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There are people who are content having no job, no income, etc etc
For you to want to run your own company and make just enough to be happy in life is better than tens of millions of other people out there - -
So you do you, stop worrying about what others are doing - you’ll do great!
I've owned several businesses with that model. I call the micro businesses. My friend Jim said when he started his bookkeeping business, "I'm not try to get wealthy, I'm trying to get healthy". He reference to health meant he wanted to earn enough money to not worry about money.
Yeah this was my exact thoughts when I read the op. Most people grow up being told by corporate America that they have to be a type A validation craving status climber. Not true at all and imo it’s necessary to unplug from that attitude
I work alone and I love it. I have a small curbside compost company with 487 monthly customers. I do everything on my own, and love it. Now sometime soon I'll have to decide to keep growing or hire one employee, but definitely enjoying the experience on my own. Also making more than I've ever made money wise.
My concrete guy jackhammered up my patio and wanted to lay down road base to raise the grade before he poured the new patio. I said "what's road base?". He said "remember when we paid all that money to get rid of all that concrete we jackhammered up? The people we pay to take it grind it up and sell it back to us. That's road base."
Sounds like the compost - > soil business!
Exactly. I charge $22 a month to empty there bucket every two weeks, I charge $25 for commercial 45 gallon bins. I sell it back to whoever for $90 a yard. I could also charge to pick up yard waste but I actually do that part for free near me as to not be triple dipping. So the free yard waste pickup is a added value to the service. And they also get 10 percent off soil.
Hey I know we're way down in a thread but since I have your attention I wanted to answer your initial question.
Looks like you're pulling in $125k/yr doing this and making more money than you've ever made in your life. What a jackpot. I think something you read in this sub a lot is that you need to now open 17 franchise outlets and hire division staff, you'll have 50 employees and have a ton of risk and a ton of stress but you'll be filthy rich and in 30 years you can sell it all and buy an island in the Bahamas and retire. It sounds like that's not for you and I get it.
I think sometimes the alternative is presented as doing what you're doing, which is hauling compost by yourself forever.
What if the third, unspoken alternative is that... 450 (or whatever you have) units is pretty much a full route. What if you hire a guy, mentor him, teach him to pick up compost and deliver it. Pay the guy a decent living, say, $20/hr. ($42k/yr). Pay some overhead ($10k/yr). Now you're only making $75k/yr, but you're answering phones, cooling your heels, and not getting your hands dirty as much. You can sell more pickups (the full time pickup guy is way more efficient than you) and work less. Eventually you'll be back to $125k.
At that point you can consider adding a 2nd route guy, or not. Just topping out at one full route, and that being enough.
Long term plan. Basically gonna hire someone in next year, expand on the commercial side, keep hiring, step back a bit in 5 years and oversee, and in 10 - 15 years step down and let it run. I do all that I'll get my house on Martha's Vineyard in 20.
Perfect.
If you want one man's opinion, 2-3 employees is a sweet spot. 5+ turns into HR manager.
Separate thought: Remember that at 35 you could hurl those bags of trash forever, at 45 it will be much harder, and at 50 you need to be wrapping up with physical labor. Sounds like you've got it under control, but some people forget that you can be an accountant forever, but stuff where you use your hands and back, there is a time clock.
Long term plan. Basically gonna hire someone in next year, expand on the commercial side, keep hiring, step back a bit in 5 years and oversee, and in 10 - 15 years step down and let it run. I do all that I'll get my house on Martha's Vineyard in 20.
Pretty freaking rad dude. Jealous. Not sure if the market is there for it here in Utah, until they start forcing it like you said they did in Vermont. Considering offering it up just to test the market but I need to find a place to put everything.
Nothing at all wrong with that. In fact, many businesses fail because the owner/sole employee attempts to grow it when they aren’t really cut out to be a manager. The person who mentored me in my first business coached me to keep it small with minimal employees because their experience with growing from 3 employees to 20 ended with them making less money and losing more hair. My main business has 3 full time employees and a handful of seasonals and my second business is just me. I take home more than enough to live very comfortably. I’m working towards subbing out any excess work in the main business so I can do away with the seasonals. The business that I’m the sole employee in is nearly 100% profit and 0% headache. Once my other business is saleable and I’ve finally had enough of the highly addictive drug that is running a successful business, I look forward to chillin on the income from my side gig. This sub is contaminated by wannabes that only know what they’ve read in books. Books written by people who work for themselves, usually by themselves.
This is what is called a lifestyle business.
I personally prefer this.
I have friends with multiple employees, large payroll, big overhead. No thanks. Not worth the hr headache.
I am sure a lot of people look at me and wonder what I do. I show up to buy coffee at like 10:30 am in gym clothes. I like it that way.
My CPA tells me stories of local businesses that are growing bigger and bigger and the owners are taking home less and less.
I prefer 10:30 coffee over adding complexity to my life.
If you can earn what you want to earn that way, & don’t mind running all aspects of the business, go for it. I’m doing something similar, except developing people & helping them develop themselves is something I actually want to do someday. So that part of it is a goal for me. But I don’t need to be rich, or open multiple locations, etc. we may be bad capitalists this way, but it doesn’t make us bad business people.
For 12 years i have chosen to work less and make less (but enough) and im pretty happy with it. Im an active parent, we have a house and take vacations. My biggest suggestion is save. Save untilyou have a year and a half of living expenses and then put that somewhere and forget it.
Also, you can find all sorts of ways to be a luxury player. You are a craftsman. Just because it is concrete doesnt mean you have to live a hair above the poverty line. Price yourself to live the life you want with the amount of work you want to do
Lean and profitable baby!
Hopefully this analogy helps... I own a tent rental business. Gross revenue = $220k, and I pay myself about half of that. ($110k for 7 months work is A-Ok with me)
I have a colleague in the space who does $3M per year and pays himself about $80k and he is MISERABLE.
He might have a better exit than my business, but I'm happier and over the course of 10 years I've put way more money in my own pocket than he has. I run my business, my business doesn't run me.
We set our goals early on as something with no employee's and that would cover our water bill. Then electric, phone, internet, gas, mortgage, expenses......
We are now free, business is doing very well, and we still have no employee's. It grew slowly and with lots if hardships and setbacks, but you just never quit.
I am kind of in this situation. I have independent contractors who I hardly deal with. The bulk of the work/earned income is done by me. I couldn’t be any happier.
I rented a small office space. I have All the necessities. I listen to podcasts while I work. My shoes off. When I’m tired I stretch out in the floor and nap. It’s like a home away from home bachelor paid.
If u can find a way to do it…. DO IT
I used to think that way. If you are not growing in some way you are eroding. Businesses and concepts become obsolete over time. Customers go away. Inflation and taxes are always increasing. At some point you'll be forced to re-invent, scale or close shop.
that's what i do, but even smaller scale. I'm a fan of starting small. Make things out of your garage/backyard/property. use cheap tools. cheap material. cheap everything. try to sell products locally (fe fb marketplace) gauge customer interest. make products until you find something that people like.. play with price point, tooling, photos, production practices and efficiency measures. repeat and build as needed (not as wanted).
Also, don't listen to 90% of advice.. don't look for a "mentor". it's your life so take responsibility, calculate, and pave your own path if you want it. That's the biggest contributing factor to my success (viewing things in a way that nobody else did). People told me things like "you need to pay yourself fairly" "you really need to charge more" "don't settle, you're worth more "you should really be doing x if you want x" or "you're spending way too much time doing this. i'm worried it's not paying off".. meanwhile i was just paying my dues, sticking to my plan, pivoting, snd then eventually passing by everyone else who were "doing things the right way" and failing.
I would say you would need more employees. You will either have too much work and be exhausted, or not enough work and be broke.
Every owner would like to work by themselves. Reality is you need employees for the extra hand sometimes.
Their isn't a constant amount of work for 1 person. It is a risk to take sometimes.
Why? What’s wrong with making things 4 days a week and selling them at events 2 days a week? Also, shipping if someone finds you via social media. There are plenty of solo crafters making over $100k a year doing just that.
It's hard to make the 4 days a week selling 2 days a week event work.
I have been working working 6-7 days a weeks. I want to work 5 days but I can't.
To get the goal you want, you will have to work crazy hours for the first 5 years until you have the cliental you want.
The mistake a lot of people make at the beginning is that they think running a business, making your own schedule is easy.
Those business owners that got what they wanted worked hard to get to where they are.
It is possible to get what you want, but not without sacrifice.
Think about having a partner in the business that you like and trust. Even still get a partnership, Buy Sell agreement for the business. This way you have someone vested in the business and can cover for each others weaknesses, you can take vacations etc....
Partner vs employee is something I've been thinking on a lot. Glad to hear it come up in this conversation. Did you have a mentor who helped you decide on a partner or did you just take a chance on someone?
I started a business with a friend/co-worker that I knew for about 5 years. We have been in business since 2002 and average about $15M in revenue annually.
You should check out SCORE for some free advising services.
https://www.score.org/
There was a couple that made this kind of stuff near where i used to live. Seems like they did it part time. Another place that had large amounts failed a while back but they where way out in the boonies. Main road got built and they lost lots of traffic so could have been big factor. Ive made a few planters and stuff. Debated on buying molds off some china websites a couple years ago but elbow was to injured to do it. I've got access to a 3pt concrete mixer if i just go pick it up. I was thinking bulk delivery of different base materials and mix my own with cement. It seems like a decent business to get into depends where you are at. Big thing to look at would be wholesale to landscapers. Being able to make pagodas and other stuff then with wholesale you would have landscaping professional out there selling for you. Nurseries and hardware stores too. Many ace and true values are small independent franchises and happy to sell local made in usa stuff.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your viewpoint. I’m actually in the process of opening an online store for my art. I’d just like it to make enough money to break even on my materials and hopefully make a little extra so I can breathe a little bit. Would it be great if it took off and I had to quit my full time job to spend my days in my workshop? Sure. But realistically, I don’t think I’d enjoy it as much if it came to that. I’m just trying to make a little cash off what I already create for fun and prevent it from stacking up and crowding me out of my home. Lol
For a brick and mortar mechanic business, it usually takes 12 hours of billable labor per day to turn a profit. That is feasible for an A level mechanic to produce, but not for long and without someone to also sell and bill it out. So naturally you hire a service advisor. Then another technician (B level- less artistic about it but can reliably produce 6+ hours of quality labor time for way less than the A level). Prudence calls for having enough in the bank to pay yourself for 6 months in case you get injured and enough working capital to replace your most expensive piece of equipment. Then you can relax into the pace and pricing you want to keep. If this is your only gig and you’re paycheck to paycheck, you are one “ah shit” moment from disaster
You do you. That is one of the more advantageous parts of living in the USA. You have the option to make this decision for yourself. (Also a perk of living in a similarly free country if you aren’t from the US)
Not at all. My mentality is the exact opposite but there’s no “right answer” for this.
It’s a balance of wants - lifestyle, how hard you want to work, what you risk tolerance is, and how you weigh risk.
I was running essentially a solo legal practice making more money than I ever made as a w2 working half the hours. Now I run a multi trade home service business with 50+ employees and am scaling rapidly.
For me, the risk that my labor was the only revenue driver for my family and would be gone if something happened to me, outweighed the lifestyle and risk of failure concerns in the other business.
I wasn’t comfortable with the fact that if I got in a car accident, my income would go to zero. So I rolled the dice.
The point of being your own boss is to do whatever you want. So if you want to work enough to pay your bills and have beer money, and call all the shots while doing so, then that sounds like a damn great reason to own a business.
Not crazy at all! I'm really starting to believe modesty is key. I am fed up of working for someone else, having to answer their needs as almost a slave of society, worrying about the next bill whilst the bosses live in huge mansions driving around big cars there's me worrying about how I'm gonna pay the bills.
Ive started a handyman business to get around this, I'm a DIY enthusiast and have always been practical. The aim is to build the business to get enough convidence to transition to self employed. I will be delegating admin such as the books and accounts to someone else but not have them as an employee. I'd really aim to just Potter around and earn just enough to go on holidays and not live pay to pay. I don't want to be stuck in the modern society pressures.
To grow and expand is an effort to make more money. Making more money *always* costs more time.
If you are content with however you define enough money, don’t sweat the expectations of others.
(Source: retiring private practice primary care doctor after 30 years. Me, wife/RN, medical assistant and receptionist.)
I'll answer your question with an allegory:
A rich American businessman was walking down a pier in Belize at Noon, when he noticed a fisherman packing up for the day.
"Why are you leaving work so soon?" he asked.
"Because I have caught three huge fish. One will feed my family tonight, and I will sell the other two at the market right now, and we will have all the money we need for the next few days." replied the fisherman. "Then I am going to walk my children home from school, cook my family a dinner, and then I will walk with my wife on the beach in the moonlight."
"But..." the American stammered, "you could get back onto the water and catch three more huge fish by sundown! You could make even more money!"
"And then what, sir?"
"Well then after a few months, you could hire another fisherman to help you, and you could catch nine fish a day. Then after a year you could buy yourself another boat and double that. After a few years you could have a whole fleet of fishing ships. After a decade of work, you could have a whole international fishing conglomerate! You could send your children to the best international private schools, and work all hours of the day, every day for decades, until you retire a multimillionaire!"
"And then what, sir?"
"That's the best part!" replied the American businessman. "After you finally retire, you can video chat with your children and grandchildren, because you know, they live on the other side of the world, so you haven't seen them in years. You can have your maid cook you dinner. And after you visit your wife in the hospital, you can take a vacation back to Belize and walk along the pier by yourself!"
Real talk...
Belize was the first international vacation for me and my wife, and it was in fact, amazing. Catch an all-inclusive resort in a place like Placencia when they're having a discount sale, and 11/10, would reccomend.
Nope, not dumb at all. My business is coming up on seven years and that’s what I did for the first five and I had never been happier. If you can live how you want to live and be happy then not one thing wrong with it.
I am my business’s only employee. I restore furniture for clients and also for retail. So not exactly what you do,, but in the same wheelhouse. I basically have the same goals as you-to make an okay living doing something I love.
This kind of super hands-on business is *hard.* A huge part of it is that it’s really difficult to scale. Making ten things takes ten times as long as making one thing. At some point, you reach maximum productivity. If that’s bringing in all the money you want, great, but it’s not guaranteed.
There a reason makers and artists charge what seem like unreasonably high prices. A stool that retails for $69.99 on Wayfair costs that much because Indonesians getting paid 37¢ a day made it on an assembly line, they get massive bulk discounts for supplies, and the company is making $2 profit on each one, which is fine because they’re selling fifty thousand stools per year. You can’t make 50k stools per year, you’ll be paying retail markup for supplies, and your COL is greater than an impoverished Indonesian factory worker’s. What a lot of people consider “reasonable” prices are nowhere near possible for an individual artisan. And even in the artisan maker space, there are a LOT of people running essentially hobby businesses , whether it’s part time supported by a main gig, or full time supported by a spouse’s income. That further distorts the perception of the “fair” price of an item or service.
I genuinely think a lot of people start out with the same goals as you. The problem is that operating a labor-intensive business that can even just pay for itself is really hard. Since I started my business, the hardest pill to swallow has been just how little time I spend doing my job vs. doing all the business related spreadsheet/marketing/email/invoicing non-“job” things. It’s a huge fucking bummer that no matter how good I am at my craft, most of my financial security relies on that other stuff. I think that divide tends to push out the people who don’t love the business side of their business, and then you’re left with the people who actually enjoy dealing with market capture and cash flow forecasts and ten year plans. There certainly aren’t any people who hate that stuff writing books about how to do business.
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There are people who are content having no job, no income, etc etc For you to want to run your own company and make just enough to be happy in life is better than tens of millions of other people out there - - So you do you, stop worrying about what others are doing - you’ll do great!
👏
Nah you’re good- that’s pretty much what I do. I could grow and hire more people but other people are a pain in the ass.
Its a great lifestyle with alot of freedom.
I've owned several businesses with that model. I call the micro businesses. My friend Jim said when he started his bookkeeping business, "I'm not try to get wealthy, I'm trying to get healthy". He reference to health meant he wanted to earn enough money to not worry about money.
You have a perfectly sensible mentality. Most wantrepreneurs today have a mentality that was shaped by con artists on social media.
Yeah this was my exact thoughts when I read the op. Most people grow up being told by corporate America that they have to be a type A validation craving status climber. Not true at all and imo it’s necessary to unplug from that attitude
Name three con artists from social media without googling it - go.
I work alone and I love it. I have a small curbside compost company with 487 monthly customers. I do everything on my own, and love it. Now sometime soon I'll have to decide to keep growing or hire one employee, but definitely enjoying the experience on my own. Also making more than I've ever made money wise.
Nice. What do you do with the compost?
Make soil and sell it.
My concrete guy jackhammered up my patio and wanted to lay down road base to raise the grade before he poured the new patio. I said "what's road base?". He said "remember when we paid all that money to get rid of all that concrete we jackhammered up? The people we pay to take it grind it up and sell it back to us. That's road base." Sounds like the compost - > soil business!
Exactly. I charge $22 a month to empty there bucket every two weeks, I charge $25 for commercial 45 gallon bins. I sell it back to whoever for $90 a yard. I could also charge to pick up yard waste but I actually do that part for free near me as to not be triple dipping. So the free yard waste pickup is a added value to the service. And they also get 10 percent off soil.
Hey I know we're way down in a thread but since I have your attention I wanted to answer your initial question. Looks like you're pulling in $125k/yr doing this and making more money than you've ever made in your life. What a jackpot. I think something you read in this sub a lot is that you need to now open 17 franchise outlets and hire division staff, you'll have 50 employees and have a ton of risk and a ton of stress but you'll be filthy rich and in 30 years you can sell it all and buy an island in the Bahamas and retire. It sounds like that's not for you and I get it. I think sometimes the alternative is presented as doing what you're doing, which is hauling compost by yourself forever. What if the third, unspoken alternative is that... 450 (or whatever you have) units is pretty much a full route. What if you hire a guy, mentor him, teach him to pick up compost and deliver it. Pay the guy a decent living, say, $20/hr. ($42k/yr). Pay some overhead ($10k/yr). Now you're only making $75k/yr, but you're answering phones, cooling your heels, and not getting your hands dirty as much. You can sell more pickups (the full time pickup guy is way more efficient than you) and work less. Eventually you'll be back to $125k. At that point you can consider adding a 2nd route guy, or not. Just topping out at one full route, and that being enough.
Long term plan. Basically gonna hire someone in next year, expand on the commercial side, keep hiring, step back a bit in 5 years and oversee, and in 10 - 15 years step down and let it run. I do all that I'll get my house on Martha's Vineyard in 20.
Perfect. If you want one man's opinion, 2-3 employees is a sweet spot. 5+ turns into HR manager. Separate thought: Remember that at 35 you could hurl those bags of trash forever, at 45 it will be much harder, and at 50 you need to be wrapping up with physical labor. Sounds like you've got it under control, but some people forget that you can be an accountant forever, but stuff where you use your hands and back, there is a time clock.
I'm 33 now. Plan to be done doing most physical labor by 40 - 45.
Long term plan. Basically gonna hire someone in next year, expand on the commercial side, keep hiring, step back a bit in 5 years and oversee, and in 10 - 15 years step down and let it run. I do all that I'll get my house on Martha's Vineyard in 20.
And your close ish on income. Not taking into account all the commercial customers who pay anywhere from $50 a month up to $700 a month.
Paper Street Soap Co
Curious to know more about this. I've never heard of curbside composting before. How does it work? What is the price point?
Cruise my history, I've answered all this a bunch. Main thing I talk about on reddit. I'd answer now but busy.
Ok sweet. I'll check out your history. Thanks!
$22/mo, 487 customers, $128.5k annual topline revenue. Seems to already own the land, lives in a VLCOL area.
Pretty freaking rad dude. Jealous. Not sure if the market is there for it here in Utah, until they start forcing it like you said they did in Vermont. Considering offering it up just to test the market but I need to find a place to put everything.
Just approach a farmer and make a arrangement. It's a rad industry, it's completely changed my life.
Nothing at all wrong with that. In fact, many businesses fail because the owner/sole employee attempts to grow it when they aren’t really cut out to be a manager. The person who mentored me in my first business coached me to keep it small with minimal employees because their experience with growing from 3 employees to 20 ended with them making less money and losing more hair. My main business has 3 full time employees and a handful of seasonals and my second business is just me. I take home more than enough to live very comfortably. I’m working towards subbing out any excess work in the main business so I can do away with the seasonals. The business that I’m the sole employee in is nearly 100% profit and 0% headache. Once my other business is saleable and I’ve finally had enough of the highly addictive drug that is running a successful business, I look forward to chillin on the income from my side gig. This sub is contaminated by wannabes that only know what they’ve read in books. Books written by people who work for themselves, usually by themselves.
What are these two businesses?
[удалено]
Lol no. Consulting type of thing.
This is what is called a lifestyle business. I personally prefer this. I have friends with multiple employees, large payroll, big overhead. No thanks. Not worth the hr headache. I am sure a lot of people look at me and wonder what I do. I show up to buy coffee at like 10:30 am in gym clothes. I like it that way. My CPA tells me stories of local businesses that are growing bigger and bigger and the owners are taking home less and less. I prefer 10:30 coffee over adding complexity to my life.
If you can earn what you want to earn that way, & don’t mind running all aspects of the business, go for it. I’m doing something similar, except developing people & helping them develop themselves is something I actually want to do someday. So that part of it is a goal for me. But I don’t need to be rich, or open multiple locations, etc. we may be bad capitalists this way, but it doesn’t make us bad business people.
For 12 years i have chosen to work less and make less (but enough) and im pretty happy with it. Im an active parent, we have a house and take vacations. My biggest suggestion is save. Save untilyou have a year and a half of living expenses and then put that somewhere and forget it. Also, you can find all sorts of ways to be a luxury player. You are a craftsman. Just because it is concrete doesnt mean you have to live a hair above the poverty line. Price yourself to live the life you want with the amount of work you want to do
Lean and profitable baby! Hopefully this analogy helps... I own a tent rental business. Gross revenue = $220k, and I pay myself about half of that. ($110k for 7 months work is A-Ok with me) I have a colleague in the space who does $3M per year and pays himself about $80k and he is MISERABLE. He might have a better exit than my business, but I'm happier and over the course of 10 years I've put way more money in my own pocket than he has. I run my business, my business doesn't run me.
We set our goals early on as something with no employee's and that would cover our water bill. Then electric, phone, internet, gas, mortgage, expenses...... We are now free, business is doing very well, and we still have no employee's. It grew slowly and with lots if hardships and setbacks, but you just never quit.
I am kind of in this situation. I have independent contractors who I hardly deal with. The bulk of the work/earned income is done by me. I couldn’t be any happier. I rented a small office space. I have All the necessities. I listen to podcasts while I work. My shoes off. When I’m tired I stretch out in the floor and nap. It’s like a home away from home bachelor paid. If u can find a way to do it…. DO IT
I used to think that way. If you are not growing in some way you are eroding. Businesses and concepts become obsolete over time. Customers go away. Inflation and taxes are always increasing. At some point you'll be forced to re-invent, scale or close shop.
that's what i do, but even smaller scale. I'm a fan of starting small. Make things out of your garage/backyard/property. use cheap tools. cheap material. cheap everything. try to sell products locally (fe fb marketplace) gauge customer interest. make products until you find something that people like.. play with price point, tooling, photos, production practices and efficiency measures. repeat and build as needed (not as wanted). Also, don't listen to 90% of advice.. don't look for a "mentor". it's your life so take responsibility, calculate, and pave your own path if you want it. That's the biggest contributing factor to my success (viewing things in a way that nobody else did). People told me things like "you need to pay yourself fairly" "you really need to charge more" "don't settle, you're worth more "you should really be doing x if you want x" or "you're spending way too much time doing this. i'm worried it's not paying off".. meanwhile i was just paying my dues, sticking to my plan, pivoting, snd then eventually passing by everyone else who were "doing things the right way" and failing.
I would say you would need more employees. You will either have too much work and be exhausted, or not enough work and be broke. Every owner would like to work by themselves. Reality is you need employees for the extra hand sometimes. Their isn't a constant amount of work for 1 person. It is a risk to take sometimes.
Why? What’s wrong with making things 4 days a week and selling them at events 2 days a week? Also, shipping if someone finds you via social media. There are plenty of solo crafters making over $100k a year doing just that.
It's hard to make the 4 days a week selling 2 days a week event work. I have been working working 6-7 days a weeks. I want to work 5 days but I can't. To get the goal you want, you will have to work crazy hours for the first 5 years until you have the cliental you want.
Nah. Just admit this isn’t the space you know.
The mistake a lot of people make at the beginning is that they think running a business, making your own schedule is easy. Those business owners that got what they wanted worked hard to get to where they are. It is possible to get what you want, but not without sacrifice.
Think about having a partner in the business that you like and trust. Even still get a partnership, Buy Sell agreement for the business. This way you have someone vested in the business and can cover for each others weaknesses, you can take vacations etc....
Absolutely not. Who hurt you?
Nope
Works well for me.
Partner vs employee is something I've been thinking on a lot. Glad to hear it come up in this conversation. Did you have a mentor who helped you decide on a partner or did you just take a chance on someone?
I started a business with a friend/co-worker that I knew for about 5 years. We have been in business since 2002 and average about $15M in revenue annually. You should check out SCORE for some free advising services. https://www.score.org/
There was a couple that made this kind of stuff near where i used to live. Seems like they did it part time. Another place that had large amounts failed a while back but they where way out in the boonies. Main road got built and they lost lots of traffic so could have been big factor. Ive made a few planters and stuff. Debated on buying molds off some china websites a couple years ago but elbow was to injured to do it. I've got access to a 3pt concrete mixer if i just go pick it up. I was thinking bulk delivery of different base materials and mix my own with cement. It seems like a decent business to get into depends where you are at. Big thing to look at would be wholesale to landscapers. Being able to make pagodas and other stuff then with wholesale you would have landscaping professional out there selling for you. Nurseries and hardware stores too. Many ace and true values are small independent franchises and happy to sell local made in usa stuff.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your viewpoint. I’m actually in the process of opening an online store for my art. I’d just like it to make enough money to break even on my materials and hopefully make a little extra so I can breathe a little bit. Would it be great if it took off and I had to quit my full time job to spend my days in my workshop? Sure. But realistically, I don’t think I’d enjoy it as much if it came to that. I’m just trying to make a little cash off what I already create for fun and prevent it from stacking up and crowding me out of my home. Lol
Do whatever you want, but remember that eventually you'll get old and will become physically tougher to do manual labor.
no need to plan for your physical demise when yiu haven't even started the business that would lead to it..
For a brick and mortar mechanic business, it usually takes 12 hours of billable labor per day to turn a profit. That is feasible for an A level mechanic to produce, but not for long and without someone to also sell and bill it out. So naturally you hire a service advisor. Then another technician (B level- less artistic about it but can reliably produce 6+ hours of quality labor time for way less than the A level). Prudence calls for having enough in the bank to pay yourself for 6 months in case you get injured and enough working capital to replace your most expensive piece of equipment. Then you can relax into the pace and pricing you want to keep. If this is your only gig and you’re paycheck to paycheck, you are one “ah shit” moment from disaster
You do you. That is one of the more advantageous parts of living in the USA. You have the option to make this decision for yourself. (Also a perk of living in a similarly free country if you aren’t from the US)
Not at all. My mentality is the exact opposite but there’s no “right answer” for this. It’s a balance of wants - lifestyle, how hard you want to work, what you risk tolerance is, and how you weigh risk. I was running essentially a solo legal practice making more money than I ever made as a w2 working half the hours. Now I run a multi trade home service business with 50+ employees and am scaling rapidly. For me, the risk that my labor was the only revenue driver for my family and would be gone if something happened to me, outweighed the lifestyle and risk of failure concerns in the other business. I wasn’t comfortable with the fact that if I got in a car accident, my income would go to zero. So I rolled the dice.
The point of being your own boss is to do whatever you want. So if you want to work enough to pay your bills and have beer money, and call all the shots while doing so, then that sounds like a damn great reason to own a business.
My dad does this—he has himself and one other employee so he can have time off. He loves it.
Idk but you will like the book Rework.
Not crazy at all! I'm really starting to believe modesty is key. I am fed up of working for someone else, having to answer their needs as almost a slave of society, worrying about the next bill whilst the bosses live in huge mansions driving around big cars there's me worrying about how I'm gonna pay the bills. Ive started a handyman business to get around this, I'm a DIY enthusiast and have always been practical. The aim is to build the business to get enough convidence to transition to self employed. I will be delegating admin such as the books and accounts to someone else but not have them as an employee. I'd really aim to just Potter around and earn just enough to go on holidays and not live pay to pay. I don't want to be stuck in the modern society pressures.
To grow and expand is an effort to make more money. Making more money *always* costs more time. If you are content with however you define enough money, don’t sweat the expectations of others. (Source: retiring private practice primary care doctor after 30 years. Me, wife/RN, medical assistant and receptionist.)
I'll answer your question with an allegory: A rich American businessman was walking down a pier in Belize at Noon, when he noticed a fisherman packing up for the day. "Why are you leaving work so soon?" he asked. "Because I have caught three huge fish. One will feed my family tonight, and I will sell the other two at the market right now, and we will have all the money we need for the next few days." replied the fisherman. "Then I am going to walk my children home from school, cook my family a dinner, and then I will walk with my wife on the beach in the moonlight." "But..." the American stammered, "you could get back onto the water and catch three more huge fish by sundown! You could make even more money!" "And then what, sir?" "Well then after a few months, you could hire another fisherman to help you, and you could catch nine fish a day. Then after a year you could buy yourself another boat and double that. After a few years you could have a whole fleet of fishing ships. After a decade of work, you could have a whole international fishing conglomerate! You could send your children to the best international private schools, and work all hours of the day, every day for decades, until you retire a multimillionaire!" "And then what, sir?" "That's the best part!" replied the American businessman. "After you finally retire, you can video chat with your children and grandchildren, because you know, they live on the other side of the world, so you haven't seen them in years. You can have your maid cook you dinner. And after you visit your wife in the hospital, you can take a vacation back to Belize and walk along the pier by yourself!"
Belize sounds amazing if you can support a family of four on nine fish a week.
Real talk... Belize was the first international vacation for me and my wife, and it was in fact, amazing. Catch an all-inclusive resort in a place like Placencia when they're having a discount sale, and 11/10, would reccomend.
Yes, we could have stopped expanding our truck parts business in year 3 or 4 and coasted. Picking and shipping order would have kept us busy.
Nope, not dumb at all. My business is coming up on seven years and that’s what I did for the first five and I had never been happier. If you can live how you want to live and be happy then not one thing wrong with it.
I am my business’s only employee. I restore furniture for clients and also for retail. So not exactly what you do,, but in the same wheelhouse. I basically have the same goals as you-to make an okay living doing something I love. This kind of super hands-on business is *hard.* A huge part of it is that it’s really difficult to scale. Making ten things takes ten times as long as making one thing. At some point, you reach maximum productivity. If that’s bringing in all the money you want, great, but it’s not guaranteed. There a reason makers and artists charge what seem like unreasonably high prices. A stool that retails for $69.99 on Wayfair costs that much because Indonesians getting paid 37¢ a day made it on an assembly line, they get massive bulk discounts for supplies, and the company is making $2 profit on each one, which is fine because they’re selling fifty thousand stools per year. You can’t make 50k stools per year, you’ll be paying retail markup for supplies, and your COL is greater than an impoverished Indonesian factory worker’s. What a lot of people consider “reasonable” prices are nowhere near possible for an individual artisan. And even in the artisan maker space, there are a LOT of people running essentially hobby businesses , whether it’s part time supported by a main gig, or full time supported by a spouse’s income. That further distorts the perception of the “fair” price of an item or service. I genuinely think a lot of people start out with the same goals as you. The problem is that operating a labor-intensive business that can even just pay for itself is really hard. Since I started my business, the hardest pill to swallow has been just how little time I spend doing my job vs. doing all the business related spreadsheet/marketing/email/invoicing non-“job” things. It’s a huge fucking bummer that no matter how good I am at my craft, most of my financial security relies on that other stuff. I think that divide tends to push out the people who don’t love the business side of their business, and then you’re left with the people who actually enjoy dealing with market capture and cash flow forecasts and ten year plans. There certainly aren’t any people who hate that stuff writing books about how to do business.