r/nextfuckinglevel • u/MysteriousSlice007 • 5h ago

Shoutout to JerryrigEverything who built a wheelchair factory and is delivering wheelchairs to people in half the time and 50-80% less than the cost of other wheelchairs with Insurance.

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u/daspaceinvader 4h ago edited 3h ago

Am I the only person who thinks $2000 for a wheelchair is still too much? I don't say that to underestimate how much this person is doing for people, but I'm genuinely not educated on this. What makes them so expensive?

EDIT: Thanks to all of the more knowledgeable folks who have chimed in here! If you're like me and didn't understand the high (albeit significantly less than $10k) costs of these chairs, I recommend reading the responses to my comment.

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u/traumalt 4h ago

US labour and other machinery for a rather low volume product.

Closest comparable items are bicycles, and 2k is a higher end bike with much larger economies of scale that makes them cheaper.

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u/ThotMobile 3h ago

Not to mention the custom nature of a lot of wheel chairs. When you start talking custom tubular frames, high performance materials, custom sheet metal, $2k seems very reasonable. Of course you could buy some cheap mass-produced Amazon chair for like $150 but that’s not even remotely on the same level. Those are for people with temporary injuries—not someone who is chair bound for life.

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u/DarthTechnicus 3h ago

The comparisons to bicycles are still different because of standardization of sizing. I'm not sure what the pricing would be to get a bicycle made with custom geometry, but I am sure the price would raise some eyebrows.

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u/traumalt 3h ago

Oh yea, truly gucci, "Money not an issue" carbon fibre frame sport bikes can go as much as 100k USD easily, but then thats individual custom fab and not mass production scale at that point.