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Building your own home with your own wood is the most rewarding use possible. Once your home is complete, the next best thing is to put your wood into someone else's home at retail prices. I learned how simple it is to install flooring when I built my own log home 8 years ago, and have been selling installed flooring ever since. When we purchased the molding machine 4 years ago and finally controlled the entire process from forest to finished flooring, our profits went way up and our enjoyment of the business skyrocketed too.
My log home is my showplace for my wood products. When a new customer calls, I invite them to view my website, take the virtual tours of the business, and then come to Timbergreen for a visit. They quickly see that we really do what we say and that we know our wood. We have 8 types of flooring installed, wooden countertops, beautiful kitchen cabinets, and many more works of wood art to see and touch. They tell me what they like the best and then we custom blend our wood into their home with 110% satisfaction every time.
It is easier to sell our flooring and other wood products direct to a customer. We have the advantage in that sale, a much different perspective than if we sold wood in a wholesale market. We guarantee our work & wood, and since we are the producer, the consumer's confidence is high that we will do what we say. Big Box stores can't come close to that.
Business Summary
We own our wood until it is installed in the buyer's home.
· We focus on making high value products, not big volumes of wood.
· We market the natural output of our forest, not affected by industry "demand".
· Our priority is to market locally, but our website lets us sell to the world.
· As forest owners, we are in full control of our forestry business.
· The market is vast for direct sales to customers, most buyers actually prefer it
Why I developed FVF
Since earning a BS degree in Forestry from University of Wisconsin - Madison in 1976, I have worked as a consulting forester with private woodlots owners in S Wisconsin. Being the first consulting forester to ever advocate for the small woodlot owner in the region, I was immediately bombarded by thousands and thousands of sad stories of how each landowner had been "ripped off" by some timber buyer. I found a timber market with no competition, no information, and no significant government marketing assistance available to forest owners. As I encouraged competitive bidding for marked timber sales, industry reaction was initially quite strong - but eventually forest owners were able to get open competition for their timber. One small victory for the forest owner!
As a forester and forest owner, over the years I have participated in all the government forestry programs and worked with the traditional timber industry. Every effort failed to produce significant responsible and profitable forest management on the small private forest ownerships. Only a small percentage of woodlot owners in the region even try to manage their timber today.
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