Growing Bonsai Study Groups

[JEads]

For those of us in urban environments I wouldn't be able to do hundreds, but I develop in raised beds and anderson flats or grow boxes. I am planning on starting a few seeds a year to develop and am a compulsive propagator of cuttings. Looks like I will need to build more benches and raised beds. In Milwaukee we have a pretty large club so you probably could fill a pretty large group or do multiple classes. Visiting each person's grow beds could be a challenge though.

I think grow beds or flats is fine. I maybe exaggerated on the 100s. I imagine one session being tasked to wire 50jbp whips, discuss then with the group and then take home 10 to develop.

I am actually trying to outsource my farm work and get y'all to pay for it.

 

[Gabler]

I think grow beds or flats is fine. I maybe exaggerated on the 100s. I imagine one session being tasked to wire 50jbp whips, discuss then with the group and then take home 10 to develop.

I am actually trying to outsource my farm work and get y'all to pay for it.

That's a sensible way to keep your costs down, and even more reason to seek out a bigger cohort per class.

I'm afraid I may have underestimated just how much it would cost. I'm not saying you don't deserve to be paid what your time is worth, but if you can spread the payments out over a larger group of students, you'll be able to bring home more money at a lower cost to each student.

Another tangentially-related thought I just had:

People who have already joined clubs and who regularly show up for club meetings are the sort of people who are more likely to actually show up for a class. It's a lot easier to commit to something online than it is to actually show up. You'd do well to target the demographic of people with a proven track record for showing up.

 

[JEads]

That's a sensible way to keep your costs down, and even more reason to seek out a bigger cohort per class.

I'm afraid I may have underestimated just how much it would cost. I'm not saying you don't deserve to be paid what your time is worth, but if you can spread the payments out over a larger group of students, you'll be able to bring home more money at a lower cost to each student.

Another tangentially-related thought I just had:

People who have already joined clubs and who regularly show up for club meetings are the sort of people who are more likely to actually show up for a class. It's a lot easier to commit to something online than it is to actually show up. You'd do well to target the demographic of people with a proven track record for showing up.

I did some math tonight and I think a 2 day class is going to run about $1,700 total to most parts of the country, assuming there is a spare bedroom I could crash in. If there could be larger workshops to a club or a club meeting, the travel expenses could be shared. Without any other work, 6 people could share the expenses and still come in less than $300 each for a 2 day class. I don't want to minimize that expense, but it is lower than most workshops or in person classes with professionals.

I don't mind doing classes with larger groups, but the logistics get harder, more unwieldy and my attention is spread thinner.

I am reaching out to some clubs to put something into newsletters, but I sort of thought that this would be something that could reach small groups of people that don't have an active club nearby.

 

[JackHammer]

I appreciate your concern and I have crunched the raw numbers and think it could work for me. Here are my thoughts:
I plan on having 5 groups. One at my farm, one in Seattle. Those are both cheap or free to travel to. The other three are will include travel and other expenses. The groups will meet 3x year, so I am making 9-4 to 5 day trips per year. So 53 days away from my farm per year. That is a chunk and will bite into my production around here, but I think the net gain might be worth it.
I have 2 acres of pre bonsai in motion that will be the bread and butter and the classes will help get my name into the community.

I might be wrong, but $200/day /student is well below the going rate for professional classes, especially when you consider your own travel and expenses and time away as a student. If a trip to a professional yard cost $275/ day for lessons plus $500 for flights plus $100 per night for board, I think it could be better deal to have professionals travel more. A trip to Portland for a 2 day class would cost at least $1200 per student.
Assuming that the cohort students are within driving distance, the cohort classes could end up being less than half that cost and less lost travel time.
I don't want to presume that I am equivalent to Bjorn or Ryan, but I think I have a passion and experience growing that is not shared by many other professionals.

Great! It sounds like you have given it a lot of thought and have a path in which to start small and see how it goes. I don't mean to rain on the parade, I just want to offer constructive critism so you know what the numbers need to look like if it were to be a success.

I did this myself looking at what I would walk into if I ran a commercial chicken egg farm. Long story short, the numbers didn't work out. Which is ok! I am just glad I looked before I bought 40 acres and took a loan.

 

[JEads]

Thanks for looking out for me! I did small business consulting for years before this and my mentor told me that my job was to work as hard as I could to convince my students to not go into business for themselves. If they persevered through the hard work of convincing me otherwise, they were usually going to make good business people.

I dont love to travel and dont plan on doing the national teaching circuit full time. I have 2 acres of trees to take care of and a family. But, I am also passionate about what I do and want to spread what I know.

 

[Gabler]

I did some math tonight and I think a 2 day class is going to run about $1,700 total to most parts of the country, assuming there is a spare bedroom I could crash in. If there could be larger workshops to a club or a club meeting, the travel expenses could be shared. Without any other work, 6 people could share the expenses and still come in less than $300 each for a 2 day class. I don't want to minimize that expense, but it is lower than most workshops or in person classes with professionals.

I don't mind doing classes with larger groups, but the logistics get harder, more unwieldy and my attention is spread thinner.

I am reaching out to some clubs to put something into newsletters, but I sort of thought that this would be something that could reach small groups of people that don't have an active club nearby.

A cost of $300 for a two-day class is closer to what I would expect.

 

[JEads]

A cost of $300 for a two-day class is closer to what I would expect.

That is my goal. It would require a commitment from the study group members to pay for all sessions ahead of time, or "sell" a session to a friend if they could not make a date. It would not make sense to split the costs 6 ways and then only 4 paying people show up, for example. I would also provide materials and plants at deep discounts for the members in order to help offset some of the costs.
The actual costs will vary by group depending on location, number of people etc, but my hope is to provide quality, affordable education on a topic that is often glossed over

 

[rockm]

So unvarnished opinion--$1,700 for two classes in how to develop stock trees? I think that is astronomically high. That is in the same category of high-end individual instruction from a Japanese-trained bonsai professional. I could get a pretty good "name" travelling bonsai professional for that and they can probably provide more than adequate instruction and advice on growing trees out.

What's your value-add?

Not trying to be obnoxious, just honest.

There are more than a few travelling bonsai professionals out there now. It's not an easy life and can require constant travel. You should definitely talk to some of them and see if they can give you any advice. I'd message folks like Owen Reich, Danny Coffee, etc. to pick their brains. Colin Lewis also had a very similar approach to his instruction and classes when he moved to the U.S. from England. He created the Ho Yoku bonsai school a while back. I don't know if its still around. He offered classes four weekends per year for three years.

 

[NateDyk47]

I am interested in teaching some regional study groups with a focus on growing and developing bonsai from scratch. I want to present my proposal here and hope to get your thoughts and feedback.

Here are my thoughts:

I think that training the hobby bonsai community to grow quality bonsai is one of the best ways to increase our bonsai quantity and quality, and will set future generations up to have good material to work with.

To that end, I would like to teach 3-4 study groups around the country. We would meet 3-4 times a year for a weekend to build, grow and develop trees with the goal towards regional and national shows.

Ideal students are people interested in learning growing techniques on young, undeveloped materials. Experience is not necessary, but commitment is expected. I hope to inspire people to commit to the group for many years to see the trees grow and develop over the long haul. We will learn on some older, collected materials, but the goal would be to develop trees through seeds, seedlings, cuttings and air layers. Students also ideally have space to grow a few hundred small trees. I believe that knowledge is best learned through repetition, so we will develop trees in groups.

I would like to keep the classes small (5-6 students). This will allow me to give more attention to each student. I would ask for a modest daily rate for my time and expenses.

I am looking for:

1. Your thoughts and ideas about the feasibility of this proposal.
2. Hosts. These people would be willing to have the classes in their space 3-4 times a year and help me with local logistics.
3. Students. If you are unable to host but are interested in attending, let's talk.

Thank you all for your time.
John Eads
Left Coast Bonsai.

Very interested! I'm in MI but should be able to travel within reason. My space is probably too small to host. Do you have a ballpark for cost structure? When do you plan on starting, or are you just gauging interest at this point?

edit: should have read the rest of the thread before posting. So we're looking at roughly $300 for a 2 day "class" 3 times per year. Is this including material costs or would that be extra?

 

[JEads]

So unvarnished opinion--$1,700 for two classes in how to develop stock trees? I think that is astronomically high. That is in the same category of high-end individual instruction from a Japanese-trained bonsai professional. I could get a pretty good "name" travelling bonsai professional for that and they can probably provide more than adequate instruction and advice on growing trees out.

What's your value-add?

Not trying to be obnoxious, just honest.

To be clear: the $1700 quote was a ballpark, back of napkin number that represented the ENTIRE cost for the 2 day class. If that cost is split between 4 people, it would come to $425 each for 2 days. If it splits between 6 people, it comes to under $300 for 2 days. I am not sure if anyone could do it much less than that and make any sort of living. There might be other professionals that are willing to do it at that cost, and able to travel and teach these topics, but I am unaware of anyone that does that. I would be interested what other professionals charge for study groups around the country.

As previously stated, I am only planning on hosting 3 groups outside my region, so less than 36 days per year on the road. That will be a commitment, but not unreasonable.

 

[JEads]

Very interested! I'm in MI but should be able to travel within reason. My space is probably too small to host. Do you have a ballpark for cost structure? When do you plan on starting, or are you just gauging interest at this point?

edit: should have read the rest of the thread before posting. So we're looking at roughly $300 for a 2 day "class" 3 times per year. Is this including material costs or would that be extra?

I am actually looking into a group in MI. I have some good connections there with a possible teaching space and good trees to study.
We now just need to get 5-6 people together and get it off the ground.
The $300 is a ballpark estimate and would not include materials, although they will be nominal. I can provide the things I sell at a deep discount for participants and most development materials are easy/ cheap to find.

 

[rockm]

To be clear: the $1700 quote was a ballpark, back of napkin number that represented the ENTIRE cost for the 2 day class. If that cost is split between 4 people, it would come to $425 each for 2 days. If it splits between 6 people, it comes to under $300 for 2 days. I am not sure if anyone could do it much less than that and make any sort of living. There might be other professionals that are willing to do it at that cost, and able to travel and teach these topics, but I am unaware of anyone that does that. I would be interested what other professionals charge for study groups around the country.

As previously stated, I am only planning on hosting 3 groups outside my region, so less than 36 days per year on the road. That will be a commitment, but not unreasonable.

That is mostly the idea Colin Lewis started out with. Danny Coffey did individual instruction and would come to your house. I think Owen did that as well, before both moved on to classes with multiple people.

If I were you, I'd reach out to people who have done this, or things very similar to it, to get a clearer view of what they did and learned.

 

[dbonsaiw]

Issues of cost aside, I tend to be a homebody. Probably one of the reasons I got into bonsai in the first place. And it means I have a hard time getting to meetings. But 3-4X/year isn't that much of an in-person commitment. Not sure this is the right place for the comment, but I wish there were more 5-15 min. bonsai videos organized by species/technique/issue. Very hard to search around the interwebs for videos on a specific topic and I don't really want to watch a 90 minute video that may touch on my question at some point of minute 49.

 

[Gabler]

Issues of cost aside, I tend to be a homebody. Probably one of the reasons I got into bonsai in the first place. And it means I have a hard time getting to meetings. But 3-4X/year isn't that much of an in-person commitment. Not sure this is the right place for the comment, but I wish there were more 5-15 min. bonsai videos organized by species/technique/issue. Very hard to search around the interwebs for videos on a specific topic and I don't really want to watch a 90 minute video that may touch on my question at some point of minute 49.

Is that a suggestion that @JEads should start a YouTube channel? Unless he already has one that I'm not aware of?

 

[JEads]

Is that a suggestion that @JEads should start a YouTube channel? Unless he already has one that I'm not aware of?

I have a hard time posting regularly on Instagram, no YouTube in the cards for me

 

[JEads]

I wanted to do a quick update that it seems that there are groups starting to gel in the Ann Arbor, MI area and another in the Birmingham, AL area. If you are in those areas, or want to be involved with those groups and have not heard from your local clubs, reach out to me and I can get you connected.
I would still be interested in having one more group, if anyone can help organize. East coast or Midwest would be nice.
I am also running a full schedule of classes and a growing group out of my home base west of Portland, OR, if anyone is interested in coming to the west coast.
Let me know what you all think and thank you for the support I have gotten so far.

To building better trees!