I
always plan. I like to think ahead and to have everything set up before
starting. That is why starting my own business has proven a little more
complicated than I thought. You always hear from people that failing is an
inevitable aspect of any business. I am trying to understand that concept a
little better. As I was jogging the other day, I thought about Nikola Tesla.
All the inventions that he came up with but that he did not patent and were
taken by Thomas Edison. Tesla was a thinker, Edison was a businessman. I think
about what I want to do. I want to do both. I wish I was more like the people
who start building and having new inventions all the time. Oftentimes, I think “That
idea is not worth it, why bother.” The why
bother is nothing more than a roadblock. It stops me from starting and from
actually completing something.
Ever
since I was little I remember having a plan. I would come up with these ingenious
strategies to make money and I would share these plans with my sister. The plan
always involved me telling her what to do, her believing it was a good idea,
trying to do it, and then us obtaining a few quarters for the job. When she was
8, I had this awesome idea of cleaning windows for our neighbors and getting a
quarter per window. Take into account our community was forty houses. On the
first house my sister introduced herself while I watched from another house.
She would say what our services were, then call me out. I would be embarrassed for
her blowing my cover, but would come out and tell the people what it was we
were selling at the time. As we grew older and went to middle school and high
school the idea of selling stuff seemed less appealing to me as we were forced
to sell door-to-door for orchestra fundraisers. I did not enjoy that because it
was like a chore. In college all the door-to-door stopped. Now, a mere 3 years
after graduating with an engineering degree, I’m looking at entrepreneurship
closely. I decided to start small and decided to begin by making wooden
letters. See below for a few designs:
I made a spreadsheet with all the calculations, even had a shop name: Silverpearl
I also gave my sister a sample to help me show our potential costumers how it
would look.
I opened an Instagram account on the shop, made a logo (Rafael came up with a clever design) and opened an
Etsy account for the new shop. However, I only had 2 people show interest in buying. One guy
said he would love his name made but then never bought the product. Another friend
asked me about the business 3 months later, but by that time I had forgotten
about the shop. I told her I was not in business anymore.
If I could re-do something again. I would continue with my first business. I want to have a chance to say. What wooden letters would you like me to make for you? What is your color of preference? Leave a comment if you are interested.
What
makes a business successful? You have to believe in your business. Costumers
might not fly to you right away. I waited for a while and after not getting
attention, I stopped paying attention to my own business. I am not proud of
that. I am taking baby steps. I am trying to learn from the options that haven’t
worked. I always play in my mind those words I told my friend. I am not making letters anymore. I don’t want to give up on
myself. I want to keep trying. That is why I thought about starting again. I have realized that there is a lot of
people that have tons of ideas but they don’t know where to start. They do not
have a prototype or they don’t know if their idea has already been made or who their potential costumers are. Of course I talked to Rafael first.
"Tell
me what the company will be about" He said curiously as he cleaned the kitchen
island. I looked at him and said:
"It’s a company about ideas"
I did not have a business plan. Just an idea in my mind. “It
is maybe like a consulting service for people who want to make their ideas come
to life.”
He stopped cleaning, looked me in the eye and said: “Have I ever
showed you the business plan for D2G?” I had not seen his plan so he showed me
a power-point and it had a process flow of all the services his business would provide. It was
much more extensive than what I had in mind and much better than I had
imagined. But it was exactly what I was thinking but with a good draft in place.
Since then I have been working on a
lot of things. I want to be a doer and I do realize that there is so much that
I don’t yet know! I want to start this business. I need to sharpen our business plan. I have started with the logo, but not yet a webpage. I want to be better than last time. I don't want to make all these accounts and then just think that the business is going to run itself. Some parts have already
lined up for us:
A friend of Rafael already does some
of the prototypes for a company here in Austin. We met about 3 weeks ago and
are planning on partnering up. The side of the company that I would take would be in charge
of marketing and distribution. I have talked to a lot of people about this. My
parents included. They have experience and they are very smart. My dad’s
advice: start with someone you can rely. That is you. Do not try to rely on a
lawyer or a patent officer yet. Stay small first to build your reputation.
Everything sounds great theoretically. I am still working on a plan. Working
out the details. There is so much to do. I want to get our business plan beyond a powerpoint. I want to talk to
people and make deals. I am not the type of person that does that, but I feel
that is what it might take to get support from those small businesses. I
realize that I am no expert. I am looking into going to business school. I am studying for the GRE. I know
classes don’t make you an entrepreneur, but I want to fill up some gaps. I need
to make connections. There is still a lot of work to do. The first step: take
one idea through the whole process. I will talk about that process and about my first two ideas on the
next blog.
Until then. Please pray for me. I will
keep working hard and learning as I go!
