Anyone here own/start their own business?

[Stg-Flame]

I've been wanting to get out of my line of work for a while now (oilfield) and a friend and I have been discussing potential business ideas. The one we're thinking about won't be cheap to start but it's highly profitable in my area. Where did you go to get information about starting your own business and was it worthwhile? I'm guessing having a business degree would be of use but it's not feasible to go to college at the moment.

 

[highland145]

Finance, 32 years, 14 years self employed.

Backed another business that I knew very little about, lost $80K.

The moral of this story, don't buy a barber shop if you don't know how to cut hair.



imo, experience > business degree. And don't forget "regulation nation". Have long conversations with people that do what you want to. And S.C.O.R.E.

 

[dasherHampton]

Would you and your friend be handling the business yourselves or would you be hiring employees?

 

[ctbaars]

1. Just start doing it.
2. Partnerships hardly ever work out. Family is even worse.

 

[JEDIYoda]

Wasn`t there somebody on these forums who use to work on wallstreet but became disillusioned and decided to move to the Midwest and open a Massage parlour? It was so successful he /she now owns a chain of parlours??

 

[FeuerFrei]

Speaking of barbershops, one guy's making big money with a mobile one in the oilfields of west Texas. Converted a delivery truck into a barbershop. Makes over $100k.

 

[deadlyapp]

I'm in the beginning stages of starting a business, primarily just to employ my wife, who doesn't enjoy what she's doing. We don't anticipate making money, but hope to break even while providing something fulfilling and getting a reasonable salary out of it. Thankfully we're in a position where we can live solely on my income and the business opportunity is relatively low buy in.

Right now my biggest difficulty is financing the startup, as we aren't very cash liquid and I expect to be negative cash flow for leasing property for at least a few months. Small business loans are nearly impossible to get if you don't have revenue, personal loans have crazy APR, and otherwise there's not a lot of options.

 

[highland145]

Yeah, the sba/sbdc were useless when I wanted to expand after 5 years. Initially, borrowed off the heloc/from parents/sold my rentals......all in.

To date, great decision.

 

[Staples]

I really have nothing to add to this thread but

I'm guessing having a business degree would be of use but it's not feasible to go to college at the moment.

Drives my crazy. Degrees only mean anything if you are looking for employment. If you are self employed, degrees mean nothing. Go to the library and gets some books on business and read them, the same thing business students do... but for free.

Well unless you want to tout this on your business card or something.

 

[Zeze]

Who the hell kept bringing up 'business degree' to start a biz?

That's the last thing you need.

 

[Mai72]

My parents were self employed for much of their working life. 30 plus years. They owned furniture stores. My dad was a mover. From there, it was cafes, coffee shops, and they finally settled on an upscale cafe up until my mom passed away. It's not easy. It's hard work. I got to see it all. My dad would wake at 4am. He'd get to work at 6. Work until 9pm and do it all over again. He was also a contractor and made great money delivering voting machines, and government commodities to the public schools in our surrounding area. My aunt owned a place called Luigis in Wildwood for over 40 years. They put 3 of their children thru college, bought a home, etc.

You don't need a degree for starting your own biz. It takes hustle, grit, determinition, sacrifice, a bit of luck, more hustle, and so on.

 

[brianmanahan]

Finance, 32 years, 14 years self employed.

Backed another business that I knew very little about, lost $80K.

The moral of this story, don't buy a barber shop if you don't know how to cut hair.



imo, experience > business degree. And don't forget "regulation nation". Have long conversations with people that do what you want to. And S.C.O.R.E.

finance? i always thought you ran a hardware store or cleaned septic tanks or something like that!

 

[brianmanahan]

i've never wanted to take the risk of starting a business

so i just do some things on the side. spend a few hours a week and make some residual income.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

i've never wanted to take the risk of starting a business

so i just do some things on the side. spend a few hours a week and make some residual income.

I would take that risk in a heartbeat.

 

[brianmanahan]

I would take that risk in a heartbeat.

nobody in my family has ever done it successfully. you just work the same job at the same place if possible until you're 65-75. it's what you do.

two relatives tried to start businesses and they both failed miserably. lost almost all their money, got into IRS trouble. no thanks.

 

[snoopy7548]

nobody in my family has ever done it successfully. you just work the same job at the same place if possible until you're 65-75. it's what you do.

two relatives tried to start businesses and they both failed miserably. lost almost all their money, got into IRS trouble. no thanks.

Until now! You can do it!

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

nobody in my family has ever done it successfully. you just work the same job at the same place if possible until you're 65-75. it's what you do.

two relatives tried to start businesses and they both failed miserably. lost almost all their money, got into IRS trouble. no thanks.

I look at it as betting on yourself. It is possible to lose any bet but, what better circumstances to bet on? That is the main problem I have with the wealthy. They accumulate wealth by making paltry bets on the stock market using large amounts of money to make the feeble returns worthwhile. Worse, this kind of outlook only concentrates wealth. Creating wealth can only be done by directly creating utility.

 

[lxskllr]

I'd never want to own a business. Not anything traditional anyway. Too much headache and hassle, and if you have employees, you're probably the lowest paid, with the most work.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

I'd never want to own a business. Not anything traditional anyway. Too much headache and hassle, and if you have employees, you're probably the lowest paid, with the most work.

No matter what corporations say, fat and lazy isn't a business plan.

 

[mpegher]

I am a Board Certified Emergency physician. About 10 years ago my wife and myself started a business providing educational materials for pharmaceutical firms to distribute and publish to physicians. We started an LLC which was rather easy in NJ. Just went online and in 15 minutes registered the business. We were able to obtain a FEIN ( federal tax number) and same for the few states we work in. I added a clinical division when I started working with travel doctor firms (Locum tenens) to travel to underserved hospitals to staff their ERs. Since its a service industry, I sell no physical products, hold no inventory and have little overhead. No employees, just two partners.
I still work as an employee for one ER group but also
Every business is different but it was definitely a great addition to my income and a degree of autonomy that is great to fall back on.

 

[Greenman]

Started my business in 1987. Had some good years, and some bad years. I didn't bother with an accountant at first, and the IRS only charged me $80,000 for my stupidity. Turns out accounting isn't a good place to save money, who knew?

The most important word to know when you're self employed is "recession". That's when you get to spend every dime you've managed to save on keeping your business going, and your valued employees from loosing their homes. It's not easy to be a good person when the money stops flowing. It really sucks to lay someone off knowing that they'll never recover from it.

If you're the nervous type, don't do it. If you don't mind betting on yourself and working your ass off, it's not a bad way to go.

 

[Jeeebus]

I have my own law firm (since 2014). Best decision I made professionally was leaving the big firms I previously worked for and setting up shop myself. That said, I primarily deal with business litigation/lawsuits, and the majority of those are partners screwing each other, stealing money, etc. You can never fully insulate yourself from that, but the #1 piece of advice I can give is to have a document governing the relationship between you and your partner. Set out the responsibilities, contributions, salaries, how profits are determined, etc. We're all more inclined to trust friends/family and thus we don't need contracts/agreements as a handshake is good enough. That holds true until it doesn't. A good agreement isn't bulletproof, but it can help you avoid a dozen different disputes that arise when you have a different understanding of the relationship than your partner does.

 

[Stg-Flame]

Would you and your friend be handling the business yourselves or would you be hiring employees?

Both. I imagine we will handle a lot of the ground work, but we will ultimately need employees.

1. Just start doing it.
2. Partnerships hardly ever work out. Family is even worse.

Well it's just a spitball at the moment since we are both wanting to get out of our line of work and I honestly can't come up with the capital injection all by myself (unless I put both my house and truck up for collateral).

Who the hell kept bringing up 'business degree' to start a biz?

That's the last thing you need.

Friend of a friend who owns his own business. I figured it was sound advice to have some education on business if you're going to start a business, but I've found plenty of information all over the place.

For reference, I work in the oilfield and I live in an oilfield town. All three cities in my area thrive off the oilfield and when we're in a recession, a large portion of the population leaves to neighboring states for work. When work picks back up, they come back. What we're wanting to start won't rely solely on the oilfield, but the oilfield will make up for a decent chunk of our business. The first hurdle we are looking at is the starting cost. From what I learned from calling around and checking a few sites, it's a bare minimum of $3 million to start and looking at $250,000 for capital injection. I make a lot of money in my line of work (I average around 200 hours on my paychecks) and working long hours doesn't bother me, but I don't have a quarter million saved up anywhere.

 

[dasherHampton]

Both. I imagine we will handle a lot of the ground work, but we will ultimately need employees.

Have you or your friend ever dealt with employees? If you haven't you may want to partner with or hire someone who has.

I started a business with two other people shortly out of college. We topped out at 6 employees. I am glad AF I didn't have to deal with that aspect of it.

 

[JEDIYoda]

I'm in the beginning stages of starting a business, primarily just to employ my wife, who doesn't enjoy what she's doing. We don't anticipate making money, but hope to break even while providing something fulfilling and getting a reasonable salary out of it. Thankfully we're in a position where we can live solely on my income and the business opportunity is relatively low buy in.

Right now my biggest difficulty is financing the startup, as we aren't very cash liquid and I expect to be negative cash flow for leasing property for at least a few months. Small business loans are nearly impossible to get if you don't have revenue, personal loans have crazy APR, and otherwise there's not a lot of options.

It doesn`t take that much money to open a Massage Parlour! Your wife can run it all by herself...…..I bet she would be a happy camper....