Hammer & Stain offers DIY experience
Customers can craft their own wooden decorations
NORTH COVENTRY >> On a recent Wednesday afternoon, Lisa Scheidt was seated in her shop, intent on staining a wooden board as a special order for a customer. Surrounded by long tables covered with brown paper, Scheidt was alone but for her daughter, 26-year-old Alyssa Godown, who was standing at another table, diligently cutting out a stencil for an upcoming DIY party.
Even empty, the large, sunny shop has a decidedly creative, fun vibe. Containers of paint in dozens of shades are lined up neatly along two walls, and artfully designed signs and other decorative pieces are placed about the store in attractive arrangements.
Scheidt is the owner of Hammer & Stain, a DIY workshop that opened in July on the corner of Laurelwood Road and Route 724 in North Coventry.
Hammer & Stain provides crafters with tools, materials and guidance to create customized wall art out of unfinished wood pieces such as boards, signs and rounds. Despite the name, Scheidt said the projects don’t really involve hammering. Instead, customers stain the wood the color of their choosing, and then paint a design using stencils prepared in advance by Scheidt or one of her employees.
The workshop is one of a growing trend of similar businesses that are springing up around the country. They offer crafters the opportunity to make a unique, personally made item, without having to purchase their own supplies or clean up afterward, Scheidt said.
What’s more, the sessions are social affairs. Scheidt estimated that about 95 percent of her customers are women who schedule workshops with groups of friends for a ladies’ night out or to celebrate a birthday, bridal shower or other event.
One area of the shop is furnished with a couch and tables, and guests are encouraged to bring their own wine and snacks and mingle before class and while they wait for the stain to dry.
While Scheidt has only been in business about four months, she’s been pleased with the overall response she’s gotten. Most weeks she has four or five classes booked, and she expects that number to rise as the holidays near.
Scheidt loves the atmo-
sphere of workshops, with their mix of fellowship and thoughtful concentration.
“I like providing a fun place for people to come, spend time with friends, be creative and leave with something to hang on the wall,” she said.
Her inspiration for opening the shop came after she saw a social media photo of a friend holding a sign she had made, surrounded by women displaying their own homemade signs.
A stay-at-home mother of four for 26 years, Scheidt had been contemplating a return to the workforce when the photo popped up in her Facebook feed.
“I was looking for something to get back out there,” she said.
When she learned that her friend had made the sign at a DIY workshop, Scheidt knew she had found her calling.
“I felt really pushed to do it,” she said. “I just thought, ‘this is what I was meant to do.’”
Scheidt discovered that a number of different companies offer DIY businesses similar to Hammer & Stain. She opted to go with Hammer & Stain, which offers licensing opportunities rather than a franchise, because she liked the variety and number of designs they offered.
“There are probably thousands of designs,” she said.
In fact, options for creating a customized piece are almost limitless. Customers can choose to paint their name on a board, a saying on a plank, or a holiday message on a wooden sled, snowman or tree. They select their own fonts, stain, paint color and decorative illustrations such as leaves for fall or snowflakes for winter.
Unlike many DIY painting classes, where all participants create the same painting, Hammer & Stain allows each customer to choose his or her own design and sign type.
“If you have six people, they might all do a different project,” Scheidt explained.
The first Hammer & Stain DIY Workshop was founded in Florida in 2016. In two short years, the company has expanded to include 32 workshops across the country.
Scheidt said the workshops are popular because they are fun, but also because people can produce a unique, handmade item that makes a perfect gift. Many of her customers create personalized signs to give as wedding or housewarming presents.
The myriad of design options make it possible for people to find something to fit almost any décor.
“The farmhouse thing is in right now, but we also have coastal themes for beach houses. We have things that are cutesy and things that are distressed and things that are classic,” she explained.
Surprisingly, Scheidt doesn’t consider herself particularly crafty. But she’s always had a creative streak.
“I’ve always enjoyed making wreaths,” she said, and she remembers painting a sign for her oldest daughter’s room.
She’s also always had an entrepreneurial streak. When her third child, Jacob, now 17, was a baby, she discovered he was allergic to disposable diapers. Forced to use cloth diapers, Scheidt began sewing her own. Eventually she took to selling them online, giving shoppers more than 40 different fabrics to choose from. She maintained that business for three years, selling about 200 diapers each month.
She admits that owning a home-based, online business didn’t quite prepare her for the challenges of opening and running a DIY workshop. Nevertheless, it was a challenge she has been happy to accept.
“I couldn’t see myself doing anything else or working for anyone but myself,” she said.
Besides, she loves the fact that her two oldest daughters, Alyssa and Lindsay Godown, 24, are working with her. Her two younger children, Jacob and Emma Scheidt, also lend a hand sometimes, as does her husband, who built the tables and helped get the shop ready for business.
After deciding that she wanted to open Hammer & Stain, Scheidt wrote out a business plan in November of last year, applied for a loan and set out finding a location. A Douglassville resident, she chose her site because of its easy access from Routes 724, 100 and 422.
According to the Hammer & Stain website, signing a licensing agreement provides shop owners with a number of benefits including trainings, project designs, class format, a website and guidance on site selection and hiring. New shop owners should expect to invest between $15,000 and $25,000 to open a workshop, the website states.
Scheidt spent a weekend attending a training session that taught her the basics of holding workshops, creating stencils on a special printer, and other key elements of managing the business. She also gets online support whenever she needs it.
So far, she’s pleased with her new business and looking forward to running many more workshops in the future.
“I would like to see it grow,” she said. “And if it continues to grow, I might look at opening a second location at some point down the road.”