We recently connected with Jon Davis and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Jon thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

Oh man, That’s the dream, right? I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to make a living off of building stuff the way I do. You might argue that it would be easier to mass produce furniture and decor, but mass production has much higher startup costs. Building one-off custom pieces is cheaper to start up, but the trickier part is being able to drum up enough business to keep the commissions rolling in. I see three main factors playing into being able to sustain business as a creative. The biggest of the three is technical skill, so that people appreciate the work. The second part is being able to get your work in front of the right people. The last part is figuring out how charge for your work.

The technical skill part is simple. Practice your craft. I believe creativity is a skill. The more time you spend trying to be creative, the better you get at it. However, all the creativity in the world will not help you if your ability to execute your ideas doesn’t produce a quality outcome. Not everything I make needs to sell. I think up complicated projects, try to build them from cheap materials, and see what I can learn about my capabilities and limitations. Then I try to figure out how to improve upon those limitations. People learn from mistakes, and you learn from finding ways to hide those mistakes, or make them seem intentional. You don’t learn much from doing something successfully the first time. It means you already knew how to do it. This practice helps me to be able to quickly think up ways to build all of the unusual projects people ask me to build.

As far as getting myself in front of the right people, That is basically just dumb luck. I got a few people to take a chance on me, and those people had friends who also were willing to take a chance. I’d love to be able to say that there is a way to make this happen, but there really isn’t. The part that is under your control, is being skilled enough to make use of the opportunity if you happen upon it.

The third factor is compensation. This is probably the part that makes people the most uncomfortable. Here is how I figure it out. First, don’t think about your work as selling a product, think of your work as selling your time. Keep track of how much time you spend on each project, so that you get a good understanding of how long it takes you to create something.
Figure out how much money you want to earn per hour. Your time and effort has value, and you need to figure out what that value is. You need that value to be fair and reflective of your experience and notoriety. This value can increase over time. If you find that everyone who wants to commission you for a project is saying yes, then your prices are too low.
Lastly, don’t forget about materials. You need to account for material costs, as well as the time it takes you to acquire and process those materials.
It’s not exactly a perfect system, but it can work, so long as you keep consistent with everything.

Jon, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I have always taken stuff apart, and put it back together again since I was a kid. I loved figuring out how stuff was assembled, and how I could make my own stuff. I went to school for Fine Art, with a specialization in sculpture. I learned how to do woodworking, and welding. After I graduated, one of my sculptures caught the eye of Robert Diez DeLeon who owns Flux Metal Studio. He gave me my first job in the industry. I learned a lot of stuff working in his shop. Mostly, at the time, we were building unique objects for businesses at the Pearl Brewery district in San Antonio. I got to build chandeliers, signage, shelving units, lamps and bar tops. Usually from some combination of steel, brass, and copper.

With the metal working skills I learned from Robert, and the wood working skills I developed throughout my lifetime, I have managed to put together a somewhat unique shop, wherein I can pretty readily combine metal and wood into unique pieces. While I can also build just metal pieces or just wood pieces, I have the most fun when I’m combining disciplines. Lately I’ve been adding more LEDs and electronics into what I build because my clients have wanted some kind of functionality integrated into the furniture.

The thing I specialize in is figuring out ways to build things that most people would think can’t be done. Floating shelves you can do pull-ups on? sure! Tables base designs meant to hold a 30 pound glass top that somehow support a 500 pound marble top plus dinner? I can do it! Stone top tables that light up without having any power cords running to them? I’m on it! I can’t tell you that any of these things are inexpensive, but I can tell you that if you can dream it up, I can probably figure out a way to make it exist.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

I think the best way for society to support artists and creatives is to think about the time and effort that goes into producing art. It takes years to develop the technical skills and experience necessary to create things. For me building furniture and other similar items it has taken a lifetime to amass the skill set needed to build all of these things, and the experience necessary to ask the right questions, and know what to look for when trying to come up with a design solution. I can’t just slap things together and hope it works out. I have to fully design each project before I even give someone a price. I’m afraid my next statement will upset many artists, but 90% of my work is algebra and geometry. Everything has to be calculated, or nothing fits together the way its supposed to.

As far as supporting a creative ecosystem, it takes money. if you want to support an artist, you have to buy their work.
Beautify your life, buy art, display it in your home.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

When I was first starting my fabrication business, it took time, effort and all the money I could spare. It was probably 3 or 4 years before my business was sustainable, and I didn’t have much money to start it with. I bought used and broken equipment off of craigslist, figured out to repair it or tune it up, and built stuff as a side gig while I worked other jobs. I did my best to find jobs that would let me practice my building skills. I worked for a while welding together BBQ pits and smokers. I worked for awhile at a frame shop cutting and assembling picture frames. I worked for other fabricators and furniture builders It was tedious, but it was fantastic practice for my welding, and for my precision with cutting and assembly. I didn’t make much money during all of this, but I kept at it. I don’t know if that makes me determined, stubborn, or stupid, but eventually, I lucked into a good opportunity for a build, and I credit that time spent doing tedious repetitive tasks with the quality of that build, which then gave me a great portfolio piece to help convince other people to hire me for their project.

Contact Info:

• Website: ironmooseco.com
• Instagram: @Iron.moose.co