Sanderson's Wooden Bowl Shop Preps For Holidays

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Created on Tuesday, 04 December 2018 00:30

Written by Chelsi Byrnes

BURKE- Sandersons Wooden Bowls in East Burke is prepping for the upcoming holiday season. Since around 2005, the Sandersons have been selling their wooden products. Owner Sam Sanderson describes the process their family went through in order to start their business. According to him, they started out by doing some logging for a furniture store, and then wanted to try it themselves.

"In the first couple of years, maybe three or four years, we didn't do much with it. We fooled around a little with it, we had some bowls, we gave some to the children, and gave a few away and we just kind of found someone to buy one. So then we bought a little better equipment, we fixed up this workshop, this used to be a living room and we made this into a show room, and now we turn everyday.", said Sanderson.

Sanderson also described the step by step process of making the bowls.

"We drill a hole in the bowl, and put it on what we call a screw-chuck and turn the back that gives me a foot so I can grab it with an adjustable chuck. Then I turn it around and turn out the inside. We try to turn them around ten percent thick, and then we coat them with wax and they go downstairs for a year and dry because hard wood drys at the rate of about an inch a year naturally by itself. Then we bring it back upstairs and we re-turn it. We turn it again making it thinner, making out a lot of the thickness where it is warped, sand it down, sign it, spoil it and bring it in here and hopefully sell it."

Sanderson mentioned that even though the store is successful in selling a lot of bowls all over the world, the store isn't going to be too busy during the Christmas season.

"We don't expect a big rush for Christmas. Maybe a week before Christmas there's always someone in a big hurry, so you wind up shipping one to some place overnight, those sorts of things, that's one or two bowls, three or four maybe," said Sanderson.

The store hopes to see more customers come and enjoy their handcrafted bowls and other wooden objects.