Many people think of 3-D printing as a gee-whiz technology used mainly for things like making fighter jet parts and artificial limbs.
But plenty of everyday products, from mobile-phone cases to table-top board games, can be 3-D printed. And by tapping into the market for them, Jason Vander Griendt, 38 has built a fast-growing, one-man product design firm, J-Cad Inc., in Toronto, which projects revenue of $1.5 million Canadian dollars—the equivalent of $1.2 million USD—this year at the business. He runs the business, started as a side gig in 2006, with the help of 40 expert contractors, such as engineers, around the world.
Inspired by Tim Ferriss’ book The 4-Hour Workweek, Vander Griendt has built the ultra-lean business so he can run it from his apartment or wherever he happens to be while seeing the world.
“That was the driver around everything,” he says. “The business was built to have a lifestyle. The goal was to work on the beach if I want, to have the freedom to jump on a plane.”
Achieving the freedom to head to the nearest airport when the mood strikes didn't happen overnight. “It’s only in the last three years I have been able to do that,” he says. But now that he's perfected his business model, he's been able to travel to more than 50 countries—32 in the past year.
“I could get an office in Toronto and hire local engineers—but then I’d been tied to an office," he says. "I’ve made the decision to keep it remote and mobile.”
Vander Griendt is part of a fast-growing trend—the growth of high-revenue, ultra-lean businesses where the owners are the only employees. For context, in the U.S., the number of nonemployer businesses generating $1 million to $2.49 million in revenue rose to 36,161 in 2016, up 1.6 percent from 35,584 in 2015, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That number is up 35.2% from 26,744 in 2011.
So how did Vander Griendt pull it off? Like many people who find themselves running million-dollar, one-person businesses, he didn’t start out his career with that goal. He studied engineering at Fanshawe College in Ontario, then began working his way up in his field in traditional jobs at Gerdau Long Steel North America, Hatch, Siemens and SNC-Lavalin.
Start it on the side. J-Cad Inc. started out as a freelance business. In 2006, while working at SNC-Lavalin, Vander Griendt began doing freelance design engineering to earn some extra money, offering his services in developing conceptual designs to welding and fabrication shops in Toronto.
Back in 2006, the best way for Vander Griendt to reach his prospects was to use the Yellow Pages. He printed out the address of 600 local firms and direct mailed them a flyer he'd printed up. He started getting calls right away, many from shops that needed him to stop by the same night to help them.
Although Vander Griendt didn’t spend money on an office, no one cared. “They just wanted to get the stuff done,” he says. “Then it turned into repeat business and started slowly growing that way.”
As the business grew, he was able to supplement his CAD $60,000 salary with about $25,000 in freelance income in a good year.
“So many people think they have to quit their job and start their business,” says Vander Griendt. “I tell them ‘No, do it comfortably.’”
By 2011, Vander Griendt decided to get more serious about growing revenue in his side business. “I realized I could really crank it out and push the limit,” he says.
He set a goal of bringing in $20,000 a month and, gradually expanding the work he took on, eventually reached that benchmark.
But there was a big downside when he finally hit his goal: His lifestyle was suffering. “All I did was work that month,” he says. “I could only work.”
Protect your time. As Vander Griendt looked for ways to regain control of his schedule, it hit him: He had to start outsourcing. There was no way he could complete all of the projects he was bringing in himself without working around the clock.
He began looking for talent on oDesk, a freelance platform that has been absorbed into Upwork. He tested each contractor with a simple project before trusting them with more advanced assignments. “I gave them one shot,” he says. The approach worked out very well, and he quickly built a stable of reliable contractors.
Know when to commit. With more work coming in, Vander Griendt needed additional time to devote to his side business. He asked his boss if he could work part-time. It was an unusual move to ask to reduce his hours. It was more likely that employees like himself would request overtime to make more.
“He kind of laughed and asked, ‘What are you up to here?’” Vander Griendt recalled.
When Vander Griendt told his boss he needed time for the side business, his manager told him, “I’ll think about it for a couple of weeks.” His boss was concerned about how other employees might perceive the flexible arrangement. Vander Griendt suggested they try it for a week.
Finally, a few weeks later, his boss said, “We’ll try it. This is what we’re going to say to people when you’re not coming in Thursday or Friday: ‘I have a side business.’”
The arrangement lasted three or four months, giving him much needed time to focus. “I had two full days per week to really concentrate on my business,” says Vander Griendt.
Find new ways to say “Yes” to your customers. As Vander Griendt’s business grew, he started getting requests from customers to make prototypes for them. Although he didn’t yet know how he would do it, he asked himself, “Why not?” and began researching 3-D printing, which is used in prototyping.
One day, Vander Griendt spotted a sign for a 3-D printing company through the window of the subway. He gave the company a call. “If I send you some files, can you guys make a new prototype?” he asked them.
They told him yes—but there were a bunch of complicated requirements to get the files ready. During his two days off from his job, he devoted himself to learning how to do the prep work. “The Thursdays and Fridays came in handy,” he says.
In the meantime, a project to which he had been assigned at work ended. “I can put you on the next project or you can go home right now and give it a shot,” his boss told him.
“I shook his hand and said see you later,” says Vander Griendt. That was the last time he saw his boss.
Make the most of digital marketing. After hearing how valuable digital marketing could be from various colleagues, Vander Griendt had, in the meantime, been poring over books on the subject during his two days off from his day job. “I was reading tons of books on Google marketing, how to do SEO,” he recalls.
Seeing the value in raising the profile of his business on Google, he hired a Google Adwords contractor—another side gigger whose day job was handling this type of advertising for a big corporation— to help him market his business.
That helped J-Cad Inc. attract new clients. Soon the prototyping service was serving clients from manufacturing facilities looking to make new products to inventors working from their garages and kitchens. “We just did salad tongs for a woman in California,” he says.
He eventually expanded to another 3D printing plant in Los Angeles, which reached out after noticing how much traffic his website was getting. Because he was able to negotiate volume discounts from the Toronto and Los Angeles providers, Vander Griendt was able to offer his services at better prices than individual clients could get on their own. And he was able to protect his lifestyle even as he doubled his revenue, thanks to the outsourced services he used.
“Their businesses are already set up,” he says. “If the printer breaks down, I let them worry about it.”
Take it all the way. Vander Griendt’s customers had soon pointed him to a new opportunity. Once he’d created prototypes of a product, customers would often say, “I’d like to order $50,000 worth.”
At first, he told them he didn’t offer that service. Finally, he asked himself the same question as he did with prototyping: “Why not?”
He was already getting emails every day from manufacturing plants in China that wanted to work with him, after finding him online.
By 2015, he flew to China and visited 50 factories. After finding one he liked, he was able to "5x" his revenue.
Make it personal. Although Vander Griendt doesn’t want the responsibilities of running a traditional office, he has made an effort to get to know his freelancers and build a supportive culture.
Last year, Vander Griendt traveled to 22 countries to meet many of the contractors he works with, taking a road trip throughout Eastern Europe, where a number of his virtual team members live.
Although the rates he pays them are lower than workers based in Canada might require, their pay is far higher than they would normally earn in their countries. When he met them, he learned how much of a difference the higher pay and steady stream of projects was making for some of those who lived in emerging economies.
Some freelancers, used to working for companies in Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria, told him, “I can’t believe you paid me every time,” he recalls. They were accustomed to struggling local engineering companies telling them, “Sorry. We didn’t make any money this month. We can’t pay you.”
Another contractor he met in a tiny village in Romania—whose electronic communication sometimes went silent for a couple of hours— told him when they met, “I never wanted to tell you something: I used to work in the library across the street. I didn’t have a computer here because we didn’t have electricity.”
With money to invest in their own businesses, some of his contractors are doing so well they have now hired two or three contractors of their own. He’s excited to hear they’ll have more capacity, as he ramps up his marketing. “They’re geniuses at what they’re doing,” he says. And, he hopes, many will see their businesses grow along with his own.
