Business owners

[timebombprod]

For the ones who've created their own business how long did it take before you were able to make it your full time job, or start really racking in money? What business was it and was it as profitable as you expected?


Ive had a mobile mechanic business for boats for a while, about half a year ago I was working and it's great pay for the amount of time I worked, but I only had about a couple weeks to really get it going before I just decided to focus on school completely. I made a little over a grand in those two weeks and that was only working 2 actual jobs, 8 hours of labour. I'm now out of school and I've started back up and so far I had one job and I have one coming up this week hopefully but I never count on people so I just wait until I'm at their house working on the boat to say It's another job I did. But anyways I've had about 3 weeks to a month now of running ads part time on Facebook and posting on groups, I know Rome wasn't built in a day but I'm just curious about how your experiences went.

[Suzukian]

It depends where you are. In Connecticut, the boat slips only let you use their mechanics. You have to take your boat elsewhere to get it fixed. They will not let any business work on any boat in a slip. I worked on a Pearson 10 Meter sailboat I used to sail. I changed out the starter motor, and was cleaning the winches, when they came up to me ready to kick me out. It was a few phone calls the determined I was doing my girlfriend's Mom a favor, no money was exchanging hands.

My TV/Audio?Electronic repair shop was never really successful. I made some wage out of it, but if it wasn't for the stuff I did under the table, I could not have stayed open 10 years. You also must have contractors insurance. If something happened on that boat, you would be blamed, and civil cases against you are good for 20 years. They will clean you out now, and for the next 20 years. You have to factor insurance into your expenses. It was all this little stuff that I had to have that made it impossible. You are actually better off buying boats that need repair, then selling them "as is".

[RichDesmond]

LOL at the "start really raking in money" bit.

Running/operating a profitable business is hard. If it was easy everyone would do it. Picking up the occasional odd job is very different from having a real business. What you're doing now isn't going to scale the way you seem to think it will.

Not saying that it can't turn into a good business, but for that to happen you're going to have to to think differently. Most critically, IME most people in your type of situation are very bad at properly accounting for all their costs, and extremely bad at accounting for all their time.

[Sandy]

Retired for almost 6 years now but I spent my last 25 working years self employeed in the IT world. My case was rather different because while employed by the local school board I was offered a substantial contract support position with a major (IBM) IT company as a 3rd party service provider to provide client support for the large remote geographic area where I lived. So I quit my day job and jumped on the opportunity. Not a lot of hours to start but it gave me the seed money to move on. News traveled like wildfire and I was soon doing Dell, Lexmark and Lenovo as well as some private commercial clients. Thankfully I was able to totally stay away from retail sales and home user support. At one point I had the opportunity of bringing in more work and hiring extra help but soon realized I did not want to go down that rabbit hole. I think one thing that really helped me grow a solid profitable private client base was being able to give some stuff away, not being pain in the butt to clients and make life easy and convenient for them. Unlike a lot of service companies I did not have a minimum charge just to show up. If a regular client called and all it took was 5 - 10 minutes to remedy a minor issue there would be no charge or I'd tell them I'd just add it to the next call. I wouldn't invoice at every call but give them a detailed invoice at month end or when it was substantial enough to warrant a bill. It was a pretty loose arrangement all round but in 25 years I was never stiffed for payments. All in all it was a really good gig.

[argonsagas]

For the ones who've created their own business how long did it take before you were able to make it your full time job, or start really racking in money? What business was it and was it as profitable as you expected?


Ive had a mobile mechanic business for boats for a while, about half a year ago I was working and it's great pay for the amount of time I worked, but I only had about a couple weeks to really get it going before I just decided to focus on school completely. I made a little over a grand in those two weeks and that was only working 2 actual jobs, 8 hours of labour. I'm now out of school and I've started back up and so far I had one job and I have one coming up this week hopefully but I never count on people so I just wait until I'm at their house working on the boat to say It's another job I did. But anyways I've had about 3 weeks to a month now of running ads part time on Facebook and posting on groups, I know Rome wasn't built in a day but I'm just curious about how your experiences went.

You need a good business plan. Really, you NEED this.
Do you have sufficient capital, equipment, knowledge of and access to outside resources, to do whatever your customer(s) are likely to ask of you?

After that, and perhaps the most difficult thing to maintain, is patience, with a strong mix of determination.

You must be patient, not just with your own expectations, but with customers.
You need them and then you need to keep them happy. It is far easier to keep a good customer than to find a replacement for a lost one..

Determination to succeed is needed, but it must be tempered. It is needed to keep on keeping on with it, but you will also need a filter that tells/shows you if the path you are following is really not a good one. Many start-ups fail because they miss or misread the road signs.

[timebombprod]

Thanks for all the advice!

For rich, you are absolutely right about time as my schedule will completely go out the door if I don't have something to do, but I am very smart with my money as I'm over buying things that wouldn't stay with me in the long run or help anything, or maybe that's not what you meant at all and I just haven't got enough experience from this to understand yet. A big part of me wanting to go this route is because I'm bad at going off somebody else's time, I work the best when I just have my own time to do what I need to do, and I see alot more value in myself than what a wage would be at a marina here.

For suzukian, luckily i am able to work on other peoples boat no problem whether its in a marina or at their house, but alot of marinas do require liability insurance and I WILL absolutely get screwed over if I were to mess up a customer's boat without having it. This is also why I don't take a job if I'm not confident I can do it, which is rare but still I make sure to not cross my limits especially when screwing up could affect somebody else other than me. Also for the cost of the insurance there's no reason not to have it. Also most privately owned businesses always have to do stuff under the table so they can even make it, the government doesn't want you to succeed!

For sandy, that sounds like one of the best possible outcomes, that's awesome! I am the same way as in I don't see the customer for just a profit and if im onky there for 5 minutes i cant take any money, id feel like im robbing them. The biggest thing for me is having somebody who wants to come back and also wants to recommend me to other people because they had such a good experience. From the work I've done most of the people have been very easy going, even if they aren't I can tell and it always works out well, most of my jobs I've been tipped extra and It could be because I'm charging so little compared to a shop but I like to think it's because im likeable (it's definitely the first reason lol)



And for argon, there isn't necessarily a laid out business plan for now, really I just hope that I get successful enough that I NEED a shop for people to be able to drop off their boats, but there's not much more to it than that for me and I think for right now setting a goal for that is just fine. As for equipment and knowledge, I have all the tools I need to do any basic service or replacement on a motor and I even have some of the specialty tools for testing certain things as well, and I feel very confident in my knowledge, honestly working on an outboard motor is a piece of cake to me, maybe it's because I already had to do most basic things to a motor before I even joined the course, but either way i Have no hesitation doing what I need to do once I am working. I not only have confidence, but I want to fix whatever that issue is or find that problem for ME, because I want to know that I did it and I want to feel the satisfaction of getting it right. The ambition is there in many forms, whether it's having a good relationship with the customer, finding a problem that wasn't so easy to troubleshoot, or just doing the best job I can on a simple service, I just want to do the best I can and give the customer confidence that I am doing the best I can for them as well! I want to feel that im not overcharginf or underperforming and i will be very transparent with them on that, if i came over and did something that took me a lot less time than i said, im definitely gonna charge them for how long I actually worked on it, not what I stated, and I'm also gonna make sure I did it as good as possible, because doing it right the first time makes everything easier.


Just a little extra note, i used to say the reason a customer shouod come to me instead of a shop is because I charge alot less for the same quality, and that still holds true 100%, but now working on people's boats, I've noticed plenty of things that were skipped for say an annual service or some form of maintenence, shoot I had a guy that said he brought his boat in for an annual service last year and his water filter separator (6 month or 50 hour service interval) hasn't been changed in atleast 5 years, that's the most important filter to stop anything from getting to your motor! The whole thing was rusted out top to bottom, which made me check the rest of the guys fuel delivery system, and luckily nothing went through but I let him know and it got changed the same day, and yeah there was a bunch of crap sitting in it as well as bad fuel and a bit of water. So now i say that not only do i charge less, but i ensure the job is done as thoroughly as possible, in a way im better than a shop! But ofcourse I don't sit there boasting, it's just things like that that shock me especially when you take it to a place that should be doing everything correctly.

So as of right now i just keep on keeping on, I don't expect to be filling up my schedule anytime soon, not because I don't have ambition to find customers but things like this just take time, but if I get a job this week, or two jobs next week, it's surely more than I would have If I never tried going this route.

[trevor]

A couple of posts here remind me of the joke about the bull
There are hundreds of cows grazing below. The young bull says, "Let's run down there and blank a cow!"

The old bull says, "No, let's walk down and blnak them all."

[dorkburger]

No experience with running a buisness, but many tradesmen have started out with an established shop, learned the lay of the land, gained experience, made contacts, etc, then went out on their own. I've also worked with a good number of fellow HVAC techs that briefly ran their own buisnesses then closed up shop, so the advice given here so far sounds solid.

[oldGSfan]

Not first-hand experience, but In my area, Orange County CA, I can drive in any direction for a long while and see businesses of all types tucked away in light industrial warehouse type buildings, shopping centers, etc. Thousands upon thousands of them. It astounds me how many there are. How well they do I can't say but it surely takes a lot of work to get off the ground. Personnel, accounting, marketing, research, rent etc, all expensive.

I have a friend that does prosthetic type, umm, implants (?) for women that have had mastectomies, his biggest issue is dealing with the government regulations but that's also about chasing contracts that pay off big. I told him there's a whole other market for those falsies that he may be overlooking . Another friend invented a low price LED lighted 'loupe' for dentists - which work great in the garage BTW, and did it all out of his house. His wife did the marketing and as a vivacious and attractive blonde Aussie, she pulled in the sales at shows. Then he sold out to a big competitor and retired with a fat paycheck. Another friend does very specialized map applications and UI stuff for Inflight Entertainment, my field actually. Each of the these friends work their tails off but also do very well financially.

[RichDesmond]

Thanks for all the advice!

For rich, you are absolutely right about time as my schedule will completely go out the door if I don't have something to do, but I am very smart with my money as I'm over buying things that wouldn't stay with me in the long run or help anything, or maybe that's not what you meant at all and I just haven't got enough experience from this to understand yet. A big part of me wanting to go this route is because I'm bad at going off somebody else's time, I work the best when I just have my own time to do what I need to do, and I see alot more value in myself than what a wage would be at a marina here...

Nope, not what I meant. I'm talking about properly accounting for ALL the costs associated with the business, money and time, and reflecting them in the rate you charge.
Small example, you likely realize that the gas it takes you to drive to the job needs to be covered. But what about other costs? Regular maintenance that extra mileage causes to occur more frequently? Added depreciation on your vehicle? Does your insurance cover business use of the vehicle?
There will be a bunch of other small things, and they add up. Time, similar story. The business will eat up various chunks of your 168 hours/week in ways that don't feel like you're "working", at least at first. But if you're not careful about tracking this stuff and making sure that it's fairly represented in the hourly rate you charge, you'll end up working for less than minimum wage without realizing it.

And another big topic is the legal, tax and liability end of things. Have you set up an LLC yet? If not, the only fair question to ask is, are you insane? You absolutely need to shield your personal assets from legal liability that may accrue from the operation of the business. In your situation I would likely form two LLCs. One for the actual mechanic piece, and a separate one that owned the tools and other physical assets that you use in the business. For every job, the first LLC rents the tools from the second one. That way if you (as the mechanic) get sued there are no assets to go after, as the tools are owned by a separate entity.
And for God's sake, talk to a lawyer and hire a bookkeeper/account. Get a credit card that you use only for business purposes, and never use your personal cards for the business. Do NOT comingle personal money and business money in any way! Declare all the income, and pay the taxes that are due. Keep complete, thorough and organized records. (And yes, doing that is part of the time that has to get accounted for. And the lawyer and the bookkeeper are part of the costs)

Above all else, get professional advice from qualified people, and don't place too much faith in random people on an internet motorcycle forum.

[timebombprod]

thankyou rich, thats a bunch of helpful advice that i really do need to understand, i guess that might be part of what i was looking for and didnt even realise it, i did have the understanding that im really never off the clock but i guess i didnt think about all the little things that add up.

and the LLC has not been informed yet, and no not insane but just dumb, i guess me being the age i am and not being &$%^ed over by this situation made it not the biggest urgency, its more that i needed to get a couple jobs in order to have the funds to properly set myself up. im thinking about doing doordash for the time being just to have a steady income while im building this business and also to be able to get all the legal documentation needed to setup this business.

i copied what you said and put it in my notes because this seriously is great advice i needed to have! this will cover my ass well lol.

[argonsagas]

Rich said it much more elaborately than I did.

These things are all part of what you NEED to do when making a functional business plan.

Here are some on-line options to help you

https://www.sba.gov/business-guide/plan-your-business/write-your-business-plan

https://articles.bplans.com/how-to-write-a-business-plan/

https://www.cornerstone.edu/blog-post/how-to-create-a-business-plan-a-step-by-step-guide/

this one is from Canada:

https://www.lawdepot.ca/contracts/business-plan/?loc=CA&pid=msnppc-1228154539002035-76759837820236_sl-msnkey_how%20to%20make%20a%20business%20plan&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&MSCLKID=4c52d342977b1109f3beb0351e610a2b