Here are five different ways to make the (Warhammer) miniatures hobby into a career; however, they take a lot of work to make it your day job.
While many dream of turning their miniatures hobby into a job (Warhammer or otherwise), it’s not always going to be an easy road. Now, if you are looking into making a living out of it, there are five main ways to go about it.
We’ll break down the pros and cons of each, and maybe you can see a world in which you fit into one of the categories.
5 Ways to Make the (Warhammer) Miniatures Hobby Your Job or Career
Before we go into the specific ways, let’s first look at the biggest pro and cons of all four right off the bat! The biggest pro is that you get to immerse yourself deeper into the hobby and actually make money off something you love to do, which you have already spent a ton of time on. The biggest con is when you turn any hobby (like miniatures or Warhammer) into a career, it’s no longer just a hobby; it’s a job.
This can burn many people out on it when they are forced to do it all the time. So, just imagine that is on the list for all the ideas.
#1: Owning a Games & Hobbies Store
This is number one because it’s the most classic way (other than creating your own game system) to really make money with the hobby. However, as the world evolves, this option takes the most money to achieve and often has the highest risk.
Still, this is a classic way to build a community and a classic way to make the hobby a business. However, there are a lot of hidden costs with running your own store. To see more about opening a store, check that out here!
Pros:
- A more stable way to make income if you can build a customer base
- Access to products at a cheaper rate
- You can build a community
- Can help build the hobby in your local area
- Having a physical store gives you something to call your own
Cons:
- Upfront costs are high
- Online sales are pushing against store profits
- It takes a lot of work to get a store up and running
- You have to really build a community which can take a lot of time
#2 Becoming a Content Creator
Squidmar has become one of the biggest content creators in the miniatures hobby
This is a wide branch that covers many different avenues. From painting streams to websites to influencers. This is a bit hard to quantify because there are so many avenues in today’s world. However, it all comes down to one thing, building a fanbase. This can take a really long time to develop, but with so many ways to show the world what you can do, it is generally cheap upfront (depending on your setup).
Pros:
- Cheap upfront costs
- Leverages technology for your hobby
- Get your voice to the world
- You can focus on what you want
Cons:
- Takes a long time to build a following
- Almost no profit for a long time
- Can be hard to find avenues for revenue
- It’s something you have to do everything for (whereas something like a store can just naturally gain clients, with content creation, it all comes down to how hard you work)
- Lots of competition
#3 Professional Painter
Kenny from Next Level Painting
This also has a couple of avenues and sort of overlaps with being a content creator (but pretty much everything does nowadays). However, the idea of being a commission painter and a teacher really branches out into its own thing.
Pros:
- Use your years of skill to make money
- Can really show the world your skills
- Commission painting can create revenue much faster than other options
- Teaching classes can be lucrative and give you feel goodsies from helping people learn how to get better at their hobby
Cons:
- Again, to really push it into a full-blown career, you need a lot of exposure, which takes time
- This is a somewhat crowded space, meaning you have a lot of competition
- Can become taxing and somewhat repetitive doing commissions
- It can be hard to prove your worth enough to actually charge enough money to make a living
#4 3D Creator/Mini Creator
Models from the Puppetswar Patreon
With Patreon becoming so big and 3D printing always improving, creating your own models and files is actually a great way to leverage new tech to make a living. There are some things to watch out for, but if you have the skills to build models, this can be one of the best ways to make a living in the space.
Pros:
- Relatively cheap upfront costs as you mainly just need software
- If you build a following, this can be quite lucrative
- It’s fun to invent and create your own models
- Seeing people play with your models is just really cool
- Can turn your creativity into something tangible and usable
Cons:
- Not much revenue upfront
- Can take years to build a big following
- Takes a lot of effort from start to finish, as consistency is key, along with constantly building out your catalog and constant updates
- You need a lot of skills to make something stand apart and make people want to spend money on it
- IP issues, be sure to not infringe on anyone’s IP as it can create a whole lot of problems for you.
#5 Coach/Competetive Warhammer Player
In our minds, this one is the hardest and most volatile to make work. There are plenty of people looking for coaching, but the meta constantly changing and the need for constant results is a tumultuous way to go.
Pros:
- You get to play a lot of events (and have to)
- Can turn your knowledge of the game into cash
- Cheap upfront costs
- Can improve your own game as teaching generally makes you much better
- A lot of travel to get to all events (it’s in both depending on whether you like to travel)
Cons:
- Extremely hard to keep up with the meta to such a point you have the skills worth it to people
- Need to build an extremely dedicated following
- Constantly need to show results in tournaments
- A crowded space compared to the customer pool
- Hard to convince people that coaching is worth the money and time
- A lot of travel to get to all events (it’s in both depending on whether you like to travel)
Well, there you have it, a bunch of different ways to make it in the (Warhammer) miniatures hobby, all of which require a great deal of work all the way around.
Do you have what it takes to turn your miniatures hobby into a career? Established content creators email us all the time looking for exposure, so be sure to contact us as well if you have a catalog of content and are looking for more reach!
Have you dreamed of making your (Warhammer) miniatures hobby into a career, or job?
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About the Author: Travis Pasch
Travis Pasch
Job Title: Head Writer & Editor
Socials: @paschbass
About Travis Pasch: Travis has been a Warhammer 40k hobbyist since the 1990s, playing the game since Third Edition. Through extensive traveling, he’s seen a lot of the miniatures hobby from across the world, giving him a unique perspective on the latest gaming topics and trends.
Travis’s brother even owns a commission painting studio, where he’s picked up a lot of good advice and techniques for painting Warhammer and tabletop miniatures over the years, as well. Travis joined the Spikey Bits team in 2019 and has been the lead writer since 2020.
Currently, he’s working on converting all his 40k Adeptus Mechanicus models and becoming a true tech enjoyer, complete with both sad and happy robot noises!
