My career in the additive manufacturing industry started twelve and a half years ago, when I launched Centrum Druku 3D – a modest blog about 3D printing, which quite rapidly became one of the foundational pillars of the emerging Polish AM market.
But what most people don’t know is that the blog was never meant to be the end goal. It was supposed to be a stepping stone toward what I initially thought was the real business idea – selling 3D printers.
In the end that never really happened. The blog evolved into a large information and education platform, and we didn’t start selling 3D printers until five years later (which happened by some sort of accident and never was our main source of revenue).
This is the story of how, instead of becoming a “guns dealer,” I ended up owning the largest “shooting range” in the country.
Some of you may know that before entering the AM industry, I had a relatively successful career in advertising and IT, managing projects for some of the biggest brands in the world.
Tired and disillusioned by that business, I was looking for something new – fresh, raw, and full of potential. The emerging desktop 3D printing industry seemed like the perfect choice. The only real alternative I considered at the time was Bitcoin (tempting, but ultimately too risky and, for some entrepreneurs, even deadly).
At the end of 2012 – like many future AM founders around the world – I came across the now-infamous Cody Wilson and his 3D-printed gun project. That was the trigger that made me take the whole thing seriously.
Now, make no mistake – from the very beginning I saw the Liberator project as a pointless publicity stunt. I had no intention of manufacturing weapons. But the mere concept of 3D printing intrigued me deeply, and I decided to take a closer look.
I had actually heard about 3D printers at least a year earlier, so the technology wasn’t exactly new to me. But the news of 3D-printed guns opened my eyes to its broader possibilities.
So I made a decision: I would sell 3D printers. I would be the first to introduce them to consumer electronics retailers!
And to do that, I figured I’d have to start promoting 3D printers in the media. The cheapest way to do that? Create my own media outlet. And that’s exactly what I did.
In January 2013, Centrum Druku 3D was born!
Since I was already working in the IT industry, building the blog itself wasn’t a big challenge. I had help from a developer I was working with at an interactive agency at the time.
But a blog – a media outlet – needs content. Back then there was no ChatGPT, Gemini, Grok, or any other AI tool, so I had to write everything myself. This had one unexpected but highly important benefit: I had to actually know what I was writing about. Which meant I had to research, study, and understand the technology in detail.
After a few months, I realized I had more practical knowledge than most people following the topic at the time.
As site traffic grew, more and more people began reaching out – asking for advice, opinions, and consultations. Still, I was only writing articles, with no intention (yet) of monetizing the platform. Throughout 2013, it remained a side project. I continued working full-time as a PM and New Business Manager at a large digital agency.
But in the back of my mind, the primary plan was still to sell 3D printers. Let’s say I was quietly building the platform to support that.
Then, everything changed – thanks to Krzysztof Wojewodzic, a Polish entrepreneur specializing in the edu-tech sector. In the summer of 2013, Krzysztof reached out after reading one of my articles, sparking a long and fruitful collaboration.
He was the first to point out that my blog (soon to become a full-fledged news and opinion platform) was a valuable business in itself. He encouraged me to focus on developing it rather than chasing printer sales like a typical e-commerce store.
Later, in 2015, Krzysztof co-founded CD3D with me – the company behind Centrum Druku 3D, which today operates under the name COLORISED. Krzysztof left in 2020, and is now one of Poland’s leading experts in mobile and AI technologies.
I took his advice and devoted myself to growing the platform. Over time, it evolved into a serious tool supporting the AM industry – along with a range of services and events we began organizing.
The first initiative was the 3D Printer Database – a catalog of printers manufactured or sold in Poland. Most other compilations at the time focused on foreign models, often unavailable in Europe.
Next came the 3D Company Database, which had a crucial impact on the development of the entire Polish AM sector. It was the first place where the vast majority of local startups made their public debut.
Then came training programs – first general ones on 3D printing, and later business-focused courses. We were the first (and only) company to offer training not about how 3D printers work, but about how to make money with them.
After that came consulting, advisory services, and support with marketing and promotional strategies. Thanks to my background in advertising, I turned out to be one of the few specialists in this area. Most others in the AM space knew how to build 3D printers – they had no clue how to market them.
And finally, our conferences – where we actively promoted 3D printing in different verticals: education, industrial manufacturing, automotive, metal processing, and more. We also participated in countless demonstrations for businesses and educational institutions.
And here’s the important part: selling 3D printers or printing services was always a minor and incidental part of our business.
That only changed for a while after 2020 and the pandemic, when economic pressure from lockdowns forced our hand.
Even after I sold Centrum Druku 3D at the end of 2023 and continued my work globally through LinkedIn and The 3D Printing Journal, I remained focused on those less obvious aspects of the AM industry: promotion, consulting, education, and networking.
Working in AM doesn’t have to follow conventional patterns. It comes down to one of my core messages from our training sessions: you don’t need a 3D printer to build a business in 3D printing.
There are countless other options.
In fact, my entire career in this industry proves one thing: the less I touched a 3D printer, the more money I made from 3D printing.
If I regret anything, it’s that it took me so long to figure that out… But that’s a story for another article in this series.
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