HoneyBee3D

Hi there. So my name is Nick. I am half of Honeybee3D along with my wife, Lisa. So we opened about a month ago Northern California's first and only retail 3D printing store. We're in the Montclair District of Oakland, and we've been open for a month, right? And so all of the things that you see from Autodesk, from these other companies, all came to us when we were thinking about Honeybee3D for what we would want to create for people. This is a retail 3D printing store. You can walk in, see the technology, you can have your designs printed on our printers, you can take classes, and we do business consulting. Lisa's going to talk to you more about the business side of it. I'm going to tell you a little bit more about the technical side. But one of the most important things that was actually spoken about earlier was this whole idea of digital to analog. It's all awesome to create businesses like Facebook and Google that all deal with digital things, right? But analog is where the stories happen. Analog is the chairs that you're sitting in, the computers that you're typing on, right? It's what people actually interface with. And one of the reasons why we're getting the press that we got, and what we are getting, is because we are next to a bakery, and a donut store, and a dry cleaners. Not in a makerspace, not in some other kind of industrial setting, but we're in a place where we literally have a hairdresser coming in saying, what can I do? Right? This type of technology is important for entrepreneurs because we get entrepreneurs walking in the door saying, I have an idea, how can you help me? Which is what an entrepreneur should be doing for every business they walk into because all of these businesses on this street have something to offer you. We had a hairdresser walk in and say, what is this technology? I told her and she's like, OK. And then I showed her— I actually downloaded a little model of a comb, and I used some software to actually extend the comb out on the computer screen in an attempt to make it more ergonomic. And then that got her mind going, saying, maybe how can I create a comb that doesn't hurt my wrist when I'm doing hair? And there are stores right now set up So that if that hairdresser has that good idea, creates that, they're actually able to upload that design and start monetizing that immediately. So Lisa will tell you a little bit more about the business side and what that means for brand engagement. But what Guillermo earlier said about complexity is free, after the talk we'll actually start running these things. But 3D printing at its basis builds everything up layer by layer. And when you take away your inability to create things, you can create a lot of things. So if you say, I want to create something like this, right? This is made out of a different type of plastic. This is made out of PET, P-E-T plastic. I'm actually able to print out of this plastic. This is a specific design by a company. The different ribs here, the different way that the cap is on here, all of this is creativity. All of this was developed by very intelligent people to sell water bottles but also be enough to shave on shipping weight. And so when you're engaging with the people that you engage with as customers or as entrepreneurs, One of the biggest calls for this technology is that creativity is all around you. Some engineer developed this curve. Some engineer developed the stitching that goes on the things that you're sitting on so that it doesn't break, so that the amount of strength that it has is appropriate to the price. Every single one of these things can be adapted and manipulated when you engage with 3D printing. All of the choices that you are enjoying online on your MacBooks that you're typing on, all of the software interfaces somebody decided to create. Maybe something is curved in one way, maybe there's a button in a certain place. 3D printing allows you to take that flexibility that you have in the software realm and change it for the physical realm. If something like this were created solid, like the walls of this were solid. Great. 3D printing actually, if you were to carve out beautiful indentations of flowers or the names of each individual client that purchased this, it would actually cost less because you are using less material when you print it. So when you say complexity is free, actually complexity is a lot of times less expensive Because as you take away things, the printing process doesn't care about complexity. So if you build in beautiful cutouts of this, it'll actually cost less to print. And it gives you the entire access to a machine shop and design from these tools that have been evolving. The tools that Autodesk puts out and other people put out create movies like Avatar. There are no 10-foot-tall panther people in the world. Right? But all of those 3D models that have existed over the past years that kind of 3D modeler people have been delightfully creating are now all printable. You go onto Google SketchUp, for example, right? Google Maps. All of that architecture, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Transamerica Building, all of those are 3D designs that are now remixable with Meshmixer and other tools and then printable. So obviously art is impacted by this, but all sorts of things. So I can talk to you all more individually after this, but from my perspective, we have inventors coming in all over the place that were only stopped by their inability to have tools in their garage. This puts an entire machine shop in these people's hands and allows you to create products that adapt for the interests of your customers or create whatever you want. So I'll hand it over to Lisa. More?

Do you have— Yeah, thank you. Off of mute. Can you guys hear me? Actually, I can't even hear a difference.

No, it's towards the camera.

Ah, okay, perfect. All right, excellent. So I'm gonna switch gears a little bit. You guys have gotten an excellent education on what 3D printing is and basically what it can do for you. It is very true, you are on the forefront of a revolution, so it's super exciting. I kind of have a little bit of knowledge of what you guys are doing. Some of you started a business, some of you are still in the idea phase, so I'm gonna kind of address that, what it is to be an entrepreneur, third-generation entrepreneur. I've been a fashion designer for 10 years. I was in over 80 stores with my jewelry, and my husband turned me on to 3D printing, and I was hooked because now my creativity was unleashed. And so 3D printing really is a fantastic opportunity to get your product out there in a low-cost way, test your market. What we do at the store at Honeybee3D in Montclair, Oakland. We do 3D scanning, 3D modeling, rapid prototyping, and the big thing that we do is classes. So if you know nothing about 3D printing and you want to take a 2-hour class for $65, go to our website, check it out. But the most important thing is, is that anybody that's involved with product— I know you were interested in probably fashion, which is awesome— build something first, test it, reiterate it, and then bring it to market. So that's a really good cost-effective effective way. So now that you know a little bit about what we do, one of the things— I'm basically just gonna go over a little bit about entrepreneurship and hopefully this is relevant to you guys that are just starting out. And it sounds like an amazing program that you guys are doing. Basically, when I first started my jewelry design company 10 years ago, people were like, don't do it, the space is crowded. I ignored them. And then basically, 6 months into it, Nordstrom's found me. So stay with it. Be passionate about what you're doing. The other thing is the power of the press. I don't want to— I can't say this enough. I wrote one email to the editor of thebayareanewsgroup.com. It's a really, really good URL to go to. And I just sent him an email and just said, hey, we're the first 3D printing store in Northern California. There's only 7 in the country. He just wrote me back an email and he said, hmm, interesting. So I said, okay, fine. That was a failed attempt. No big deal. A week later, they want to do a story on us. And this is the— we got the COVID of the Piedmont. This is 2 weeks into being open. Then I get picked up by the Montclairian. Same article cover story.

Quick question. Is this newspaper Walmart or they can use it or receptive to contracts?

Oh yeah. Well, I mean, all presses. Like in general? All presses. Yeah, this is not a tech journal. This is good old Montclair, good old Piedmont, good old San Jose Mercury News. It got picked up by 7 other papers including the San Jose Mercury News, the Oakland Tribune. On that one Friday, we call it Press Friday because San Francisco Business Times, we got picked up by 6 other publications. What I'm saying is it can happen to you guys too. Give your editors an interesting pitch, an interesting angle why you're different, why you're new, why what you're doing is exciting. And you could have a day where this is free, guys. And about 80% of our business that's walking through the door right now is because of this. And I didn't pay anything for it. So this is super, super important. The other thing is that— and it sounds like you guys being here already know how to do this— is to be very resourceful. Your friends, family, things that you know. Don't underestimate the people that you know because you never know that the guy working at your favorite coffee shop could have a connection that could be really relevant to you. And always kind of have your eyes and ears open for that because that could definitely be a turning point for you. The other thing is, if you guys are kind of deciding what company to do, is to be authentic. There are a lot of people that I think are successful because they authentically love what they're doing. They're passionate about their product, and you can feel it. People want to do business with people that love what they're doing. I love 3D printing. It's bizarre. I'm a fashion designer, and I love this technology. And I think people notice that, and they like it, and I think that that ultimately helps our business as well. Be flexible and be focused. We're focused on 3D printing. Somebody said, oh, you should do laser cutting because it's super hot right now. And I said, nope, we decided we gotta be focused, but yet we're flexible. We've probably talked to about 2,000 people that are interested in 3D printing over the course of 6 weeks. That's a lot of people, 'cause a lot of people come through our store. And we're being flexible. We're listening to our customers, seeing what our customers want, and tailoring products and services towards them. And I already spoke to you about having passion, which I think is extremely important. And I guess what I want to leave you guys with is one final thought, is that your job as an entrepreneur is this: to do what you love, to do it very well, or ideally do it the best or better than anybody else, and then find other people that love the same thing, and the rest will follow. Because if you love what you're doing and you find other people that love what you're doing, they'll pay you for it. And it— I don't care if it's tree cutting or if it's making CDs or music or clothing or 3D printing. That's the best advice I could give you guys. And it's very exciting that you guys have this opportunity, and we hope that you come into the world of 3D printing because there's a lot of opportunity and things to discover. So thank you so much. That's all we have. Thank you.