Does the United States have a spending problem? Obviously, but I really wanted to talk about how the cost of living crisis is presenting itself in your community. That relates to this article because you can’t squeeze blood from a stone. If all of you have no disposable income, no savings, and a job market that can’t support your current cost of living… What happens if you lose your job? Do you default on loan obligations along with America because we are stretched to the edge. Should we vote in members of congress to pass more tax breaks for private jets?Are mods whack? Let me know in the comments.
In America your business either gets big enough to get purchased by private equity, or small enough to crushed. How am I going to start a business in a state with no jobs, who are my customers ya know?
I’ve managed to keep my one man operation going for 18 years, and I’m not quitting any time soon. I know lots of other people with small companies like mine.
I guarantee that there are lots of small businesses where you are, even if you think there are “no jobs.” That’s kind of my point - If there are no jobs for you, create your own.
Stop blaming others, circumstances, the economy, etc. Nobody is stopping you but you.
Here’s a softball; which industry or market is underserved in the north east United States, specifically Maine? Let’s get a data supported answer. No one’s holding you back but you!
That’s not how you start a small business. Either you figure out a way to carve out a niche in the business you already know, or you look around your community and try to figure out what it needs.
Are they building a lot around you? Maybe there is something in construction. I just wrote in another post about a friend who was starting a cleaning business for real estate agents, cleaning houses, condos, and apartments between tenants/ buyers. Every day there are multiple Craigslist ads for people to do just that. I used to own an ice cream shop (not an example of a cheap business), and the guy who cleaned my windows was an actual meth head, but he showed up every week to wash my windows. Neither one of them had any education or experience, but they both could start businesses.
What do you care about the industries that are in your “region?” You care about what is needed in your immediate community. That’s where you will be operating your business, in your own backyard. Don’t worry about the macro-economy, think about you’re local micro-economy.
If all you’re looking for is a part-time income, even just driving people to the airport can be a good part-time job. I have a list of a dozen people in my neighborhood that will drive someone to the airport for cheaper than Uber or a Taxi. You could do pet-sitting, teach music lessons or do after-school tutoring, you could teach part-time at the local community college, or even high school. Even my neighborhood offers classes taught by residents, who can charge for the lessons.
If you think you’re going to end up on the cover of Forbes, you’re probably delusional, but if all you want to do is make a part-time side hustle, or create a business just large enough to support your family, that’s something people do every day.
Everybody wants me to hand them a blue print, a map to follow, but nobody did that for me. You have to use your brain and figure it out for yourself. You can see that others have done it, so why can’t you? Stop squandering your mental power on excuses for why it’s impossible, and spend that effort on thinking of solutions.
Have you ever thought about offering useful advice instead of useless advice to make yourself feel better? What should I do Mr business guru. Which market am I missing out on in my local economy that you might be so hip too?
I’m trying to get you people to understand that nobody is going to just hand you your new business. YOU have to figure that out for yourself, based on your own knowledge, and your community. That is your first challenge as a business owner.
All of you are so willing to surrender, and go work for some company that was started by someone who wasn’t willing to surrender. You see evidence of small businesses every day, from that beat up work van next to you in traffic, to the guy painting a house, or the guy washing all the windows of that shopping plaza you drive past every day. Those windows don’t get clean and shiny on their own.
There are small businesses everywhere, all started by people who were told it was impossible by nearly everyone they knew. Yet they did it anyway.
Are you going to be the Dreamer or the Dream Stealer?
Congrats I ran a 20 man 120 light cannabis cultivation facility for 10 years. It got destroyed by margin compression and over competition. I’m sure your business is great having no overhead, no employees, no market over saturated, no legislators and private equity changing the rules every 6 months.
If you’d like to offer a suggestion on what kind of business to run here in the great state of Maine I’m all ears! Keep in mind I have limited startup capital and I’m unemployed and unable to obtain startup capital. I do own a 3 acre farm lot with a house so I got that going for me. Which business do I start?
I was in the music business, which I targeted as a teen, and customized my entire education toward that goal. I made a living in it for a long time, and it seemed like a business that would last forever, but it all collapsed in the early 2000s, the victim of computers, the Internet, and automation.
I tried making am independent living in that world for a while, but I couldn’t stay ahead of the inevitable collapse, as my clients, mostly independent record labels and record stores, folded, one after another.
So I had to pivot into an entirely different industry, which I had never prepared for, and it was scary. I concentrated on sales, because that’s was the heart of most of my business experience, and also the most important skill you can develop as a business person. You can have the best idea in the world, but if you can’t sell that idea to those who need to hear it, you’ll never get out of the gate.
You were in the cannabis growing industry, a new and growing business that promises to only get bigger. Nobody believes that they’ll go back to making weed harshly illegal again, and start throwing thousands of people in jail over it. If anything, it will be totally legal within a few years. You already know and understand that business, which is growing steadily.
I’d be offering myself as a consultant to others who are just starting to get their farms going. You can offer yourself as an experienced commercial grower, who can keep them from making the same mistakes as you did, and get their farms off to a faster, more profitable start, without the rookie mistakes. I operated a side consulting business in my industry with that exact pitch - “I screwed up EVERYTHING when I first started, but I figured it out, so I can help you avoid all those same mistakes.” It’s a surprisingly effective pitch - “I can keep you from being as stupid as me.”
f I were you, I’d be starting an independent consulting business in the Cannabis Growing Industry. I wouldn’t hesitate at all, there is definitely a business to be started there.
Beyond that, if there wasn’t a glaringly obvious hole in the local market for a service, I would be looking at creating a business on the Internet. Anyone under about 35 has no concept of how miraculous the Internet is, and how transformative it was for the world. It offers the easiest, cheapest ways to start making money, that mostly require just the time to work on it, something unemployed people have plenty of.
I’m exploring some of the online market places and potential products, distribution etc and it’s also really pricey and kind of exploitative. I do remember doing business out of the yellow pages and I wonder if the internet has become to convoluted and concentrated. Who do you ad spend with for services and products these days?
I found the transition from brick and mortar to online to be really daunting and it probably is because I’m a phonebook generation.
I’m old school, too, so my business has been built on networking, word-of-mouth, and good old repeat business. I’m worthless on Social Media, so I’m currently learning how to work with it, and making a little progress, I think.
My experience in the past with advertising is terrible, so I almost never spend money on it. I’m trying to launch a new online business, and I may have to invest a bit to jump start it, so I’m doing research before I blow my money on nothing.
Usually the best advertising is to get people to experience it firsthand, so samples or demonstrations are effective, but can be pricey and time consuming.
Yea I just shoved a vase full of flowers into a guys hands, so we come from the same school of thought. Good to hear on the ad spending I was trying to avoid it but its seems like a lot of small Direct to customer businesses have to use Instagram/Facebook/google for growth. I’m having a hard time getting serious Face time with local businesses as well, which is why im considering DTC. I guess the retail mark up is nice too. The only advertising I did in my previous business were local news prints and fund raising events for charity. Neither were very fruitful.
Oh yeah, I’m all for going direct to the consumer if you can. It’s a big layer of infrastructure and effort, but it’s worth it. I can’t imagine trying to make a living on wholesale margins.
Setting up the credit card fulfillment is probably the most complicated part, so once that’s done, you’re able to take cards from any other business you do as well. It gives you a lot more credibility than using some dumb app.
Then you have to set up a method of selling, but that’s not hard on eBay or Etsy, at least to get started.
Then you have to attract business. THAT’S the hard part.
Yea im live on ETSY and Ebay already, was debating with Amazon but doesn’t fit my scale. I’ve got a reputable eBay account but it’s still hard to get eyeballs on there even offering Ebay 15% commission for ads. I like that they are commission based. One day I will make that brave leap into credit card processing. I haven’t even researched the costs yet. Trying to grow low overhead until it’s clear I need to make these investments. Don’t need a processor if I don’t have a customer.
Whole sale margins are tough but distro makes it worth it. Simple clean 1-2 days a week, focus on farming and yields to fix the margins. But as you know, we must follow the money and 12 months in I’ve only found retail customers. I’m developing tobacco products as a last ditch effort. tobacco always sells in a recession and the high taxes and legal loop holes create some interesting opportunities. Thats where I am at tho. I’ve analyzed my entire state economy and landed on tobacco as a last ditch effort to generate revenue. There is no surrender but like…Im gonna boot leg cigarettes like I’m al Capone. Lets come to agreement on the state of the economy and political/legal world.
That was wonderful advice and I’m very impressed. Thank you for taking the time to think and write that out. I was really not expecting that much. I’m currently working down a similar path. I have a real estate license but that market has oversaturated and declined as well. I have certainly not giving up and am pursing more angles. But I gotta say it is not as easy to start a business as it was back in the 90s, 00s or 10’s. Having a more hostile business environment is as the kids would say “pulling up the ladder”.
Anyway, I really do appreciate the thoughtful response and I’m sorry if I was rude earlier. My concerns are less personal and more “why are we building a society like this”
One of the things I forgot to mention from my pitch was that I would say directly “I will give you enough tested tips, tricks, and advice, that I will pay for myself in mistakes you WONT make.”
And then I would give them a free example: You can buy a dedicated cart to carry around the gear you’ll need, and it will cost $2000, and take 6 weeks to arrive. Or you can go up to Harbor Freight, and buy this cart for $250, and it will do everything that dedicated cart will, do, plus more, AND you can stand it up against wall so it has a small profile.
There, they just saved $1750 off my fee.
And don’t let that Real.Esrate License lapse. Stay in touch with the biz, because at some point the market will turn around in a big way, and you can be in a position to recognize it, and get in early. It might be 4 or 10 years from now, but it will happen. You’ll need money then, too.
Yep I’m keeping the license up. this fall is my 4 year so I am eligible to start my own brokerage. I will probably at least go out on my own. Absolutely going to need some ad spend for that start up. I’m going to absolutely fuck my competitors and do half price deals. Drive bomb real estate commissions rates like they were cannabis prices. Won’t be looking to hire, that market always rebounds, but my entire 4 years have basically been the slowest years in real estate history. It was still kinda hot when I got in but instead of having more clients every year, its less, and more work. I’m not afraid of work, 1% commissions will bring in customers. But there just has to be real estate sales or else its just me paying fees and chatting with old ladies about their unobtainable housing needs.
You’re on a good path, keep it up. People want houses, and mortgage rates are getting lower, and prices are starting to drop.
I think the only thing holding back a lot of people is uncertainty about the future of the economy, and jobs. So people are banking money, not spending it. I have a hobby buying, fixing, and selling guitars, and I’ve noticed a big decrease in sales interest, with lots of sellers.
The good news is that if we make through this mess without losing everything, these people will be sitting on a bunch of money they can finally drop on a house.
Yea the used car market is starting to bottom out here. Lots of people dumbing those extra items. I am one of those people slowing down, money is tight, it’s not coming in. As a customer I’m purchasing inflation mitigation tools, and Capex spending on my farm. Thats it. Consulting was barely a thing in my state before things slowed down so as much as I’d love to do that. It was hard to sell consulting services when I had in of the top grows in the state and people were interested in the industry. I can’t think of anyone who would want to hire a consultant in this climate. Not a single industry except maybe real estate. I also think I’m not the only weed farmer who pivoted to traditional farming. So no surrender over here but a lot of treading water. A lot of the businesses and industries im interested are oversaturated. There’s a lot of people stuck treading water.
When I was in high school and it was time for college planning, I looked at all the careers and starting pays and pay trajectories and decided the pay wasn’t worth it. Started a weed business and went to community college for growing weed. They are still paying the same Damn wages for the same damn jobs if you’re lucky enough to find one. We have gone astray, and the American dream of owning a house and business should not be this difficult and convoluted. How can you run a business when the entire economy is just being jerked around every 6 months. You can’t long term plan a business with an unstable government and economy. We can’t hand kids a shittier deal than we got and expect them to love it and say thank you. How can a business thrive when your potential customers are squeezed to the brink.
I’m going to start the business and succeed but like damn. I’m working over time to make a $20k a year job for myself because the 40k a year jobs are fucking terrible. Im too old to go to college for 2 more years to get a 50k a year job. Be easy on these kids out here. The boot straps are stretched tight! If you are not an asset holder in the 500k-1M range this economy has fucked you to death.
I’ve interviewed with 5 brokerages in the last 2 years all desperate to bring people on. The other thing they had in common was no work. They could not convince me to jump ship to not work for them. Im a super low volume agent and they’re recruiting because I managed to scrap together a couple sales in the drought but damned if anyone can provide me with leads.