Legal Advice for Woodworkers, Makers and Crafters 

Here is what I have done and it works well as a protection device. 1. Create an LLC. For this company we will call it "Joe's Wood Products." 2. Create another LLC and call it "Joe's Wood Tools." Now, all the tools in my shop, my shop itself, and all material in the shop are owned and held by "Joe's Wood Tools." "Joe's Wood Products" leases the use of all tools and gets all material from "Joe's Wood Tools." "Joe's Wood Products" writes off material cost and tool leases and holds no assets itself. The cost of the tool leases and material is almost always 90% of the total revenue of "Joe's Wood Products". "Joe's Wood Tools" writes off the depreciation of the tools under lease and practically holds 90% of the income of "Joe's Wood Products" but holds exactly 0% liability for anything "Joe's Wood Products" does. So if I build a stool and it breaks when someone steps on it and they fall and break a leg, they can sue "Joe's Wood Products"; however, that LLC holds no assets beyond minimal money for future products. So if I lose the lawsuit I lose the capital assets of one business and not the other. And maybe the name of the business if it goes under. Now coming after someone personally, beyond the LLC is called piercing the corporate veil. There are very well defined actions an LLC owner can take that opens them up to this. One of them is commingling the LLC assets with the personal ones. i.e paying your mortgage directly from the LLC bank account. Simply Google "piercing the corporate veil" and see how to avoid it. It is rather simple and straightforward. On a final note: Under-capitalization of "Joe's Wood Products" could be a reason to pierce the corporate veil. Meaning, the LLC does not have enough assets to run because the owner is artificially keeping it low to avoid asset forfeiture. I suggest you speak with a reputable attorney to get a better idea of what capital you need to keep to avoid this pitfall.

Good call on this topic David, and thank you for providing us with some great information to help us steer clear of trouble! Thanks for putting this video together.

Thank you both for taking the time to make the video. Very helpful and appreciated.

This was a wonderful video David. This is invaluable information for anyone making You Tube videos or selling their hand made crafts. Thanks so much for taking the time to do this and share with the community!

Great info. While I wasn't looking for this info, I was glad you took the time to put this together. And thanks to Josh fro helping us woodworkers out!!

Thank you for your efforts in helping to educate your subscribers. Greatly appreciated.

Thank you for this episode David & Josh, lots of great info. You should do it again down the road.

This was awesome. I would love to see another one with more in-depth and technical info. I always have to explain this stuff to my clients and friends who are new to business and sales. Now I can just send them this video! Thanks, David!

Great information, thank for sharing your knowledge with us josh.

Wow! I learned a lot! Thank you for having your guest on your show.

Best video on wood working I have seen. I just found this. Thanks for having the for-sight to have this.

Great information covering things that I see many makers and crafts people forgetting, because their focus is on the making, design, creation, not on the fact that once they start offering the things they make for sale, they are running a business.

Thank you David, This was one of your most informative shows to date. Excellent information! Thank you Joshua. Regards, Bob

Very informative, David, and give a big thank you to Joshua for answering everybody's questions.

good stuff david! very useful! keep up the great work with jimmy and bob!

Awesome info David!! Thanks for sharing Josh with us viewers. I learned a great deal!!

Thanks guys, great show!

Great stuff... Much of this is so overlooked, thank you for all the information!

You make and sell items or create videos this is a must watch!!

wow....you make some thoughtful videos.....greatly appreciated!!!!

Thanks David for having Josh and answering the legal issues, Great info, Learned a lot !

Great video! Thanks David.

David & Josh, thanks so much for your insights and advice. I enjoyed the disclaimer that Josh gave at the beginning, right before he discusses disclaimers. I got a laugh out of that. Cheers.

Awesome info. Gracias David

That was great info, I would love to see this as a regular thing

Excellent video. It's important to cover all the bases if you aspire to sell your work. Joshua thanks for taking the time to do this video. Great stuff! Rik

Wow, I'm sure glad that you plugged this video in a recent podcast. This was a great idea for a video. Maybe it could be re-visited once in a while with more questions? Thanks again for the video.

Thanks David. This is valuable to every woodworker. At some point every woodworker thinks if they should sell some projects.

Thank you SO much David!!! So important now-a-days..... All the best, Charlie

Thanks for this information, I live in Michigan so this is close to home for me. Very good advice , thanks David for this cast . ..

Thanks for doing this, really appreciate it. And Mr. Driskell was a very good choice to make, his explanations were clear and to the point.

Thanks David! The discussion about the LLC and S corp were really informative.

Excellent video. Thank you for sharing thus valuable information with us.

THANK YOU! This is all very helpful information.

David, thanks for bringing this subject up. lots of misinformation out there so it's good to hear from someone who knows the law. Thank you to Joshua as well.

Alot of really good info, thanks David and Joshua.

Thanks David, very informative video.

hello fellow buckeye. And out of all the price your work theories i have heard yours is the most sensible. Im a new subscriber and just wanted to say hello. Curt from Cleveland

Thank's for doing this... very important information most people don't think about.

Thanks Joshua (and David).

Great stuff, thanks for sharing.

Great stuff, guys. Thank you.

The answer to the question about disclaimers begins with a disclaimer. Seems that disclaimers really are important!

Has a Scroll Saw Woodworker, thank you for asking that question. Thanks guys, for the very informative video.

Excellent vlog thanks for sharing

Wow, this was hugely helpful!

Great information ... Thanks, David!

Wow this answers alot my questions... thanks

Thanks for doing this!!

Great video and very pertinent information for hobby woodworkers. Thank you for the video.

Thanks for doing this DW!

Great video. Yes disclaimers should be placed in your videos. Unfortunately, there are a lot of folks who would chop their finger with an electric saw. Just like lawyers may put information online, but they always put out disclaimers that it is by no means any legal advice. Always check with a license attorney in your area... great video

Great video, very informative!

Thanks for this information. It was very informative.

wow great stuff thank you so much

Good information, Thank you.

Thanks David and Joshua, great information, I am a business owner and operate under an LLC, and as sue happy as the general public is now I would NEVER under any circumstance operate with a DBA (Doing Business As or Soul Proprietorship). It would be a sad day to loose your house, savings, etc.. do to a mistake that someone capitalizes on. Thanks again!

A very good show. I remember one time I closed my video by saying something like Now get out in the shop and make some sawdust. Weeks later, while watching PBS, American Woodworker, I heard Scott Phillips, say almost the same thing. I didn't intentionally steal these words from him, but I often wonder if said that phrase because I've heard that line before or my conversation in the video just led to that type of ending. I have to admit, it is a catchy ending, much like the one you use.

Great information. Interesting to know about "Trademark" and "Copy Right" Thanks for sharing.

Great info for us little guys!

An important video installment. Thanks very much.

Awesome, thanks for doing this video!

Thanks. Good info.

hahaha he gives a disclaimer in the video before talking about disclaimers in videos. hahaha, the irony... ohhhh what a world we live in. Good video.

Awesome info!!

Great video thank you sir

Interesting video. Thx

Great info. Thanks for making a video like this.

Great show!

Hey David, Thanks for making this video. -Dave Rutan

Excellent video. Very appropriate timing as tax season is right around the corner, and that I'm in that "am I a hobbiest, or is this a business?" mode.

great info

What a great show. Thanks very much. Went to Primuthlaw website and didn't see any pointers to Josh. Maybe some website updates are coming?

you are so the best!

I just wanted to thank you because I will soon be starting to sell locally at farmers markets and flea markets and making RU-vid videos and was trying to figure out if I needed to trademark or copyright my company name

Wow! Great video! I have been asking my self most of these same questions as I am in the early stages of starting my own woodworking business. I have an idea for a bar stool that has team or Nascar logos. I know I can't legally sell it, but I have been thinking if I use a disclaimer claiming that this chair, with the logo in it, is only a display model and "not for sale" I would be ok. I make the chair, charge full price, and the customer requests that I add the logo. Of course I need to talk to a lawyer but I think I would be ok. I really enjoy your videos. They are very inspirational. We don't need to be Norm Abram or Sam Maloof to make a living as a woodworker.

Great video. For the benefit of viewers who aren't used to dealing with IP issues, I do wish Joshua would have taken a couple of minutes at the start to explain the difference between copyrights and trademarks. The terms are so often confused by the public, yet mean very different things and have very different protection. I find it is always useful to define those two terms before giving people advice on either one. For example, using logos would most likely be handled as a trademark issue, especially in this context, even though Joshua talks about infringing on copyrights (violations of which may or may not also enter into it). EDIT: He also says that not policing *copyrights* can lead to losing them, which is untrue. That is true for *trademarks* (most often seen in the case of genericized trademarks) but not for copyrights, which cannot be lost or transferred, only licensed, in the authors lifetime (in most of the world).

really good vid, some interesting points. Francis Worcestershire UK

Up late getting your video out huh? Thanks for taking the time to help out the entire RU-vid woodworking community! This was some good info have.

Thanks for this great interview, David and Josh. That sucks about your cool t-shirt design... For those interested in bolstering the 'automatic' copyright that technically applies to creative work in the US, you may want to consider registering your work with the Writers Guild of America (WGAW). Even though the Guild was created for writers, they will register many types of creative work: music, visual art, etc. For a $20 fee, you can record the fact that you are the author of this piece of work on such and such a date. According to their Registry Details page: ' Registration provides a dated record of the writer's claim to authorship of a particular literary material. If necessary a WGA employee may produce the material as evidence if legal or official Guild action is initiated.' This legal registration will be in effect for 5 years, and could come in handy if you discover someone pirating your work. Not foolproof, but if you create something that you really want to protect, this can be an added safeguard.

On the logo question, what if the person uses only the colors of the teams, is that ok and legal?

You should probably make sure you're talking to a lawyer that focuses on business law. Just because someone is a lawyer doesn't mean they are proficient in the laws you need advised on.

Thanks for doing this. I was hoping for the question on copyright and trademark to go one level further - what if I buy something with a team logo on it (or a Disney character, or whatever) which is a licensed product, and then I use that item to make something else, which obviously now has that item on it? For example. Say I buy a baseball bat that has the Red Sox logo on it, a licensed and legal product. Then. I cut it up, put it on the lathe, and make a wine goblet from it that I was careful to make in a way that the Red Sox logo lands nicely on my goblet. Is that allowed? Doctrine of first sale apply here? (Or buy licensed fabric with Minnie Mouse on it and use it to make baby blankets for sale, or anything like that.)

Awesome information, thank you for this video.. Now i have to start my business all over again...lmao... kidding.

Copyright Question almost answered. If I buy a copyright logo/sign of a sports team from a craft store that sells all logo of all teams and embed it in the stripe area of a wood US Flag I make is that a copyright infringement? I bought the logo/sign from a national craft big box store and would be just adding it to my woodworking project.

So i want to make a sign to sell, (as an example). I want to put "Bud Light" on it, (again, as an example) , if I draw or print and paint the logo on my sign, i can understand that being copyright infringement, Can I buy a decal from someone else and install it on my sign, is that still considered copyright infringement? I was told that as long as i buy it, and can prove it, i can sell it on whatever I want, because I then own it.

I am suing you for injuring myself with a lazy susan i put my table saw on.

Maker "I'm going to ask about disclaimers". Lawyer " let me answer that by first giving a disclaimer about my answer".

Outstanding video; excellent advice, and simple explanation for a simple mind like mine. I have to add though, it angers me to no end that if I make a "widget" with reasonable care, function and safety, and someone hurts themselves with it and sues me, why must I be responsible for that idiot's lapse in common sense and judgment? Just like all the idiots in the world who sued tobacco companies because they got cancer or emphysema. I smoked for 41 years before quitting. I knew the risks, but I chose to do it anyway. That is a major malfunction in the thought processes of many Americans these days. Sorry about the rant. Excellent video with excellent advice!

I believe in Florida, a single member LLC is easy to pierce. A Corporation is not. I am not an attorney, but that is my understanding. In other words, in these cases, I think a Corporate shield is much tougher to pierce than a single member LLC.

Hi, wish I had seen this earlier and would have sent you a message to ask your friend which a question that wasn't covered. You mentioned using music on videos and it's obviously common sense that you don't want to use something that isn't creative commons free or something you've created yourself. My question though was in relation to what i've heard has happened to a few channels. They've used music where the copyright holder had made it available for free use but then have sold it on later down the road. People who have already used this in their videos, albeit at a time when it was free to do so, have then received infringement letters/emails from Google claiming that they are using audio that someone has made a claim to. Would you be able to ask what the legal standing in that respect would be? Google seem to be erring on the side of caution by supporting the new copyright holder whereas at the time of it's use it was allegedly free to use??

David Awesome Video Great info thanks a ton... =O)

I wish I thought of asking this question for the video, what's the best way to find a good lawyer in your state?

Confused copyright and trademark. Trademarks are the only things that have to be actively defended to keep.

I'm 15 and have been a woodworker for a couple years now and have sold quite a lot of product. This is my main (only) source of income, so I was wondering if I need to be reporting the income and paying taxes on it?

question, is that tea or whiskey?

DAVID JUST JOINED YOUR VIDEOS AND CATCHING UP ON YOUR OLD VIDEO,S.SO I CAME ACROSS THE ONE WITH YOU INTERVIEWING THE LAWYER,SO JUST TO LET YOU STORY CUT SHORT CAN MY SISTER CLAIM FROM YOU AS SHE GOT HURT WITH ONE OF YOUR PENCIL HOLDERS, OH YE I FORGOT TO MENTION I THREW IT AT HER AND SHE GOT A KNOCK ON THE HEAD. Can we settle out of court please.lol

Re: Logos I want to make and sell wall mounted bottle openers (wood back with an embedded magnet to catch the caps and a cast iron opener attadhed). If I paint it red or white and give a free Ohio State sticker with it that I paid for, am I in the clear?

To say the disclaimer, "do not try this at home" would be a pointless thing considering that the idea is to try this at home (shop).

the second question is why I never build baby cribs