How A Furniture Maker Turned Art Into Sustainable Growth with Ansel Ringler

A great piece of furniture tells a story long before it’s finished. We sat down with custom furniture maker with Ansel Ringler Estatoe Woodworks to unpack how he turned a childhood hustle into a sustainable business by pairing creative craft with clear-eyed operations. From first principles planning to a client experience that invites collaboration, Ansel shares the systems that keep his shop profitable, resilient, and fun to follow.

We dive into the early missteps—making whatever seemed exciting and hoping it sold—and the reset that came from stepping away, running the numbers, and rebuilding a product mix around real demand. Ansel explains why custom desks became his flagship: strong margins, repeatable process, and obvious value for buyers who need a perfect fit. He breaks down the hidden hours that crush margins when ignored, the communication loops that reduce revisions, and the simple tweaks that keep projects on schedule.

Marketing for makers can feel like a mystery, so we get specific. Ansel maps how he layered channels—local Facebook groups, Instagram, Pinterest, Etsy, galleries—and let reviews and process videos do the heavy lifting. He talks about building a reputation that travels farther than ads, the discipline to ask for feedback, and why thoughtful hiring unlocks both output and culture. Expect practical takeaways on pricing, scoping, batching similar builds, creating client buy-in, and fostering a shop where craftsmanship and camaraderie go hand in hand.

If you’re a creative entrepreneur, woodworker, or small business owner looking to grow without losing your soul, this conversation offers a blueprint: focus on what sells and scales, count every hour, and tell your story where your customers already gather. Subscribe for more builder-to-business insights, share this with a fellow maker, and leave a quick review to help others find the show.

Guest contact info:

anselhringler@gmail.com

www.estatoewoodworks.com

www.instagram.com/estatoewoodworks

Thanks for Listening. You may contact me or our team at https://billgilliland.biz/

All the best!
Bill

Please hit the subscribe button, leave us a 5 star review,  and share this podcast. You can reach me at williamgilliland@actioncoach.com or at https://billgilliland.biz/

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Hi everyone. Welcome to this week's episode of Epic Entrepreneurs. I am Cliff McCray filling in for Bill Gillilan with your local business training and coaching firm Action Coach Business Growth Partners. I'm excited to have Ansel Ringler with Estato Woodworks as the focus for our Epic Entrepreneurs podcast episode today. So, Ansel, please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself and your company and what primary products or services you offer our community.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Hey Cliff, well thanks for having me on. Yeah, like I said, my name's Ansel Ringler. My business is Estateau Woodworks. I make custom furniture and home furnishings. I make a lot of live edge furniture, but really anything my clients request. I've been doing this since I was a kid. I actually first started making cutting boards and selling them in the farmer's market when I was 10 and 11. Um and then I started the business more full-time while I was in college to put myself through school, wound up dropping out of college, focusing on the business, fast forward about a decade, and I'm doing this full time.

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Okay, perfect, perfect. I love it. So if you had to start your business from square one, what would you do differently?

SPEAKER_01 1:49

If I had to start from square one, I would advise myself to think about things from first principles. Um it's easy to make emotional decisions on what you think would work or what you would like to work, especially with what I do, which is art. Um, but you really have to back up and kind of think about the whole picture and think about it more as a business and what will work, what people want, what products are actually profitable. Um I can remember in the early years just kind of making whatever I could think of, and I was working really hard, but in the wrong direction. So I mean that's that's easy to say now looking back on it. Um, but if if I could have taken more time to sort of come up with a solid business plan and really do the math and work out the numbers on what was going to work for uh my products, then I probably would have been better off because I did not make a whole lot of money the first couple years.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

Okay, that's interesting. So let's dig into that a little bit more. Would you would you have paid somebody to come up with the business plan for you, or would you have just done more yourself to come up with one?

First Principles And Real Business Plans

SPEAKER_01 3:11

You know, possibly I would have paid someone if I could have found someone that was the right fit. What I do is pretty specific. It's it's a somewhat unusual business. Custom furniture, it's more of an artistic thing. Um and what really helped me, surprisingly enough, was I took another job, a seasonal job, and worked out west in a different state, and I had some months away from the business, and I took that time to kind of re-evaluate the direction I'd been moving in and to come up with a new plan. I also had made a little bit of money at that job that I was able to put back into the business. So when I came back, I sort of revamped things, I redid my process, reorganized the shop, launched some new products. Um, and that was that was really helpful for for me to have a little bit of space away from just being right in the in the thick of it to come up with a better plan.

SPEAKER_00 4:12

Yeah, so basically, like I you know, with furniture, like I I mean, I've seen some I've seen some couches that probably would offend me, let's put it that way, um, as far as the way they look. So have you seen anything like that that you probably were like working on and you were like, hey, I I don't really care for it, but hey, I'm you know, you're paying me, so you know, whatever you want.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

That's exactly right. So at the end of the day, um, the customer is the right, you know, they're in the right. You build what they want, but I have found I can kind of guide my clients to what I think will look best, but also what I know that in the end they will like more. Um, you know, I'm the one with the expertise, I've been doing this for over a decade. So you kind of have to, you know, your client has the idea, and sometimes they think they know what they want, but through the back and forth, I mean, sometimes in a custom project, I'll have 30, 40 emails exchanged, um, and we'll we'll arrive at the final design. Um and and really like with my work, like people are paying for that custom experience. Um, they get to pick out the wood that they want, the exact dimensions, um, and and kind of you know, whether they want an epoxy highlight, whether they want to add a wireless charger in, whatever other little detail. Um, and people often ask me, like, why don't you make more stuff in stock to sell that's pre-made? And the reason being people always want it two inches longer, three inches wider. They they want it to be to be a part of that process as well. Yeah. Um so so over time, that's what I found is really the the custom furniture is and the custom process is a large part of what I'm selling people.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

Yeah, no, I get it, I get it. So, what would you say your biggest learnings have been as an owner since you started your business? What have been the big biggest things you've learned?

Stepping Away To Rebuild The Model

SPEAKER_01 6:09

I mean, well, one thing about running a business that I think anyone could tell you is you don't have you can't just be good at one thing. You can't just be good at what you do. There are plenty of other woodworkers who honestly are probably more skilled than I am, but you have to learn marketing, you have to learn photography, you have to learn social media, you have to learn um accounting, you know. So when you say one thing, there's really been a lot of things. Um, but frankly, the most important is in my view, you have to work the math out, especially with what I do, to know whether you're actually profitable building things. Because it's not just the time that you spend building that specific piece, but all the time that you spend on the back end obtaining the wood, cleaning the shop, fixing your tools. And if you're not accounting for all of that, you might think you're making forty, fifty dollars an hour, but in reality you're making twenty.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

Yeah. So what would you say are some common misconceptions about running a business?

Guiding Clients Through Custom Design

SPEAKER_01 7:21

Um, some common misconceptions, well, for me in particular, um, considering I do art, there are a lot of people I think that look at that and sort of glorify it in that, you know, I'm I've turned my passion into a career. But in a in a sense, um when when something you enjoy becomes your business, it does take away from that thing that you originally loved about it. Um so I think a misconception would be that basically that running a a business as an artist is like a dream come true. And it is, I love it, but there there's a lot. I mean, I work seven days a week. I'm not saying 10, 12 hours every Sunday, but I always have to respond to an email. You know, I'm always planning out the next project, figuring out where I'm gonna get material. It's you know, people that work a normal job, they get to clock out at the end of the day and kind of leave work at their work. If you're running a business, it's 24-7. And maybe that's not true of every business, but it certainly is of mine. You know, the plus side of that is you get to make your own schedule, you get to take control of your own time. I wouldn't trade it for the world. Um, that's very, very important to me. But I think some people see it as, oh, you know, you have a successful business, you know, it's it's easy, but it's it's a lot of work.

SPEAKER_00 8:55

Okay, okay. And that and that gets right into the next question. You kind of tapped into that just a little bit, but I'll follow up with you here. Do you think you are a better entrepreneur or employee and why?

SPEAKER_01 9:08

I think I'm a better entrepreneur. Um, like I said, I'm I'm quite skilled at my work. I do a good job. People love my products, I'm rated and reviewed well, but there are a lot of people that are good at what they do. And if you're not able to be an entrepreneur and get that product in front of people and the people that might be interested in buying it, then um it doesn't matter how good your product is.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

So basically you're saying the the the the putting getting it in front of people, the marketing piece is is probably even more important than actually being good at your job. Is that what you're saying? Kind of a little bit?

SPEAKER_01 9:50

Well, to an extent. Obviously, you still have to be good at your job, you have to pay attention to detail, quality is important, making sure your clients are happy, all of that. I mean, yeah, you you couldn't just be good at marketing and have a poor product, but my point would just be that if you could have an exceptional product and if you don't have any of the entrepreneurial skills to sell that product, it's not going to go anywhere.

SPEAKER_00 10:14

Love it. Yeah, no, love that. That's great advice. That's great advice for small business owners looking to grow. Um, so how do you handle taking vacations while running your business? I mean, you said you work seven days a week, you work a lot around the clock, so I don't know if you even know. But uh, how do you handle taking vacations when you do?

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Well, um, I think other business owners could um empathize with this, but there is an ebb and a flow. Um, you know, you'll have periods where it's just wide open, and then you have some periods where it's a little slower. And, you know, you can feel in the slow times like you need to constantly be busy, but sometimes it's good to just take a little bit of that time for yourself. Um and I do carve out time in a year um just just to do what I want to do. Um I you know, I don't get to take any PTO. Um, we don't get federal holidays or anything, but if I want to do something, I could work hard a couple days in the week and then I could take off at lunchtime to go fish and hit the lake the next day. You know, so you just you just kind of have to work your schedule um to carve out a little bit of time here or there.

SPEAKER_00 11:23

Okay, okay. Perfect, perfect. So, you know, diving into that just a little bit more, how do you balance your your personal life with the demands of running a business? Are you a you know, 6 p.m., you're off the clock, you're done for the day, you can put everything down, or how do you do how do you balance your personal life?

Beyond Craft: Marketing And Math

SPEAKER_01 11:41

Um, yeah, so like I said, it's best to kind of stick with a more normal schedule. Um and and then I'll I'll have a couple days a week where I might work a little more, and a couple days a week where I'll work a little less. Um, and that is one of the things I love about running my own business is if a friend um, you know, like I said, wants to go out fishing on the lake, I can take a little bit of time there and know that I can make up for it the next day or the day afterwards. Um But really, you know, as someone who's self-employed, you have to have a lot of discipline in staying on top of things.

SPEAKER_00 12:21

Okay. Yeah, makes sense, makes sense. So what have you attributed to the growth of your business so far?

SPEAKER_01 12:29

Um well, there's a lot of things. Um I mean, first and foremost, having a a good product, like a I I I do make beautiful things that people love and they share online. Um I take good care of my customers. I make sure to always have good reviews. I bend over backwards to make sure my clients are happy, even if sometimes I probably shouldn't. Um, you kind of have to at the end of the day make sure that your clients are happy. Um and then also social media has helped me out quite a bit. Um, you know, I post regularly. I'm I'm sort of famous in the local community um just just from getting out there on all the different little Facebook groups and broadcasting it. Word of mouth, you know, if you're doing right by your clients, then they'll recommend you to the next person. Um and then also just sort of casting a broad net. Um, you know, I I sell on Etsy, I've done a lot of business through there, I have the various social media platforms. At times I've been in galleries, I've posted to 80 different Facebook groups at a time. Um, and over the years that's built up into where I have a uh a following that kind of naturally provides growth organic without me having to pay for ads or anything of that nature.

SPEAKER_00 14:05

Yeah, okay, okay. So you you so you pretty much have like a nice pipeline of that you can kind of pick at and right? Is that sound is that sound about right?

SPEAKER_01 14:14

Yeah, it's it's pretty consistent. I always say, you know, it's it's cons um consistent in its inconsistency.

SPEAKER_00 14:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

So, you know, I stay busy throughout the year. There's times where it's a little slow, there's times where it's a little fast, but it's it's consistent in that.

SPEAKER_00 14:32

Yeah, yeah. So, you know, and and this is gonna get into a little bit more of kind of uh I know you did say you have an employee. So, what qualities do you look for in potential employees? Do you look for any specific personality traits, any kind of work ethic things?

The Myth Of Turning Passion Into Work

SPEAKER_01 14:47

Well, work ethic is important. Um, another quality I find important in an employee is um if they ask questions that are thoughtful, it shows they have an interest in the subject at hand. Um, you know, there's a lot of folks that will do the job but not necessarily pay attention to the job and ask questions so that they can do the job better. Um so so that's a very important quality. Um work ethic, obviously. With what I do, someone who has just uh an interest in woodworking in general, like they they want to learn that just for themselves, not even just for the paycheck. Um, all of those things.

SPEAKER_00 15:29

Yeah. Okay, okay. So how do you foster a positive and productive work environment for your employees? Are you doing anything particular?

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Yeah, I mean, I think it's very important to treat your employees not just as workers, but also as friends, and to tell them that you appreciate their work and make it not just like a business transaction. Um you know, I'll often uh, you know, make lunch for my employee, dinner. I um I live pretty far out in the country, so I throw a little bit of extra money on my employee's paycheck just to cover gas. I give them a little bonus every now and then if it's been an exceptionally busy week and they've showed up and made it happen. Um and then also just hanging out, you know, like it's not just about the work, it's about having fun and fostering a sort of fun work environment where we can be super productive and get it done, but also have a good time while we're doing it.

SPEAKER_00 16:30

Okay. I love that. I love it. All right, so let's go ahead and now what we're gonna do now is called the quick fire round. So basically, what I'm going to do is I'm going to say I'm going to say one word, and based off that one word, I want you to tell me the first thing that cut, you know, and not the not just a word, but I want you to, you know, give me your first idea that comes to your mind when you hear that word in regards to running your business. Education.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

First thing that comes to mind with education is um regarding employees, you know, like teaching them the next step, keeping them engaged in the entire process, um, you know, not just keeping them stationary like you want them to learn and grow within your business.

SPEAKER_00 17:15

Planning.

SPEAKER_01 17:17

Planning. It's just trying to stay organized. I mean, it can be a mess keeping up with emails from uh five different places and all these different requests, but coming up with a schedule, um, like a methodology you have to stay on top of your communications.

SPEAKER_00 17:36

Inspiration.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

Um, you know, every now and then you need to do something within your business that that is fun and for growth and not just to make money.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

I love that. I love that. And the last one is commitment.

SPEAKER_01 17:53

Commitment. Yeah, you um you gotta stay on top of things. If you let yourself get behind and things start to snowball and pile up, you're gonna regret it. So stay on top of things.

SPEAKER_00 18:06

I love that. I love that. Yeah, no, you said some great things there. So what words of advice would you offer to other business owners and specifically smaller business owners who are looking to grow?

Entrepreneur vs Employee Mindset

SPEAKER_01 18:18

Um keep an open mind. Diversify, seek an outside opinion, um, and really just hit it from every angle. Um, you know, little things that you wouldn't think uh could make a big difference, like posting to a bunch of groups that are associated to your business on Facebook over time will add up to a big difference.

SPEAKER_00 18:44

Okay. I love that. Love that. So, what would you say is the next big thing for Estato Woodworks?

SPEAKER_01 18:51

So, um, you know, I I make a wide range of furniture, as I've mentioned in this podcast, but I've found one product in particular that uh has just done really well for me. The profit margins are there, the demand is there, so I'm really trying to focus in on that and go through my whole process, find ways that I can make it more efficient and better organized. And then while I still want to build various types of furniture, focus in on um custom desks because um what I've found is is that's just the ideal product for for my business type.

SPEAKER_00 19:30

Okay. Okay. And lastly, what's the best way for someone to find you or get in touch with you?

SPEAKER_01 19:36

Well, I have all the things Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Etsy, all of it under Esteto Woodworks. So follow me on social media and you can keep up. I um post process videos of me building furniture, the finished products, um, and I make it fun. I do giveaways. Um, it's it's worth tagging along.

SPEAKER_00 20:02

Okay. Yeah, fantastic. Yeah, thank you so much for being a part of this community and for all that you're doing. We certainly wish you continued success. Really appreciate you coming on.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

Well, thanks, Cliff. It was fun to be on. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00 20:12

Yeah, thank you very much.