enjoys creating good figures from wood and he falls back on his practice often. Whenever he wants to reflect, digest, think, he carves.
Before long, his shop is stuffed with good carvings. Naturally, he finds a place to offer the pieces he can bear to part with for sale. His rhinos are especially popular.
Should he carve more rhinos? It is fun to see his art being purchased. The income from carving brings in more wood, more tools, more acclaim. Will he be drawn to carve what sells?
Even if you are the master carver, it may be a little difficult to tell whether you want to branch out into Harry Potter figures and historical figures or whether you get more of a lift from sales and more sales. He may get all marketing and statistical, studying trends in gifts and carving sales, locating areas where carved figures are a hotter item. He could get a degree or a certificate in marketing and learn ways to push his figures as gifts, tokens of travels or prizes. He might become "Mr. Rhino" and put his animals on candle holders and vases, file boxes and racks for clothes and keys.
He may desert his art and pay other carvers as his sales, overseas and home, increase.
Or, he may continue to carve wood into figures that please him, whether or not they sell well.
No matter whether he works his hobby or his business or manages some of both, he may come to feel that he never really did the right thing. Getting deeper into sales of wooden carving can saddle him with the suspicion that he deserted his art for crass cash. Producing more figures in a greater variety and getting more expert all the time may give him a nagging suspicion that a good business would have developed if he had put more energy into marketing and sales.
If you meet the man, give him some cheer, will you?
