OT: Starting Businesses in Difficult Times

For the sort of a "how to have a business to run that sells something other than my time" my answer for myself is websites. They run by themselves and make money for me. It is also a very recession resistant business.

That could still work, but you have to look outward. My dream is to get a cruise ship and teach international seminars while cruising around the world. Hey, let start to dream together.

I believe that often businesses started in recessions are actually more likely to be successful, because the management is not overspending, and it always takes some time to get things going, after which chances are the economy is growing rapidly. In my experience, it's sometimes difficult to get things going in boom times because people don't want to look at new suppliers- they've got all they can handle with projects that have been on the back burner and handling increased demand. When times are tough people are more willing to look at options that bring value, and even to take certain types of risk (such as schedule risk).

Here in Canada, the Feds will pay for approved retraining of qualifying laid off workers during the time they are collecting unemployment insurance (and they don't have to look for work during the training period), and I think that can be fairly lucrative, but it's more than just a seminar, more like a few months four days a week or so. A combination of something like that and training to corporations might be a recession-proof business model.

There was a controls seminar some years ago given on a tall (sailing) ship in the Carribean. That would be nice. Some potential upside on taxation too, depending on your residency and citizenship.

What are your web sites selling? Physical products? eBooks? Videos?

I am thinking about the Pacific. They (the students' parents and governments) have money and willing to learn. It is too difficult to arrange it for them in the US, so it needs to be in international water.

Able and Willing to change.

It's better to sell things manufactured by people who don't understand how they work. If you train up a bunch of seminar-givers, there's nothing keeping them from going feral on you.

The nice thing about products is they they sell your expertise many, many times for a one-time design effort.

Another way to have ongoing revenue is to design something for a small, cash-poor startup in return for equity or royalties.

John

Is that really much different than training up a bunch of engineers to build competitive, marketable products, though? -- Since they can jump ship at any time and either start their own business or go to the competition?

ge

And you can't stop the rest of the world to train them. If you don't want to train them, there are hundreds of people lining up behind you for the chance to do so.

Hi, Tim. May I suggest in this economy you consider buying an existing business? The recession has already weeded out the businesses that are weak in either capital or management skills. Now the problem will be to find one that is willing to make you a long term deal because banks are really gun shy about business loans.

Another possibility is to find one or more partners to join in either buying or starting a business. My experience has been that a new produce takes two years or more to go from idea to production. If you are looking to create a physical product, can you survive economically for that long and still have enough capital to market the item?

I need another year or so to get my business back into profitability, then you could buy it and move to the dry side.

Good luck!

Paul

I am not selling anything, they are informational, but carry ads or some such.

The REAL EASY MONEY is in wire brushes. You can make a mint and spend all your spare time cruisin' the 'net, casting bullets, and shooting

Karl

Ah, gotcha. Don't you need many thousands of hits per day to make significant money that way?

Depends on site, generally yes.

Well, I can tell you about a half-dozen ways NOT to try to start a business, mostly having to do with lack of capital and lack of customers. ;-)

Good Luck! Rich

I had a good friend that was the main instructor for PSpice classes. He took a look at all the usual costs involved, and figured out that having the class on a one week cruise would cost LESS than holding it in a hotel, both for the company and the students!

Unfortunately, the reality of going to your boss, and asking to take a cruise to learn PSpice sank the idea! You are supposed to be working!

Charlie

I had a guy tell me that his boss wouldn't let him go to the Embedded Systems Conference when it was in San Francisco because SF was too much of a tourist town, and it was just vacation time.

Getting sent to a seminar in an armpit of a city someplace was fine, though.

Probably the best solution to that is to choose a variety of venues -- catch the "I'll get a seminar and a vacation" at some, catch the ones with Grinch for a boss in others.

That's hard-core.

And to think that there are actually some ENGINEERING COMPANIES in San Francisco! I wonder how they ever get any work done? Amazing!

:-)

I spent a month at a customer site in Rochelle, Illinois, once... definitely qualifies as an armpit.

---Joel

I see a lot of down-side. Too many PHBs would sign up.