Client Gave Me $16,000, Then Changed His Mind

this is a story of a $10,000 table that

I did not want to build but my customer

never knew that and the only way he's

going to know that is if he watches this

video as you can probably guess what I

have here is a bunch of skis provided by

the customer that he's asked me to cast

in clar epoxy and turn into a coffee

table but that's not actually the table

he paid me for when this customer first

reached out over 3 years ago he said

he's in the process of building a new

cabin in Colorado and wanted a quote

really big dining table and I'm like all

right I like big dining tables what are

you thinking like 9 ft 10 ft maybe 12 ft

long and he's like yeah close what I

need is a single slab black walnut table

that's 16 ft long by 5T wide and I was

like okay yes that is a really big

dining table and he said the house is

still a little ways out but wanted to

get the ball rolling on the furnishings

and wanted to know what my lead time was

and I'm like oh for a table that size

probably 12 to 16 months or so he's like

yeah that should line up pretty well

with construction what's it going to

cost and I'm like okay off top my head

doing a little research I've seen slabs

that sized price before and they can be

as much as like 20 $22,000 I'm thinking

hopefully I can get one for 14 or

$15,000 so I told him $32,000 for the

base and everything except for shipping

and normally when I have these

conversations with clients they go on

over the course of days weeks sometimes

even months and he just says okay what

do you need from me and I was like well

I'd need a 50% deposit so $1,000 and he

goes great send the invoice over and I

keep in mind I literally just talked to

this guy for the first time maybe 15

minutes ago and I was like this guy for

real is he messing with me but I was

like okay so got his information sent

him a QuickBooks request for $166,000

thinking we'll see if he actually pays

this and in like a few seconds I get a

notification that the payment's been

received and I was like okay this guy is

really ready to rock and roll and he

told me wait for me don't buy the slab

yet I'm still planning the house we'll

let you know when it's time to start

working on the

table I will keep going with that story

but I realized there's probably a few

people here that want to know what's

actually happening in this build so all

I've done so far is I built a mold out

of melamine and then I put all the skis

in there the way the customer chose I

was holding that photo in my hand if you

noticed and that was the photo the

customer sent me showing me how he

wanted each of the skis arranged and so

what I did then traced everything with

the pencil so I knew I could come back

and get it exactly lined up in the

perfect spot and I thought it would look

a little bit awkward if I just put the

skis on the very bottom of the table

also thought it might be a little bad

when I run them through a planer cuz I

didn't want to actually Plane off part

of the skis so what I did was I have

these little half inch blocks of plywood

and those are going to be perfectly fine

going through the planer and they're

also going to give a nice little

standoff so all the skis will just be

essentially hovering

there if you've seen any of my past

epoxy table videos you know that I

almost always just work with black epoxy

and I wish I could tell you it's because

I'm an artist and I think that the black

looks the best and it's the classiest

and the most timeless and all that and I

do believe a lot of that to some degree

but it's also probably the most

forgiving so it's really nice working in

a Dusty environment because if you get a

little speck of dust in there you'll

never see it unlike this very very clear

table or I should say almost clear table

I'm actually putting a slight blue tint

in it and that's for a couple reasons

one I think it'll look a little bit

better but two any epoxy over the years

and I mean like 5 10 20 years will

develop an Amber Hue kind of a yellowing

but the blue if you get on the color

chart or the color wheel it's kind of

the opposite end of that yellow and it

will offset the yellowing so as it does

yellow it'll actually just look clear

it's kind of a cool effect and I have

some samples that I've tested this with

over the years so talked it over with

the customer and said hey I'd like to

give a really just gentle blue hue what

do you think and he said that he loved

it but the problem was going to be

mixing this much epoxy up and getting

that same blue hue which is why I'm

going bucket to bucket and I Tred to

keep the drops consistent but I always

got an extra drop in one bucket or one

less in the other bucket so got them all

mixed up and now I'm finally ready for

the

pour so why am I building a 5T long

solid brick of epoxy table when he paid

me for a 16t long solid Walnut table and

about a month or so after he gave me

that deposit he reached out and said hey

I'm thinking about adding another table

to the order what do you think about

this idea and he basically pitched me

the skis cast an epoxy table and what I

didn't tell him is I absolutely despise

making these types of tables they are so

much more difficult than say like an 8ft

Walnut and black epoxy dining table but

I don't want to tell him that when I

hire someone the last thing I want to

hear from them is how difficult the job

is because yeah that's why I'm hiring

you to do it because I don't want to do

it so I didn't tell them how difficult

it was but I also didn't want to really

gouge him on the price because I wanted

him to think he could come to me for all

of his future tables because I like

building big dining tables he's probably

going to need a coffee table he might

need countertops and I want him to be

able to come to me even though this

particular table isn't one that I really

want to build and so I gave him a quote

of $10,000 I know that's a ton of money

but I would normally quote someone

significantly more for this type of

table but again I wanted him to think

that he could come to me for all future

orders I don't want anybody to lose

track on what I'm actually doing here so

I P that epoxy I made sure to use fans

if you don't know epoxy gets hot and

when you pour a lot of epoxy like this

it gets really hot so if I wouldn't have

used fans this epoxy would have almost

certainly overheated cracked and you

would have had a really bad time and if

you didn't know that if you'd like some

more tips and tricks on building an

epoxy table whether it's building a

solid brick of epoxy like this or a more

traditional Live Edge and epoxy table I

have a virtual epoxy table workshop and

we go through absolutely every step to

building an epoxy table in your home

shop or garage why you need to use fans

the types of finish to get a crystal

clear finish versus kind of a more

opaque or natural finish that you might

want to use on wood it's over 3 hours of

content I still go through every week

and answer all the questions that people

ask me it is what I say not guaranteeing

yourself success but you can skip the

learning curve you basically skip the

first two years of building an epoxy

table so if you want some more

information on that there's a link in

the

description I know what you're thinking

the guy just wanted to add the ski table

to the order he never said anything

about canceling the Big Walnut table so

what's up with the Big Walnut table and

every six months or so we would stay in

touch I'd reach out ask how the

construction was going and I don't think

it was going very well I got the feeling

it was mostly permitting issues or

issues with the county or government

type issues where the house just wasn't

getting built to the best of my

understanding anyway and he never said

anything about asking for his money back

he never asked for a portion of it back

he was just a really great customer to

work with and after about 3 and half

years or so he just I think got fed up

with it and was like hey I'll just take

that ski table that we talked about but

this kind of put me into a tough spot

and I'll explain more in just a

second if you haven't gathered what I'm

going to do is I'm just going to bounce

back and forth from that story to the

actual construction of this table so

people that want to see how this table

is built can know how to do it

themselves and people who are more

interested in the story also get a

follow along with that so I'll stop

giving that caveat every time I switch

back and forth now but what I'm doing

here is I'm using a flush trim bit to

get a perfect fit against this metal

base and even though this base was

welded up really really accurately

there's always going to be some

variation either in my cut using a

tracksaw or a table saw or a little bit

of warping of the metal so what I'm

using is that flush trim bit there to

have it contoured exactly to the base

itself it's just a really slick way of

doing

things the big epoxy por went pretty

well there really weren't many bubbles

left in the epoxy itself but I made a

mistake in that I should have sealed the

ends of the skis with a faster drag

epoxy and I even thought about it and I

looked at the skis closely but they

looked to be fairly dense kind of

fiberglass in the middle but what

happened was there was actually air

trapped in those skis and at the very

end of the curing process those bubbles

came out and came up to the surface in a

few spots so to fix that I drilled them

out with the Dremel and I'm coming back

with clear epoxy you might think that

it'd be better to use like a blue tint

but it's almost impossible to get that

very very light blue tint match so clear

is going to be your best bet if you have

a similar problem or you're trying to

fill some bubbles or a slight void it's

almost always better to use Clear even

on a black

table so when the client told me or at

least implied that he no longer needs

the big walnut dining table and instead

will just take this smaller ski table I

was in a little bit of a tough spot

because this isn't a project I was

particularly passionate about and I

probably wouldn't have taken this order

if he'd reached out in 2024 and said he

just wanted this cast epoxy table

because when I choose a project I need

to be able to make a video on it I need

that video to be interesting and

honestly I I don't know how interesting

this video is going to be I guess we'll

know once it's uploaded but I wasn't

passionate about building this table but

also this was a great customer he had

not hassled me for over 3 years gave me

a deposit instantly and I wanted to

extend to him that same respect that he

gave to me and also I don't know if you

guys remember this early whatever mid

2020 when I first talked to this guy

things were a lot cheaper and so

inflation could be a factor or should be

a factor but the guy had already given

me $166,000 and so if I was to come to

him and be like hey coincidentally now

you don't want that big table and that

$10,000 table from 3 years ago that's

going to be

$15,700 I thought that would have been

kind of shady or even if I said it was

13 or 14,000 just whatever that normal

rate that I would have told someone in

2024 I feel like it would have sounded

like a bait and switch and I would have

probably been Furious if someone did

that to me so I decided to forego any of

the inflation related costs and just

tell him yeah I'll honor that $10,000

original cost because again that guy was

a great customer he was so easy to work

with the whole time and I wanted to

extend to him that same

courtesy I have built these solid epoxy

type tables before and I finished them a

number of different ways in the past one

of my favorite builds ever was I had

this solid brick of kind of a blue

gradient epoxy and I bent it out in the

sun I don't know if you guys saw that or

not but it was one of my favorite builds

and for that one I actually just

polished the epoxy itself I went from

like 80 grit to 3,000 grit and then

polished it with Auto Automotive

compounds the problem with epoxy is I

know people hear epoxy and you think

that it's the hardest Coating in the

world compared to something like this 2K

acrylic it's actually not that hard so

if you can you're better off coating it

with some type of clear coat and to my

understanding these 2K acrylics are some

of the hardest Coatings you can give so

I only had to sand this up to about 400

grit and then I'm hitting it with this

2K acrylic and I'm still going to have

to go through the whole polishing

process but it's going to be a much more

durable surface in the end

I actually wasn't spraying the 2K

acrylic there I know I said I was but it

was technically the sanding sealer

that's designed to go under this 2K

acrylic but I don't actually fully

understand what a sanding sealer does

and I don't want to answer a bunch of

questions because I don't have any

answers to those questions so we'll just

pretend it was that acrylic top coat but

you can see there was a couple little

pinhole bubbles that were left from

those bubbles that I patched earlier and

some people might look at those and call

them a feature they may say yes kind of

like that cool bubbling Treasure Chest

that the scuba diver has in the

aquariums and I am not one of those I

don't like the look of the bubbles I

wish they weren't there I did tell this

customer there was a number of risks

with doing a big epoxy brick like this

and one of the risks I told them it

might crack and we might lose the skis

altoe and I told them I won't charge you

for the table if I ruin it but I also

can't get your skis back so don't send

me any Priceless heirlooms that you must

have or that you can't have ruined and I

just kind of explained the risk and that

it's not going to be perfect there's

probably going to be some little micro

Bubbles and he said that he was fine

with all all of that so just know I did

warn the customer and they weren't

terrible but again if I'm being honest I

wish they weren't

there if you didn't know it is nearly

impossible to get a perfect finish right

off of the spray gun and I am not

particularly gifted with the spray gun

so I was going to have a lot of wet

sanding to do but even a high-end

automotive shop when it comes out of

their paint booth when a car comes out

and it's got that clear coat on it they

still have to do this wet sanding and

polishing that's really what separates

the high-end show cars from the low-end

show cars or all the rest to the cars

there's always some degreee of orange

peel like you see me trying to sand out

there and you also might be noticing

some bad audio in the background and

that's cuz my guy Charlie was here and

sanding isn't that much fun to watch but

do you know what is fun to watch taking

trees down and this actually isn't

Charlie this is one of Charlie's guys

but it was a really kind of Blustery Day

and these are some old Lombardi popper

trees which turns out is the same thing

as mapa Burl which is kind of a really

pretty wood but they ended up taking

this one down

pretty satisfying right and this was all

two weeks before we had a massive storm

that took down about 15 trees four giant

trees that ended up taking down a bunch

of trees on their way down but it was a

fun process watching Charlie do that and

much better than watching me

sand wasn't watching trees come down way

more fun than watching me sand that up

to 3,000 grit but the polishing is

actually a little bit more satisfying

cuz it goes from that fairly opaque to

almost crystal clear and this is a

three-step polishing I think I'm only

showing you the first step here with the

wool mitt but I do go through all three

steps on this 3M system and I am not an

expert but I can generally make things

shine pretty well the underside though

Scott actually had a great idea for this

he suggested doing a frosted Underside

so you wouldn't see right through the

table it would almost look like it's

sitting on snow which is again something

Scott came up with and I pitched the

idea to the customer and he actually

really liked the idea so here's how I'm

going to go about achieving the Frosted

look on the

underside I've done this frosted effect

once years ago I had a customer say he

wanted this kind of frosted look on this

clear epoxy and Redwood table so I'd

played around a lot with it years ago

and I think I can do the same thing here

and what I did was I sanded up to 320

grit and then came back with that maroon

pad and tried to sand it as evenly as I

could and that was the tricky part just

trying to get it an even consistency but

I wanted to make it look really good for

the adhesive that's going to hold this

top down this is my most nerve-wracking

part of this build cuz all the rest

could be fixed later but now

everything's done and I don't even know

if I have enough of this

glue I have a spoiler for you in that

this does not work it does not go very

well at all and you might be wondering

why I didn't just weld tabs onto this

table like I normally do and have it

bolted down and that's a fair question

now knowing what I know but at the time

I didn't want to have any visible bolts

and I thought that it would look bad

being able to to see through that clear

epoxy and having the bolt also I hate

running threaded inserts right into

epoxy I'm always a little bit worried

that they're going to crack the epoxy

however if I had this over to do again

and actually I do do this over again I

would do it entirely different but I

this point I don't know that and felt

pretty good about myself well it's been

about 4 days since I put that adhesive

down and I thought the silicone would

dry to that kind of clear silicone

looking opaque look which would really

match the bottom of this table and it

did not at all it looks terrible there's

just kind of wavy lines um and I don't

like it and I don't want it going out of

my shop that way so the only alternative

is actually to add some tabs to the

metal which means grinding off the

powder coat

rewelding bolting it

down but I think it's going to look a

little better and I just I really don't

want this in someone else's house

looking like this I was just getting

ready to video trying to pry this off I

didn't know how tough this construction

adhesive would be and it just popped off

which probably means it wasn't a very

good uh substance to use but I guess

it's good for this anyway but get the

rest of yeah that was not going to work

anyway oh well I guess I'm glad it

looked

bad so in order to make this look right

I need to carefully go through with this

chisel plane try to fillet all of that

clear construction adhesive off without

gouging the epoxy itself because I'm

going to have to go back do that same

kind of sanded frosted effect which

shouldn't be too difficult as long as I

don't gouge it with this chisel plane

and it came off pretty well this wasn't

too bad of a process the metal on the

other hand this was a real problem or at

least it wasn't a huge problem because

this is the guy that built the base this

is Alias and he claims that's his real

name however I can't tell you how many

times a girl gave me that name at the

bar and turned out to actually not be

her name but he came to my shop and

actually welded the tabs on and to avoid

seeing the bolts we were able to place

the table on there and find out where

exactly each ski was so we could place a

mount right under the ski which I think

was a pretty good solution and it was so

nice to have alas come to my shop

directly to do this because it is very

difficult getting across town especially

trying to line up all those holes just

perfectly so big thanks to Alas I

convinced him to start an Instagram page

which I will link in the description CU

he did not even have any social media

channels whatsoever but he's trying to

get his business going so give him a

follow check out his work big thanks to

Alias I mentioned earlier that I really

don't like drilling into epoxy and

especially adding threaded inserts

directly into epoxy is one of the last

things I want to do but I don't really

have a choice here so what I'm doing is

I'm very carefully trying to not drill

through ski and not trying to crack it

but I'm using an oversized drill bit and

what this is going to do is this is

going to enable me to add a little bit

of epoxy to the threaded insert and

therefore the holding power will lie

with that epoxy not the threads like it

would in a wood table and as I'm

watching Scott edit this I was like why

did I add blue to that epoxy and he goes

oh he said at the time you thought that

would blend in a little better and I

have no recollection of saying that or

even thinking it but apparently I did

and it didn't look bad but I don't think

it made any difference and the final

step before assembly is adding N3 Nano

and if you watch any of my videos you

know that I always add N3 Nano to my

pieces this is a product that I offer

myself this isn't something that anybody

pays me to to add this is a product that

I offer and one of the things I'm most

proud of is going to provide so much

protection from spills stained and a

clear table like this scratches it's

also a repair surface so even if you do

scratch it you could add another coat of

the N3 Nano makes a massive

difference with all the delays about

having to modify the table base and

having it rep powder coated I was sure I

was going to be late on delivery but

when I told him it was ready to be sent

out he said great I won't be at that

house in Colorado for 6 weeks and go

ahead and hold off until then I was like

oh guess I'm early but he did offer to

have me send it to his place in North

Dakota and then he would ship it from

there to Colorado I thought that seemed

like a lot of extra shipping so I held

on to it in my shop for those 6 weeks

and looked a little awkward in the

background of a few videos you might

have seen but all in all a build that I

am not super excited to replicate but I

am really happy with how it turned out

and he told me he was thrilled with how

it looked as well I mentioned at the

start of the video that this customer

would only know a lot of the behind the

scenes details of this build if they

actually watch this video so if you are

that customer and you know who you are

and you feel like leaving a comment say

whatever you want and probably send me

an email letting me know that you left a

comment I will pin that as the very top

comment so if you're curious if this

customer actually saw the video check

the comments and we'll see you guys

always want to know what these pieces

look like in the customer's house so I

sent them an email and asked for a photo

in the space and he sent me this so

thank you so much remember he's a better

customer than he is photographer