December 2024
To all of you who still have trouble ordering the kit or instrument that you desire: so sorry that we have not been able to help you yet.
Fay and I do our best to meet the demand, together with a growing team of great collaborators, contractors and suppliers. We have quadrupled our output in the last year, but it seems that the number of people looking to buy one of our kits has increased at an even faster pace (which is equally wonderful and daunting).
Every Sunday we put the kits online that we think we can shift in the coming week, but the situation is indeed that since this summer we keep selling out within 5 to 10 minutes. And we have two teams of experts building instruments, which we put up for sale at the start of each month (with similar dynamics).
Over the Christmas holiday Fay and I are going to do some more deep thinking about where we want to go from here. There are two logical ways forward: set up a real factory and hire people to increase output, or increase the price of kits until demand drops along capitalist principles (as business people keep advising me).
To start with the latter: this is not an option for us. We don’t want to move to a situation where only the richest people can buy our kits and instruments.
Then on starting a real factory with hired staff: for both Fay and I this would mean that we have to stop doing the work that we love best. It’s also a serious financial risk, that we’re not quite ready for.
So it’s a conundrum, and you’ll need to have a bit of patience with us. We’ll keep working on innovative solutions, and intend to make great strides again in 2025.
There’s also new instruments coming ;)…
Love, Jaap and Fay
A few years ago I took up the idea of building my own Hurdy Gurdy. Now I’m not much of a craftsman, so that might be a disadvantage. I am, however, a highly experienced mechanical engineer. My normal field is designing equipment for the high-tech industry, with customers around Europe, Japan and Silicon Valley in the US.
So I thought: why not use the tools of the trade, and create a Hurdy Gurdy using modern rapid prototyping technology: Laser Cutting and 3D printing? Would it be possible to create an instrument that is inexpensive to build, and still sounds well?
I worked on it for 4 years before releasing it into the wild. I’ve named it the Nerdy Gurdy, because it’s high-tech and a bit quirky. Since it’s inception a number of traditional builders, and some of the best hurdy gurdy players in Europe have tested it and helped to improve it.
The design is unconventional: it was designed from scratch to be able to build a Hurdy Gurdy with a good sound, for a very good price. Therefor the construction method is in many ways different from traditional instruments. It does however sound quite good, and it is very playable.
My wife Fay has taken up the challenge of shipping kits and instruments around the world. And we have a growing team supporting us to help us meet the demand.
Jaap Brand
The Netherlands
