is there a market for 2000$ pcs made by a person and not a company?

[Snowy Fox]

bc i'm thinking about it

[Jurrunio]

Definitely

[PeachGr]

You want to buy one? Or to make one and still it?

[Haro]

Yea people who don't want to build a PC but try avoiding OEM's

[Jurrunio]

Of course I'm not saying there isn't competition, in fact there is a lot, so you'd better be good if you want to step in.

[RollinLower]

there's a market, but a very small one.

 

most people i know that want a 2K machine are enthousiasts that also want to experience building it.

[WereCatf]

8 minutes ago, RollinLower said:

most people i know that want a 2K machine are enthousiasts that also want to experience building it.

On the other hand, most people that I know would want a PC with proper warranty- and support-services, which makes the market even smaller.

[kkpatel87]

24 minutes ago, Snowy Fox said:

bc i'm thinking about it

Well, what is your value proposition? What do you offer that no one else does? There are lots of boutique builders and custom modders that have cornered this market. 

 

From what i understand profit margins are pretty small in this space. There is definitely a market but you have to have a well thought out plan before entering it.

[AngryBeaver]

39 minutes ago, Snowy Fox said:

bc i'm thinking about it

The custom building market is saturated already and there are enough big players out there that can buy in bulk you will be hard pressed in making a decent profit. You are much better off just offering your services via craiglist or facebook market. If you build a 2k pc and it doesn't sell you are out the 2k. If you offer the services then provide them a custom build... then they are more in control of their price and can provide the cash for the parts + your build fee. I would probably also toss on some kind of cheap warranty for like 30 bucks or so. More than likely it wouldn't be needed, but gives them peace of mind and since it should be covered by the manufacturer warranty you are only going to be out the time in the case one does fail.

[Teddy07]

PC building is not worth the money. Customers might expect you to fix their PC for free because you built it. We know there are a lot of dumb people with money out there.

[PeachGr]

Just to say it: a company may be one person. If you wanna sell a product you must have a company

[Cloaked]

Yeah, I guess. You'll have to make some business decisions first, though, like if you're only going to be selling PCs in your area, or if you will use Amazon, Ebay, Ali Express, Kajiji, or other e-commerce sites to sell them to people in more far away locations. You'll also want a website and a social media presence to help spread the word about your business, and so that potential customers can contact you. i would also recommend building PCs for a wider price range, as most people aren't looking for $2000 computers. And a final note is to clarify which dollar currency you are talking about, as that can cut down on hassle for the customers when it comes to finding out how much that will cost in their local currency if they don't live in your country. These are just my personal thoughts, though.

[Marbo]

The way I would look at it, unless you are a business that can offer guarantees or after sales service, then you are selling a second hand computer. 

[AngryBeaver]

1 hour ago, Marbo said:

The way I would look at it, unless you are a business that can offer guarantees or after sales service, then you are selling a second hand computer. 

Well luckily that is only your opinion. Since someone doing this as a side career can easily offer a guarantee and warranty service. They might even be able to have similar turn around speed since they would just need to ship back the bad component and then install the new one that gets sent. Instead of trying to ship a whole system like you might need to with some prebuilts.

 

As for after service support depending on the person that would probably be much faster than other prebuilts could offer. I mean the market is saturated, but it doesn't mean it can't be viable as a source of side income. I once upon a time did a very similar thing mostly via ebay. Now they did change their policy on when payment is released which made it less feasible, but if you do it via FB market place or craiglist you can make it work in a very similar way.

 

I think the biggest problem is that these days the task of tossing together a pc is much easier and a simple youtube video could walk most people through the process. Now where they would get hung up is if they DID encounter an issue. In the end it means the target audience has shrunk even more.

 

In any case these are not "second hand computers" even more so if they are taking your budget and needs then piecing together the parts to meet those items. There is a big difference from someone tossing up a 2k gaming machine and someone who is working with you to customize a machine to your exact needs. 

[Marbo]

34 minutes ago, AngryBeaver said:

Well luckily that is only your opinion. Since someone doing this as a side career can easily offer a guarantee and warranty service. They might even be able to have similar turn around speed since they would just need to ship back the bad component and then install the new one that gets sent. Instead of trying to ship a whole system like you might need to with some prebuilts.

 

As for after service support depending on the person that would probably be much faster than other prebuilts could offer. I mean the market is saturated, but it doesn't mean it can't be viable as a source of side income. I once upon a time did a very similar thing mostly via ebay. Now they did change their policy on when payment is released which made it less feasible, but if you do it via FB market place or craiglist you can make it work in a very similar way.

 

I think the biggest problem is that these days the task of tossing together a pc is much easier and a simple youtube video could walk most people through the process. Now where they would get hung up is if they DID encounter an issue. In the end it means the target audience has shrunk even more.

 

In any case these are not "second hand computers" even more so if they are taking your budget and needs then piecing together the parts to meet those items. There is a big difference from someone tossing up a 2k gaming machine and someone who is working with you to customize a machine to your exact needs. 

One thing I didn't say is that it's not feasible. However careful consideration must be taken. If you buy a load of parts and put them together then sell as brand new you then become a retailer of prebuilt systems. In that case you need to be in a position to offer the protection afforded by the consumer laws of your country. 

 

On the other hand you buy new parts put them together and sell "as is" then your customer has the same protection as anyone buying a second hand system. In that scenario you can't expect to receive retail value, but you might still make some beer tokens. 

 

The other case you state is a custom build, where the customer is involved with picking the parts. This would be a service you're offering rather than retailing pcs. Depending on how you advertise that service i.e professional or hobbyist making a little bit of pocket money would come with a different set of responsibilities. And the price you could offer that service at. 

[kelvinhall05]

Trust me, you don't want to start assembling expensive PCs for real customers until you can comfortably build one blindfolded and with your hands tied behind your back and can guarantee there will be no abnormal problems with the PC.

 

No offence to anyone here, but far too many people on this forum think they are good enough at building a PC to run a business building them. Simply isn't the case for most people here.

[divito]

11 minutes ago, kelvinhall05 said:

Trust me, you don't want to start assembling expensive PCs for real customers until you can comfortably build one blindfolded and with your hands tied behind your back and can guarantee there will be no abnormal problems with the PC.

 

No offence to anyone here, but far too many people on this forum think they are good enough at building a PC to run a business building them. Simply isn't the case for most people here.

As someone who does this on the side, this is pretty true. There is a lot of background stuff that goes into it, no matter how "legit" or "professional" you are. For people that have never worked retail, you're going to encounter a lot of things you'd never have considered when trying to have a business like this. The variability in client needs, hardware, software, use case, etc... are going to truly test your mettle and problem solving ability, in sometimes critical scenarios.

This is why some people that offer these types of services avoid small business clients, and stick to teenage gamers and/or residential clients. But even those have some ridiculous challenges.

Ultimately for the OP, there might be a market, but it's super dependent on your local area. If you're thinking of doing it online as well, and shipping your systems, just know that even the biggest companies have customer service and shipping issues. To try and tackle this as a boutique and single one-man show, it's going to be challenging if there is demand for your services. 

[kelvinhall05]

14 minutes ago, divito said:

As someone who does this on the side, this is pretty true. There is a lot of background stuff that goes into it, no matter how "legit" or "professional" you are. For people that have never worked retail, you're going to encounter a lot of things you'd never have considered when trying to have a business like this. The variability in client needs, hardware, software, use case, etc... are going to truly test your mettle and problem solving ability, in sometimes critical scenarios.

This is why some people that offer these types of services avoid small business clients, and stick to teenage gamers and/or residential clients. But even those have some ridiculous challenges.

Ultimately for the OP, there might be a market, but it's super dependent on your local area. If you're thinking of doing it online as well, and shipping your systems, just know that even the biggest companies have customer service and shipping issues. To try and tackle this as a boutique and single one-man show, it's going to be challenging if there is demand for your services. 

I can slightly relate with keyboard PCB design.

 

I have a decent amount of experience (nearing two dozen PCBs) and feel comfortable making them for myself and friends. But as soon as I reached out to people I don't personally know, it got stressful real fast. Now money was at stake, as well as my potential future reputation, etc etc. Until the first of my designs physically arrived in their hands, I could barely sleep thinking I fucked something up.

[cmcman21]

100%. I'm actually in the process of having my $2500 PC built by a person and not a company (well they run a company, but it's just them, so you get the idea). It's ending up about $100 more than going through CyberPower (my 2nd option) but the idea of working with a small business and much more personalized service is worth that money to me

[cmcman21]

As a graphic designer though be warned, for every easy, good client you have you'll have 10 psycho clients. patience is a virtue in the creative service industry 

[Snowy Fox]

what if I where to build a pc but for someone but they choose all the parts?

[Kilrah]

Yeah that's how it works, but unless they're a friend they'll expect some support/warranty on the work.

But like every business you'll have to count all the overhead you have to run the operation, including making provisions for the few cases where for example someone orders a PC, you buy all the parts, and they say "oh i don't want it anymore in the end" and you're left with the parts... or non-payment, credit card scams, people saying "you broke it", etc.

 

A lot of people tend not to think of things like this and don't charge enough to have reserve for the bad cases. But then if they're a small shop that makes a small number of machines they can't charge enough to cover them since otherwise they'd be too expensive for people to be interested...