Nick Offerman says he had “no idea” he would one day be considered one entrepreneur.
“It was much more something that I was obsessed with that people were willing to pay a good price for,” Offerman said. entrepreneur in a video interview.
Offerman, 54, is the face of new educational content at American Express Business Class that aims to demystify small business ownershipa partnership he jokes is due to his “bucolic Midwestern charm” and ability to “sound like a layman.”
But really, it's because for the past 23 years, the actor, who is known for his roles in Parks and Recreation, The last of usAND Fargo, has led Offerman Woodshopa small collective in Los Angeles that makes everything from tables to ring boxes.
“I spent many years of my life as an ignorant small business owner who really could have used a lot of this tutelage myself over the years,” Offerman said.
Nick Offerman. Credit: American Express
How Offerman started his business
Offerman's father was a furniture maker and many of his family members were farmers, so he learned how to build things at a young age, he said. He says that by the time he was a teenager, he was skilled enough in carpentry to frame houses.
When Offerman went to theater school, his carpentry skills came with him. Then he started building landscapes post and beam decks and cabins that required no nails or screws to join. He compared the style to old-fashioned barn joinery or Japanese temple joinery.
“I tricked myself into becoming a woodworker through these post-and-beam decks and cabins,” Offerman said. “One day I realized, oh, if I scale this down, it's an antique French table.”
That realization came around 2000. It was right when Offerman met his wife, Megan Mullally, Emmy Award winning actress that starred Karen Walker on NBC Will & Graceand his life “suddenly became really happy.”
“I set myself up with an empty warehouse space and started making custom dining tables,” Offerman said.
Offerman Woodshop was officially opened in LA in 2001.
Setting up shop and overcoming challenges
After establishing the business, Offerman began a process of trial and error, realizing that there would be an overlap between making the pieces he liked and the pieces customers would pay for. The “scary” part, at first, he said, was figuring out what he should pay for his work.
Offerman says his first hire was familiar with budgets and invoices, so they could confidently hand a customer an invoice explaining why an Offerman-made heirloom table cost what it did.
Now he CHARGES anywhere from $45 for American cherry wood coasters to $4,500 for a walnut slab table.
Nick Offerman. Credit: American Express
Offerman's team also helped by convincing him to get things like insurance.
“Insurance is a very smart thing to spend money on, especially when you're running a barn full of sawdust,” he reflected.
Even with insurance and a pricing plan, starting a business “was scary in a way that's still very scary for me,” Offerman said.
Should I expand my business?
A major challenge arose when the store began to perform well. Offerman was at the crossroads of choosing between expanding the business and making more money or keeping things in-house. His business manager at the time suggested that he produce his work in a factory to increase business.
“And I said that's not why I have this store,” Offerman said. “I would hate to take anything back to an assembly line or give it any kind of iteration, because the whole point of this handmade furniture store is the handmade piece.”
The challenge now, he says, is to make sure the four employees in his wood shop are happy, having fun and not turning their lives into an assembly line. Because he doesn't want to expand.
“How can I keep this business profitable and keep it in the black without trying to grow it?” Offerman said. He later added, “The rule is, and has been for many years, no robots in the store.”
Acting as a side hustle
Even as he built his business, Offerman continued to audition and landed small roles in Gilmore Girls AND Miss Congeniality 2 before hitting it big as Ron Swanson on the hit NBC song Parks and Recreationwhich ran from 2009 to 2015.
When Offerman won awards and accolades for his role as Swanson, the financial pressure on the business eased.
“I have a very quiet safety net now that in my waitressing gig as an actor, I've had very good luck,” he said.
The business can still be a balancing act, but Offerman's acting career gives him enough leeway to cushion any potential downsides. And when he's not acting, he's in the wood shop.
“I finish this acting job in October and then I have a few months off,” Offerman said, referring to the upcoming Netflix historical drama. Death by lightning for which he is currently working in Budapest, Hungary. “So then I'll be in the shop all the time and that's really fun.”
Meanwhile, Offerman manages the business from afar. When we spoke, he had just picked up the phone for some renovations at the store.
“I think part of its vitality is that it never gets boring,” Offerman said. “There is always a new challenge.”