Duane Gitzel is an industrial machinist from Canada. He’s also a talented design entrepreneur, who started a company called 3 Five Design, which allows him to make money in a relatively risk-free way while also satisfying one of his passions. “I’m a small-time 3D printing digital creator,” Gitzel writes. “I love playing board games and tabletop wargames, and I run my business out of my basement office.”
Tabletop gamers are a rich subcultural market. To serve them, Gitzel designs and prototypes 3D printed transport and organization cases for the gaming accessories he uses. These modular cases feature a variety of pull-out trays, drawers, and compartments for storing dice, gaming figurines, books, and more. As a gamer himself, Gitzel understands what other gamers want and need, and designs best for that market.
What’s great is that he doesn’t actually sell products. Instead, he sells the .stl files of his products on Kickstarter. His last War-Ganizer 3.0 case brought in roughly $12,000 USD in revenue. He also sells designs (again, just the .stl files) on his Etsy page under 3 Five Design.
By not selling a physical product, and instead offloading production to hobbyist end users, Gitzel has eliminated all of the major hassles of running a product business (production, inventory, fulfillment, shipping) with no risk or upfront investment required, allowing Gitzel to focus solely on design and creating what is ideal for him.
Gitzel asks that anyone who purchases the .stl file use it for personal use only, not for production or resale. I found another Etsy user selling a physical version of Gitzel’s War-Ganizer design, and the seller said they licensed the design from Gitzel, which creates another revenue stream. Hats off to 3 Five Design.
