A bit of a different one! A 3D Printing Business review

I figured this blog is going to be a bit of a different one from my usual (even though I've missed a few weeks of D&D blogs).

I'm Justin and I run Useful 3D Prints down in Melbourne.

We've printed some really cool stuff over the last 6 months.

This weeks blog, a review of what it's like running your own business, and starting from scratch.

6ish Months in review for my 3D Printing Business

So I decided to take the plunge on starting a 3D Printing business in November 2025 and it's time for a review. The aim was "give it a shot for 6 months until June and see how we go" if I needed to I'd just go get another job. And now we're at June, it's time to look at where I've come from, what I've learned, and what I look forward to.

Where I've come from

I was previously working as a telehealth nurse, and the pay was consistent, I'd do small prints here and there for friends and family, but mostly just do my own printing. I decided I couldn't continue with nursing, and was going all in on this. And it's been hard, the money is no where near as consistent or good currently, but I did have a safety net for this reason and am currently "afloat" which is nice.

I knew Rome wasn't built in a day and was well aware that it'd be a slow start.

Initially I spent a lot of time on the website, trying to make it look pretty, without realising that SEO and marketing matter just as much if not more.

It was pretty rough for the first few months, I'd average maybe 1-3 orders a fortnight for the first few months, and I started to get really skiddish and think I should throw in the towel.

But then I saw something that helped, "Burn the ships", essentially, give yourself no way other than forward.

So I did, I resolved myself to not getting another job, and making it work. I learned about how SEO works, I'm still trying to sort marketing but that's when I've got a bit more income, I still gotta pay bills.

That's we're we've come from, 1-3 orders a fortnight, to closing in on our 100th order, so we're getting there.

What I've learnt?

Ho boy, this one, I've learnt a lot and I've been forced to learn a lot fast.

Luckily, the resin printing and FDM I have been learning has just been adding to the knowledge base I already had, so the growth I've seen there has been positive and useful, but albeit not the mainstay of what I've learnt.

My prints are better quality now for what it's worth than the already high standard they were which is nice.

But I've learnt that, I knew close to nothing about running a business, and have probably only learnt a fraction more than that currently.

Cost of project is not the same as "time worked" on project.

I've learnt that quoting to cover your time required on a project is paramount, yeah, I might only use a few dollars of material and a few hours of time on the machine, but the hidden time in the work is what's the killer. Quoting? 10-15 minutes maybe for a simple job. Preparing files? 20-80 minutes for a simple/medium complexity job.

Post processing? Depending if resin, maybe 15-60 minutes, if FDM maybe a bit less 10-30 minutes.

Machine maintenance, ensuring you've got stock, marketing, networking, meetings - hours, just to keep the machines running.

When you look at it from this lens, a $25 print job doesn't go far when you're using $3 of material, but you're spending an hour or more on the job, and paying tax, insurances, etc.

You never turn off as a sole trader.

I've learnt that I need to balance my work life balance, which is hard as a sole trader, I'd previously stay up to 2-3am to quote a job that would come in at 11:50pm.

Part of my unique selling point is the fact that I pride myself on the quality, and turnaround time of my work, so it was a hard hurdle to cross for me to realise, replying in the morning, isn't the end of the world.

Under promise, over deliver.

Things go wrong in printing all the time, sometimes your machines just have a hiccough and something goes wrong, sometimes there's a bit of gunk you can't see on the build plate and they don't stick. Operating on "print times" alone through the slicing programs once again doesn't account for those hidden time factors, if you've got a failed print, you're possibly looking at an 8 hour delay to fix it, plus the cost of lost materials.

Having done a few B2B transactions now that are larger than your standard custom order, this is where I learnt that timelines need padding.

Future proof sooner than you think you need to.

I was previously working off of an M5S Pro, and a P1S, that was it. And then my M5S Pro shat the bed when I had a bunch of resin orders, so I had to scramble to find a new machine, knowing that I didn't want the M5S again, I ordered a new machine, and ran into warranty issues, we're now at a week of our main machine being offline, and I had to return the machine. I decided to dive in on 2x Saturn 4 Ultra's. At that point I didn't have the consistency of work to justify a second machine, but having only 1 machine and it going offline, was going to leave me dead in the water on timelines.

It's not plug and play with machines, when you get a new machine, you've got about 2-3 days of working that individual machine to get everything calibrated and learn it's individual quirks.

I said to myself that I wasn't going to rely on a single machine for a workflow again, so I swallowed that bitter pill of a huge spend before I needed it, and when money was incredibly tight. But I'm better for it now, if a machine has an issue, I've got the other one, if they're both working, I'm able to do double the printing workload at once, which helps with that priority of high turn around.

I had similar with the FDM printers, now having 2 machines, this one was more from reaching our growth criteria than the fact of one shitting the bed. I was getting larger orders/more frequent orders that the machines were booked out for about a week at a time as FDM takes a lot longer than resin for larger orders (Resin and FDM prints scale inversely on time because of the method in which they print, I promise you it's very interesting, ask me about it sometime). So we're now at 2 of each resin and FDM, able to handle surges in orders, and have a back up plan if one of the machine goes offline. The aim is to hopefully have 4 of each machine, but for this I will wait until we hit the required metrics for this growth.

People still appreciate genuine communication

I've never been one to shirk a hard conversation, or to accept accountability if something goes wrong. One thing that I've been told by others whether colleagues, friends or family, or other business owners, they say "don't tell someone that" or "remove this part if you're going to send that email". But I don't operate like that, I am genuine and forthcoming in what I communicate to my customers and clients even if it's going to cost me, and I've found that honestly, it's been overwhelmingly positive or rewarding to engage collaboratively when something isn't working or has gone amiss. I think obfuscation in the way most business conduct themselves is one of the biggest hates of mine, so I try actively to not do that, and my customers seem to appreciate that.

Learning how to quote

This one kind of links into the first one, but is it's own beast entirely. I've always struggled to back myself or speak highly of what I do, and that sometimes reflects in the way I quote. I under quote to try and get a job or to make it more affordable for someone. But I need to value my time, and the quality of work that I put out. I've now got some quote calculators that I use to help with this and it's getting better. But I'm still learning to back myself and value the quality of my work and my own time. A lot of people do have 3D printers, or know people with 3D printers, but often the quality of what someone's getting from me, is leagues above what they've gotten in the past and they've told me this, and this is where I need to value what I'm providing.

Custom prints vs "stocked items"

I've got a few commercial licenses here and there for different items, and these are listed on my store, but I'm finding it really hard to see these convert into sales, so I'm still looking at what to do to fix these issues, but most people often aren't purchasing off standalone websites for the type of items I'm selling, they're most commonly purchasing off Etsy which I refuse to base my business off of, a harder path to walk, definitely, but hopefully more rewarding later. Currently, the monthly subscriptions are not justifiable, this one I need to review a bit later.

Custom prints however are doing great, and this honestly is why I started, helping people access items they need, while not having the ability to print them themselves. While they're more time intensive than my store products because I need to download files, manage files, set plates, check file integrity, repair files etc etc before I can even print, appreciating my time is helping this become more rewarding from a business perspective.

You don't do it alone.

I'm a sole trader, but you don't do it alone. I've had to realise that sometimes I need to lean on people for help, support or guidance, and they've been paramount in me getting to the point that I'm at. So a thank you to a few people in particular, my partner Anna, and my good friends Bruce, and Rory, you've all done more than I can thank you for already, and I've no doubt you'll be helping still in the future.

I'm sure there's things here that I'm missing but I'll leave the "learnings" at that for now.

What I look forward to

For the first time in a long time (I've been working since 15) I can say, I look forward to work, every day. It might be a challenge sometimes, but I genuinely look forward to a new day with what I do, and this is really nice to have for once.

I've have a few B2B interactions, and look forward to learning more about this and securing more, I think that while I love the variety of doing custom jobs, the bread and butter (money) will come from B2B contracts.

From a business perspective, I look forward to the growth I'm aiming for, I look forward to being in a position to scale to a brick and mortar shopfront and to have staff. I'd really love to be able to employ people who are homeless/at risk individuals or need help getting back on their feet, from a young age and through various stages of my life I've helped at risk individuals through volunteer work and soup vans. I'd love to be able to help try to fix this in a tangible manner.

But for now, I look forward to tomorrow, and whatever orders that brings.

If you're a customer, or a silent observer that's cheering me on from the sidelines, thank you.