Patrick Bateman
Footballguy
More!! I have 10k. I need more advice!
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If you were starting a small business with <10K startup capital... (2 Viewers)
- Thread starter Dudley Do-Right
- Start date
nightmare
Footballguy
I like D Dodd's ideas even though some of you don't think of it as a
"business". 10K is not going to get you very far starting up landscaping.
A good used zero turn mower is 4 to 8K never mind the truck or trailer to
haul it with. You could start with a push mower if all the accounts were
postage stamp lawns and somewhat close together-summer rentals by
the beach maybe, but you would need a lot of those.
"business". 10K is not going to get you very far starting up landscaping.
A good used zero turn mower is 4 to 8K never mind the truck or trailer to
haul it with. You could start with a push mower if all the accounts were
postage stamp lawns and somewhat close together-summer rentals by
the beach maybe, but you would need a lot of those.
Austin Tiger
Footballguy
We started our business as a IT reseller in Dec 2007 with a $200 investment. In Feb 2008 we moved to a 1200 sq ft office and that year had $1,000,000 in sales. In 2009 we started to venture into a totally unrelated business, building Laboratory and industrial furniture, but did not have the infrastructure or machinery so we outsourced the fabrication and finishing. 2009 showed minimal growth with sales of 1.5 Mil. 2010 sales grew to 2.1 mil.
Fast forward to May 2011, we moved from the office environment to a warehouse/industrial space, 6000 sq ft, invested in machinery infrastructure and brought most of the manufacturing in house, only outsourcing a few components. 3.4 mil in sales.
July of 2012 we moved again, this time to a 12,000 sq ft facility and brought another component in house. 4.8 mil in sales
July of 2013 we moved yet again, 19,200 sq ft of space, bought more equipment and have brought all but one component in house (we plan on bring the last component in house in 2014). 6.3 mil in sales.
I consider us pretty successful and lucky.
What do I contribute to our success?
1. Customer base, in 2008 we had an existing customer base as the company we worked for closed down in 2007, the companies, ie. our clients still had a need, we were there to fulfill it.
2. Slow growth as far as infrastructure, outsource to start and slowly bring components in house.
3. Well thought out business decisions.
4. Strong hires of good quality employees and strong training.
5. Willingness to go "all in".
6. Continually re-investing in the business.
7. Cash, making sure we always had cash in the bank and never missed a payroll.
8. Building customer relationships and always bringing in new customers and opportunities.
I am not going to kid anyone, the first 3 years were tough, real tough financially on us personally as we were used to making decent money, north of 80k. We barely made half of that the first 3 years. There were lots of sacrifices made but owning our own business and watching it continue to grow has been rewarding.
Not sure if this really answered the OP's question, but I want to throw the fact out there that you can start and build a business with significantly less than $10,000, with good business acumen, a customer base, and luck.
AT
Fast forward to May 2011, we moved from the office environment to a warehouse/industrial space, 6000 sq ft, invested in machinery infrastructure and brought most of the manufacturing in house, only outsourcing a few components. 3.4 mil in sales.
July of 2012 we moved again, this time to a 12,000 sq ft facility and brought another component in house. 4.8 mil in sales
July of 2013 we moved yet again, 19,200 sq ft of space, bought more equipment and have brought all but one component in house (we plan on bring the last component in house in 2014). 6.3 mil in sales.
I consider us pretty successful and lucky.
What do I contribute to our success?
1. Customer base, in 2008 we had an existing customer base as the company we worked for closed down in 2007, the companies, ie. our clients still had a need, we were there to fulfill it.
2. Slow growth as far as infrastructure, outsource to start and slowly bring components in house.
3. Well thought out business decisions.
4. Strong hires of good quality employees and strong training.
5. Willingness to go "all in".
6. Continually re-investing in the business.
7. Cash, making sure we always had cash in the bank and never missed a payroll.
8. Building customer relationships and always bringing in new customers and opportunities.
I am not going to kid anyone, the first 3 years were tough, real tough financially on us personally as we were used to making decent money, north of 80k. We barely made half of that the first 3 years. There were lots of sacrifices made but owning our own business and watching it continue to grow has been rewarding.
Not sure if this really answered the OP's question, but I want to throw the fact out there that you can start and build a business with significantly less than $10,000, with good business acumen, a customer base, and luck.
AT
slackjawedyokel
Footballguy
It's eye-opening just how much "IT" talk there is here. No real opinion on it other than realizing just how many people are in that industry.
Maelstrom
Footballguy
It's also an industry that, in general, can be entered based on experience and knowledge, rather than requiring a large capital expenditure. That said, it's a online message board, likely to have a great representative sample of IT than not.
NCCommish
Footballguy
You have to be getting a lot of hits to make any real money. I mean 100's of thousands. It's pennies per view IIRC.
Abraham
Footballguy
Awesome. Starting with a customer base was a great idea and no doubt contributed to your success a great deal.
Buck Bradcanon
Footballguy
Well the world needs ditch diggers too.
Congrats to all you guys. I enjoy the discussion..I don't have the stones.
Congrats to all you guys. I enjoy the discussion..I don't have the stones.
jwb
Footballguy
I look at it totally opposite: I don't have the stones to invest years in a job, only to have them tell me "thanks, but". And that always seems to happen when you are 40+, and employment prospects shrink.
I don't make a fortune at what I do, but I know I am 100% capable of taking care of myself without a job. That's a good feeling.
I've got a very easy one (but time consuming). I think someone mentioned converting slides into digital....but what about pictures. I was up in my attic yesterday and I have 2 boxes of old pictures that are fun to look at, but take up a ton of space and slowly deterioating over time. I would gladly pay someone to scan all these and put them into slide shows. That would be a base service, then could add tagging, dates, etc for extra.
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
Maelstrom
Footballguy
Probably goes without saying, but if anyone is going to do this as a business, make sure and shell out a little extra for an automated scanner that will autofeed a stack of images (within reason) one by one and scan them each.Tiger Fan said:I've got a very easy one (but time consuming). I think someone mentioned converting slides into digital....but what about pictures. I was up in my attic yesterday and I have 2 boxes of old pictures that are fun to look at, but take up a ton of space and slowly deterioating over time. I would gladly pay someone to scan all these and put them into slide shows. That would be a base service, then could add tagging, dates, etc for extra.
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
Johnny Rock
Footballguy
I don't think you can risk damaging old photos.Probably goes without saying, but if anyone is going to do this as a business, make sure and shell out a little extra for an automated scanner that will autofeed a stack of images (within reason) one by one and scan them each.Tiger Fan said:I've got a very easy one (but time consuming). I think someone mentioned converting slides into digital....but what about pictures. I was up in my attic yesterday and I have 2 boxes of old pictures that are fun to look at, but take up a ton of space and slowly deterioating over time. I would gladly pay someone to scan all these and put them into slide shows. That would be a base service, then could add tagging, dates, etc for extra.
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
I like the 37Signals / Basecamp guys and I think I mentioned them earlier.
Jason Fried has a good article here on going against the conventional wisdom a bit. http://www.inc.com/will-yakowicz/jason-fried-basecamp-stay-small-grow-slow.html
Jason Fried has a good article here on going against the conventional wisdom a bit. http://www.inc.com/will-yakowicz/jason-fried-basecamp-stay-small-grow-slow.html
Maelstrom
Footballguy
Another guy I like reading stuff by (although his posts often are about software, rather than business, but he delves into both) is Joel Spolsky - http://www.joelonsoftware.com/
He created Stack Overflow (with Jeff Atwood), Fogbugz and Trello. Fogbugz is how he makes his money (maybe ads on Stack Overflow), but Stack Overflow basic revolutionized how people communicated about software issues and if you do any kind of list management and you haven't tried Trello yet, you owe it to yourself to give it a shot.
He created Stack Overflow (with Jeff Atwood), Fogbugz and Trello. Fogbugz is how he makes his money (maybe ads on Stack Overflow), but Stack Overflow basic revolutionized how people communicated about software issues and if you do any kind of list management and you haven't tried Trello yet, you owe it to yourself to give it a shot.
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kutta
Footballguy
Good stuff. I particularly like the "avoid investors" thoughts.
Dudley Do-Right
Footballguy
Good idea, TF.I've got a very easy one (but time consuming). I think someone mentioned converting slides into digital....but what about pictures. I was up in my attic yesterday and I have 2 boxes of old pictures that are fun to look at, but take up a ton of space and slowly deterioating over time. I would gladly pay someone to scan all these and put them into slide shows. That would be a base service, then could add tagging, dates, etc for extra.
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
Let's hash this one out a bit, because I do think there is a market here because everyone has old-fashioned pictures that will be in need of archival eventually.
What's the approach here for marketing?
Do you have a physical location to catch passersby or is this a "we'll come get the photos from you" kind of operation? (Presumably working out of home from there)
What's the price point? Is it by picture? By gallery?
No need for a physical location at all. Just find some folks who have disposable income and no time to do tedious tasks like this. Doing all of this would make an awesome present for my wife (taking all of her physical pics and putting them in a timeline of some sort).Good idea, TF.I've got a very easy one (but time consuming). I think someone mentioned converting slides into digital....but what about pictures. I was up in my attic yesterday and I have 2 boxes of old pictures that are fun to look at, but take up a ton of space and slowly deterioating over time. I would gladly pay someone to scan all these and put them into slide shows. That would be a base service, then could add tagging, dates, etc for extra.
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
Let's hash this one out a bit, because I do think there is a market here because everyone has old-fashioned pictures that will be in need of archival eventually.
What's the approach here for marketing?
Do you have a physical location to catch passersby or is this a "we'll come get the photos from you" kind of operation? (Presumably working out of home from there)
What's the price point? Is it by picture? By gallery?
Just spitballing here, but I would imagine charging by the picture with some sort of minimum would be a good place to start. Pricing would depend on how quick you could get them scanned/touched up.
One problem could be that if you have stacks of pictures that aren't in albums...they could stick together over time and wouldn't work in an automatic feed type scanner. In that situation, Shark move might be to just drop a few hundred bucks on a nice camera and take indivdual pics of the pics.
Henry Ford
Footballguy
Delivery coffee and donuts.
ClownCausedChaos2
Footballguy
Henry Ford
Footballguy
It would be cheaper than almost any other business. You could probably just glom onto a local donut shop, and tell them you'll do it strictly for the delivery charge plus 10% of sales to start off. Probably double their sales volume in about a month.
bleachercreacher
Footballguy
Here's a company that does the same http://www.scancafe.com. I've used them to scan some medium format negatives for me. I would love for someone local to offer the service locally though.No need for a physical location at all. Just find some folks who have disposable income and no time to do tedious tasks like this. Doing all of this would make an awesome present for my wife (taking all of her physical pics and putting them in a timeline of some sort).Good idea, TF.I've got a very easy one (but time consuming). I think someone mentioned converting slides into digital....but what about pictures. I was up in my attic yesterday and I have 2 boxes of old pictures that are fun to look at, but take up a ton of space and slowly deterioating over time. I would gladly pay someone to scan all these and put them into slide shows. That would be a base service, then could add tagging, dates, etc for extra.
I imagine you can do this with a basic apple computer and scanner
Let's hash this one out a bit, because I do think there is a market here because everyone has old-fashioned pictures that will be in need of archival eventually.
What's the approach here for marketing?
Do you have a physical location to catch passersby or is this a "we'll come get the photos from you" kind of operation? (Presumably working out of home from there)
What's the price point? Is it by picture? By gallery?
Just spitballing here, but I would imagine charging by the picture with some sort of minimum would be a good place to start. Pricing would depend on how quick you could get them scanned/touched up.
One problem could be that if you have stacks of pictures that aren't in albums...they could stick together over time and wouldn't work in an automatic feed type scanner. In that situation, Shark move might be to just drop a few hundred bucks on a nice camera and take indivdual pics of the pics.
ClownCausedChaos2
Footballguy
Or partner with a local pizzeria. They're not open in the mornings, so the shop is available, they've got the necessary equipment with deep friers for fries, chicken fingers, etc. and the donut boxes would fit perfectly in the pizza-warmer sleeves.
Henry Ford
Footballguy
ClownCausedChaos2
Footballguy
I'll start calling around to local pizzerias today and pitching the idea. I'll talk asfast as I can, so I don't waste their time. I'll ramble, so that I can get as much information to them as possible. I'll talk as loud as I can, in case there's background noise. Oh, and I'll slurp my spit, so that the phone doesn't get wet and distort my speech.
Will report back.
Henry Ford
Footballguy
Right, but open it in a pizza restaurant that's closed in the morning and use their delivery stuff to deliver. Zero overhead.
gotcha. Don't think the pizza shop has the infrastructure to turn out the amount of donuts you're going to need. For less than 10k, just wholesaling from donut`
shop is the better move IMO.
kutta
Footballguy
It's not zero overhead. The pizza shop won't let you do this for free.
derek245583
Footballguy
Can you order donuts day of or is everything pre ordered?
Have a work crew coming over to build a deck tomorrow, I need 2 dozen donuts and 2 boxes of coffee
Or
I would like 3 glazed donuts, 2 sprinkles, and 2 cups of coffee....be there in 15 minutes
Both?
Have a work crew coming over to build a deck tomorrow, I need 2 dozen donuts and 2 boxes of coffee
Or
I would like 3 glazed donuts, 2 sprinkles, and 2 cups of coffee....be there in 15 minutes
Both?
mr roboto
Footballguy
I would think it would be easier to do the former. Although without a retail outlet you'd be completely guessing regarding the types of donuts to make.
derek245583
Footballguy
They built about a 2,000 sq ft building close to my subdivision and it's clearly supposed to be two businesses. I think a tenant fell out because it's a papa johns on one side and one side is vacant.
I bet there are 25 big subdivisions in a 5 mile radius
It has crossed my mind
Chaos Commish
Footballguy
Derek, I think the answer to that is both. Of course you can phone in an order like you would for pizza and of course you can pre-order by phone or online if that's what you want.
I sold a business 18 months ago and haven't worked in 12. I am considering launching this on a small scale for home deliveries on weekends (to start). Obviously, office deliveries are going to be necessary during the week, but that requires too much work.
I'm not interested in popping up in a pizza kitchen because I don't want to make the donuts. That's too much work. The best donut shop here is struggling and I'm pretty friendly with the Mrs. there. I think I'll stop by and chat today.
I would roast, grind and brew my own coffee, I think. That might be too much work though. But brewing my own coffee is a must.
I do need something to do. I can envision the ongoing operation, but I am struggling with launch. Maybe target a few neighborhoods, do a little canvassing before advertising. Not sure.
Chaos Commish
Footballguy
A couple thoughts I can't shake. No one is roasting there coffee beans locally. That might be worth doing. The product in this town of 30k overpaid government workers is simple old school Asian donut shops and what you can get in typical supermarkets. Maybe driving into LA for cronuts and whatnot might be worth it. I know a 24 hour place that wholesales and destroys any product here. It just wouldn't be quite as fresh but that would only be by a couple hours. Probably adding $60 a week in gas.
Sarnoff
Footballguy
I had a dream years back to open a Dunkin Donuts in Studio City CA right outside one of the big studio lots and offer delivery to the sets & offices. Figured it would bring in a mint. Unfortunately D&D's franchise fee for L.A was $5 million. A bit out of my range.Henry Ford said:
Chaos Commish
Footballguy
Baloney Sandwich
Footballguy
I don't see a delivery coffee and donut business being successful, exactly who is the target audience? People that work from home or house moms and dads? Perhaps the unemployed? People that commute will do what they do today which is stop on their way into work. Perhaps it could work on the weekends but even then you will be targeting people without kids because most likely those with kids are up and out of the house. Seems like way too much of a niche business with low margins (unless you make your own donuts) to ever be a money maker. Horrible idea in my mind.
Chaos Commish
Footballguy
SIDA!
Footballguy
ClownCausedChaos2
Footballguy
Dudley Do-Right
Footballguy
Time for a fresh round of ideas, EntrepreneurGuys.
Henry Ford
Footballguy
Ball bearings.
Long Ball Larry
Footballguy
what was the first business?
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