The Ligne Bretagne Morta Collector

Two blog posts in two weeks!  Will wonders never cease...  But I had two things worth saying, a rare event in itself.  I'm back this time to introduce (or re-introduce) the Ligne Bretagne Morta Collector:

I had a great time working on all those Ligne Bretagne Dukes and Dons recently.  It's a fun shape, very elegant and stylish, and offering a lot of creative freedom in the final renditions, and I got to thinking...  We don't have a lot of morta left from Brittany, and I recalled that we had a bag of small blocks that was actually labeled "Probably too small for pipes".  I went digging through our stock for this and voila, it was just as I remembered:

Too small for pipes with traditional shanks, yes, but...  a lot of these are perfect for Dukes, Dons, and other "no shank" variations.  Turning these last smaller blocks into pipes would be a productive way to finish them out, and preferable to the previous option of just cutting them up as decorative rings, tamper parts, etc.  And when I say "these last", I mean it - In the photo above, you're looking at the last of my smaller blocks of Breton morta stock.  I've got some bigger ones set aside for higher-end pipes, but what you see above is it for the small ones.  When it's gone, it's gone, and with no other pipemakers likely to ever set up shop in the Briére, this is almost certainly the last Breton morta in the world.

What's different about it?  I've worked with morta from a few other suppliers.  Thus far in my experience, the Breton morta is denser, harder, and heavier.  It's very rough on workshop equipment, and just sanding it is prone to wear out sanding discs and drums almost immediately.  It also possesses, in my opinion, a richer, darker, earthier flavor than other mortas that I've worked with.  It's positively made for latakia, and excels with any really strong and dark tobacco, offering a flavor that is quite literally like nothing else.

So, this will be the next site update!  We're working on the first several of these now.  I plan to work our way through that box you see above until they're all turned into pipes, or at least all the blocks that are usable as pipes.  This is pretty much the definition of "Limited Edition"!

Making the New Ligne Bretagnes

It's possible this may be too technical (AKA "boring") to write on, but what the hell... I thought I would make a quick post on the process behind the creation of the new Ligne Bretagne Duke & Don shapes.  I've been wanting to do something like this for some time now, as a wholly alternate shape style for the Ligne Bretagnes.  When you're working with partially pre-fraized stummels, your final design options are perforce limited, but I find it an entertaining challenge to see just how much variety and individual personality I can inject into the line, considering that they are in essence machine-made pipes.

If I were making this as a Talbert Briar, it would in many ways be simpler.  I'd cut a length of stem rod, hand-turn the tenon to the desired size, file the stem to shape, drill and hand-turn a custom band to the desired style, and drill and turn/shape the bowl to what I wanted.  All of this would add up to $400+ of shop labor hours.

Ligne Bretagnes, of course, sell for $140-$190 on average, so none of the above is possible.  I need methods to do everything above for roughly 1/4 the amount of shop labor time, given that Ligne Bretagnes also need to be priced where they can be sold direct OR wholesaled to retailers.

The first order of business are the bands.  To get high quality AND time efficiency, these are factory-machined parts that come exactly sized and pre-polished - Each one is identical so my shank size turning can be pre-set. (In reality, I use three different sizes of bands, and three different styles, to accommodate the different shank sizes of various bowl shapes, but this is the thing about individual small-shop craftsmanship - Nothing is ever *quite* identical).

Below you can see some of the ingredients of the Ligne Bretagne Duke/Don stew:

A few bands always come scratched or otherwise imperfect, so I set these aside and use them for "masking" - Pop them onto the turned shanks to protect them during sandblasting and overall bowl shaping, then swap them later with the final, finished bands.  The turning of the shank should be tight enough to hold the bands on by pressure alone, but I always add some commercial-grade epoxy just for extra insurance over time, since the wood swells and shrinks with temperature and humidity.

Another key part of the process is to greatly speed up the tenon sizing and fitting.  On most Ligne Bretagnes, I use Delrin tenons - I prefer them for their strength and smooth fit.  Here, however, this isn't possible.  The thin stems simply don't have enough body to insert a Delrin tenon into, even if it were easily possible to drill them out without splitting them.  Instead, they'll need to be turned.  This simply can't be done by hand for a $147 pipe, so instead I set aside the time to assemble and customize a commercial tenon turner.  Here's what one looks like:

The turner is mounted on the headstock of one of my metal lathes.  The various slots allow cutting blades to be ground and inserted for a variety of fraizing purposes, but here we're just focusing on making a reliably-sized tenon.  I mounted the cutting assembly onto the head, then cut a piece of guide pin that matched the airhole sizes of our stems.  I also drilled and cut a thicker bracing tube to mount it into the center of the cutting head, and both keep the guide pin from flexing for better turning accuracy, as well as providing a handy stop point for each tenon so they would be a consistent length.

Once this was assembled, a lot of "test and size" experimenting took place - The adjustment knob above is slowly dialed to slide the cutting blade in and out towards the guide pin, until it's at the exact point where it will cut a tenon that matches the size of your drilled mortises.  The sliding tool mount is then locked in place.  The small carbide cutting blade at the tip will automatically shave down a stem tenon as the stem is pressed onto it, while leaving a slight bevel at the base of the tenon to add rigidity and help protect a bit against snapping.  Here it is in use:

The cutting head is spun on the lathe and the stem is pushed onto the guide pin.  The blade cuts a perfectly-sized tenon every time.  It takes a lot of time in the set-up process to customize it to provide accurate results each usage, but once that work is done, turning a tenon is as simple as pushing the stem onto the guide pin.  In this way, I can reliably make dozens of pipes efficiently and with reliably quality fit and finish from pipe to pipe, and make them all on a budget that a lot more people can afford!  Et voila, the new Ligne Bretagne Dukes and Dons, a whole new look for the brand to help kick off 2015:

(Note - This does NOT mean that all Ligne Bretagnes will look like this from now on - I'll continue to make the classic standard shapes as well.  But it is something new and different and fun to add to the brand, and that's always a good thing)

Social Marketing 101

Social Marketing.  It's a buzzword (Buzzphrase?) that everyone talks about, who sells online.  It can also be one of the most fucking annoying things ever, when people do it poorly.  I have been effectively doing social marketing online for my own business successfully now for 16 years, and what I write here is drawn from that.  I do not claim to be an expert, and I have no formal education on the subject - This is strictly firsthand experience coupled with my personal ideas of decorum.
I've been spurred to write this post because it seems like more and more, I see a lot of people doing it very badly.  What do I consider "badly"?  Consider this:

If you have...

• Ever added anyone to your email list without their express request
• Ever mass-messaged all of your friends & contacts on a social network to 'Like" your work
• Ever used your friends list as a marketing address book
• Ever posted advertising posts more than once every few days, preferably once a week
• Ever played numbers games to pump up your "Likes" 
• No separation of your personal and professional online accounts
• Ever shotgun-blasted your advertising across multiple social network groups, platforms, and forums all at once, then...

...You might well be a Bad Social Marketer.  

Let me give a couple of examples.  I know someone who uses their Facebook connections to heavily advertise the artistic product they create.  How do I know this person?  Because she aggressively friends everyone she encounters in any forum or Facebook group, and then regularly PMs them a never-ending stream of ads promoting her work.  If you're friends with her, you become her target market.  You probably barely know the woman but you can expect at least 2-5 PMs from her daily offering you chances to buy her work.

Another example - Utilizing your personal Facebook (or other) as an advertising platform or sales pitch.  When I log on and see the same person posting a dozen new ebay links a day, I block their posts quickly, or remove them from my "Followed Friends" list.  Seriously, folks... if you're trying to sell something, this is not the effect you want.  If your connections are blocking or aggressively/selectively filtering your posts, you're doing it wrong.  The only thing you're communicating is that you view your friends as potential dollar signs.  People very understandably resent this.

FWIW, here are my Golden Rules of Social Marketing:

1. If you operate an email list, it must be voluntary opt-in ONLY.  Years ago, some vendors would scour the Usenet pipe forum for email addresses to add to their lists.  Receiving one unasked-for email from one of these types was, for me, an instant brand of, "I will never buy from you, you asshole."  Voluntary.  Opt-in.  Easily unsubscribed from.  What you get with this are people are are genuinely interested in what you sell, enough to go and type their email into a form.  That's the market you want.
2. Don't use your personal account as a sales pitch.  It's a nebulous subject for those of us "in the biz", because a lot of poor souls follow my personal Facebook and Twitter accounts presumably to get pipe news, and what they get instead is a stream of ridiculous movie rants and Godzilla posts and comic strips.  But the thing is, my friends list is for my friends.  They know what I do for a living, and sometimes, VERY rarely, I will post pipe news to my personal feed.  By and large, though, pipe news goes on my Facebook business page and on my Twitter business account.  I do not treat my social network contacts as potential dollar signs because they're people and they already have enough assholes shoving crap in their faces to buy all day long, they don't need more of that from me.  If they want to follow Talbert Pipes news, they can follow the Talbert Pipes page.  C'est simple.
3. Make your online presence interesting.  Do something other than just hurl ads at people.  Interact.  Sing, dance, bake cookies.  Whatever the fuck your skill is, engage people with it.  A business page that is nothing but a long stack of ads and promos is a damned boring business page.  I write and draw comics.  I write blog posts.  I post How-To instructions.  Basically, I say, "Hey, here's some stuff to look at that isn't solely designed to take your money."  
4. Avoid broadsiding.  A broadside is when you plaster every possible group or forum or social network with your advertising, all at once.  Again, there are people on Facebook whose entire streams I have blocked because when they post an ad, they post it to every damn group on the site.  Just because there are fifty pipe clubs on there does NOT mean that I should post my same ad to all of them.  Pick and choose.  Scatter.  Ideally, interact with the people in those groups and get a feel for which specific of your ads might actually be interesting to them.  Pipe clubs devoted to estate pipes and cheap pipes aren't going to give a shit about my work, and that's fine, I don't want to bother them with commercials.  Waste of my time and theirs.
5. Don't play numbers games.  Don't friend everyone who's even once worked in a pipe shop just so you can pad your friends list.  Don't badger groups or your own connections to go 'Like' your page every week.  Marketing types will say, "Network, network, network."  I say, "Do good work.  Be interesting.  Let the market come to you.  Don't be an asshole."  My business wall on Facebook, as of this writing, has about 1040 Likes.  I've never chased those.  That's not the result of me bothering my friend list and family members and everyone else I know to go and "Like" my page, it's strictly a count of how many actual people went there and actually were interested in what I do enough to click that button themselves.  Don't chase customers, let them come to you.  
6. The best advertising you will ever get is word of mouth.  Rather than burning time and money trying to put your ads in front of the five thousand followers you have on X network, just do good work and have engaging interactions with your customers.  One single guy who goes back to his forum saying, "Hey, look at this pipe I just bought from that Talbert guy, he's a trip." is worth SO much more than all the ads you can fling.  This ties back into the "Be Interesting" rule - If you want to market your stuff, be interesting enough that people want to talk about you and your work.