What is the price of a Handpan (or Hang drum)?

1,200 to 3,500 euros is the price of a quality Handpan. However, prices start around 300 euros. The Handpan therefore has a value very similar to other instruments, such as the violin for example.

But why is this instrument so expensive? Isn't it just a simple assembly of two pieces of metal glued together?

Well, not quite. The Handpan is even very far from that. We are therefore going to explain to you why the handpans cost so much, but also why ZenaPan can deliver to you so quickly.

Why are handpans so expensive?

It is the manufacturing process, combined with the law of supply and demand, which makes the Handpan so expensive.

The manufacturing process

The manufacture of a single Handpan requires between three and four weeks of work. This significant time frame includes many steps:

1. Sculpt a sheet of steel.
2. Manually hammer the structure to form the dome.
3. Carry out a thermochemical treatment by nitriding.
4. Mark the instrument, to prepare the tuning.
5. Tune the instrument, usually to 7 to 9 notes.
6. Fix the base of the instrument.
7. Tune again.
8. Polish the whole.

Here are the reasons why the manufacturing process makes the Handpan so expensive. This is also the reason why, in many companies, the supply is much lower than the demand, creating long waiting lists.  

A problem of supply and demand

About ten years ago, the waiting time to acquire a Handpan spanned one to three years. Fortunately, the number of manufacturers has greatly increased, improving the instrument quality, increasing the range of products, as well as their availability.

The number of manufacturers is more than 300, distributed in all the countries of the world. Most of them allow you today to acquire a Handpan without long waiting times.

However, many workshops still have to manage a demand that far exceeds their production capacities, and it is not uncommon for them to make you wait several weeks or even months before being able to deliver the instrument of your dreams.

How does ZenaPan deliver to you quickly?

ZenaPan has large stocks, which many companies refuse to do, in the name of the sacrosanct respect for the number one stock management principle: just in time.

This principle, applied in all companies in the world since its appearance in the 1950s at Toyota, is not necessary in the handpans market. The demand being so important, it makes possible a more reasoned management of the stocks, so that this instrument at the beautiful sound can be sent to you once your order has been placed.

Above all, on-demand inventory management is an Achilles heel in a Handpan industry where "handmade" requires long weeks of work to ensure the production of a quality instrument.

Since the automation of tasks is only marginal in the production of these instruments at bewitching sounds, it makes production chains impossible to set up.

With the demand for Handpan being so high, the just-in-time managerial rule of inventory management does not need to be followed. That's why when you order, we're always ready to deliver.

At ZenaPan, there is no queue, no negotiation to pass faster than other customers, and even less a lottery system to be drawn and be able to benefit from an instrument. You order, you get delivered.