All articles written by: Gavin

Quick ways to boost business cash flow

5 Quick Ways to Boost Business Cashflow Instantly

With insolvency on the rise (the number of UK businesses claiming insolvency in 2022 was at its highest level since 2009), here we look at 5 quick ways to boost business cash flow instantly.

Cash flow refers to the amount of money that comes in and goes out of a business, and it’s essential to keep it positive for your business’s survival and growth. Here are five quick ways to boost business cash flow instantly:

  1. Offer Discounts for Early Payment

One way to boost cash flow is by offering discounts for early payment. This can be an effective way to incentivize customers to pay their invoices earlier than usual. Offering a small discount, such as 2-3% off, for payments received within a specific timeframe can encourage customers to prioritize your invoice and pay it sooner.

When implementing this strategy, it’s important to communicate the terms and conditions clearly to your customers. Make sure you highlight the benefits of early payment, such as saving money and improving their credit score. Additionally, set a clear deadline for the discount to expire, so customers know they need to act quickly.

  1. Negotiate Payment Terms with Vendors

Another way to improve cash flow is by negotiating payment terms with your vendors. Often, vendors will offer discounts or extended payment terms if you pay your bills earlier than usual. By negotiating these terms, you can reduce the amount of money going out of your business and free up cash flow for other purposes.

When negotiating with vendors, make sure you understand the terms and conditions fully. If the vendor offers a discount for early payment, make sure you can meet the deadline and take advantage of the discount. Similarly, if you negotiate extended payment terms, ensure you can meet the new deadline without jeopardizing your cash flow.

  1. Sell Unused Assets

If your business has unused assets, such as equipment or inventory, selling them can generate additional cash flow. This can be especially useful if you have older equipment or inventory that is no longer needed or has depreciated in value.

To sell unused assets, you can use online marketplaces or auction sites to reach a broader audience. Alternatively, you can work with a local equipment or inventory dealer who specializes in buying and selling used assets.

When selling unused assets, make sure you understand their market value and price them accordingly. You may need to invest some time and effort into cleaning and repairing the assets to get the best price.

  1. Offer Subscription Services

Offering subscription services can be an effective way to generate consistent, recurring revenue for your business. By charging customers a monthly or annual fee, you can create a predictable cash flow stream that can help stabilize your business’s finances.

To implement this strategy, you need to identify services that customers are willing to pay for on a recurring basis. This can include products or services that customers use regularly, such as software, training, or maintenance services.

When developing your subscription service, make sure you price it appropriately and offer clear value to your customers. Communicate the benefits of the subscription, such as cost savings, convenience, and access to exclusive content or services.

  1. Claim R&D Tax Credits

Finally, one of the most effective ways to boost business cash flow is by claiming R&D tax credits. These tax credits are designed to incentivize businesses to invest in research and development activities that can lead to innovation and growth.

To claim R&D tax credits, you need to identify activities that qualify for the credit, such as developing new products, processes, or services. You also need to document these activities thoroughly and prepare a detailed claim that outlines the expenses related to the R&D activities.

Working with a specialist R&D tax credit advisor can help ensure that you maximize your claim and receive the full benefit of the tax credit. This can provide a significant boost to your cash flow, which you can reinvest in your business to drive further growth and innovation.

I have worked alongside many clients to process their R&D Tax credit claims, and always use the same consultant firm – they have consistently helped to advise on qualifying projects, and are supportive/helpful throughout the whole process. To find out if your project could be eligible, sign-up and answer some questions about your project here.

In conclusion, managing cash flow is critical to the success of any business. By implementing these five quick ways to boost cash flow, you can free up cash to invest in your business and drive growth.

These are trying times for small businesses across the Country, with many under more financial pressure now, than they have ever been. So I do hope these tips help to ease the difficult times and allow you to navigate your business to a bright future.

long-stay-visa-france

Long Stay Visa France: A Cautionary Tale

If you’re thinking of moving to France under the Long Stay Visa France – Talent Passport, I hope you find this post useful.

We recently spent the past 5 weeks following the entire process, and in summary, it’s not at all easy.

And it’s not even the large expense and time/effort required to get all the specified documents together that’s the hard part.

The hardest part is that the visa approval process in France is ‘highly discretionary’ – so even if you dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s, going over-and-above what’s asked, if you happen to have your application land on the desk of a consulate employee who’s had a bad day, they can render all the prior time, effort, and expense, pointless.

I’m going to start with a little background information to our situation then proceed to cover-off everything we had to do in order to bring our application together.

Everything we did in the visa process was textbook, we met every requirement laid-out to us. But there was one stumbling block that our (very awkward) consulate employee brought our way that wasn’t made clear to us at the outset, so I’m going to wrap this post up by covering this and hopefully help a few readers to avoid a similar situation to the one we experienced by sharing this ‘insider information’ on the process.

We applied for a Long Stay Visa France – Talent Passport, Company Representative.

Why We Chose Long Stay Visa France – Talent Passport, Company Representative

If you’ve read other posts on this blog, you may know by now that we run our own businesses. One of which is an ecommerce health food retailer Vitalife Health.

This business has been struggling with International sales since Brexit was brought into effect at the start of 2021.

With almost 65% of sales coming from outside of the UK (pre-Brexit, at least), consumer sales across the EU were a fairly significant part of our business.

However, since Brexit, most parcels were either being outright blocked by customs (due to new commodity code restrictions), or our customers were receiving further charges from the courier for import VAT and customs duties.

We initially thought we could navigate these changes whilst still utilising consolidated fulfilment from our single UK warehouse, but over time, we realised this wasn’t going to be possible. We’d underestimated how much disruption Brexit was going to cause to EU-based consumer orders.

Despite the difficulties it poses, considering the vast product range we offer through Vitalife Health, and the added complexities of managing separate fulfilment systems – we decided that sending goods at wholesale volume (palletised) to the EU, then breaking this down, storing in an EU-based warehouse and fulfilling to consumers within the EU was going to be the only real effective solution to the issue.

Bear in-mind, we could have introduced a totally remote solution for this – we didn’t need to register an actual business in an EU Country (we would have just needed an EU VAT number), and we certainly didn’t have to personally move to the EU Country that we were planning to run our fulfilment from.

However, lifestyle factors also came into play, and we were feeling like we were ready for our next adventure after living on the Isle of Wight for over 7 years (since our original move from Rotherham, South Yorkshire).

In essence, we felt we could kill two birds with one stone, by establishing fulfilment operations from France and also using the business move as leverage to fit nicely with the Long Stay Visa France – Talent Passport, Company Representative option – facilitating our lifestyle move to France too.

We chose to do this for two reasons:

  1. COVID regulations for travel to France were very restrictive at the time (and still are, at the time of writing this post), and you had to produce a ‘compelling reason’ why you were travelling to France. These reasons were predefined, and the only one that could apply to us was having possession of a Long Stay Visa France – Talent Passport. So we literally needed the long-term visa to even step foot in the Country
  2. We have 2 young children, and transitioning them to a foreign speaking school was something I was a little apprehensive about. However, long stay talent passport visas provide a 4 year visa from the off – meaning we could be certain that there was sufficient time for the kids (and ourselves) to master the new language, and not have to head back to the UK after just 12 months had we received a shorter-term visa and not been able to renew it for whatever reason. If we had to return after such a short time, I feel like they’d have struggled with the initial transition to a foreign-speaking school, and received no real benefit in return. They certainly wouldn’t be fluent after such a short time.

We received a little professional consultation from an Expat specialist (who I won’t mention the name of here – since they were actually very helpful, and I don’t want to link them to our unsuccessful visa application as it was not their fault), and after considering all Talent Passport options, we went with the Company Representative Long Stay Visa, as we felt it fit our situation perfectly.

The Requirements (or at least, the ones they state openly) of the Talent Passport – Company Representative

The first step in any France visa application is to process your application on the France Visas portal.

Select the visa category you require, and follow the application process. You’ll be asked a number of questions – name, DOB, Nationality, Residency, and so on.

At the end of the process, you’ll be presented with a printable version of your France Visas Application Form, along with some ‘guidance’ on what evidence you’ll need to supply to the consulate to support your application.

NOTE: Do not leave this file in your downloads folder! Place it in a backed-up, permanent folder. I made this mistake, and between applying for the visa and reaching the appointment date I had to reset my laptop password which – on a Chromebook, at least – deletes all local data (including downloaded files!).

This wouldn’t have been too much of a problem – I’d just need to log back in to the France Visas portal and re-download the files. Well – turns out the France Visas portal is not the most reliable in the World and is often down/extremely slow. On this occasion their website was down for a whole week, and it wasn’t until 10.30pm on the night before our appointment with TLS Contact that the platform came back online! We very nearly had to cancel due to not having a copy of the application forms.

So, when you get the file, back it up, print it out, and keep the copies safe!

For the Talent Passport – Company Representative application (at the time of writing), supporting evidence consists of:

  • A travel document (in most cases, this will be your passport), issued less than 10 years ago, containing at least two blank pages, with a period of validity at least 3 months longer than the date on which you intend to leave the Schengen Area or, in the case of a long stay, at least three months longer than the expiry date of the visa requested. Be sure to transmit (scan) ALL PAGES of your travel document containing visas, entry and exit stamps or any other inscription
  • ID Photograph (on most modern photo booths you are given the option to select a visa picture, ensuring this is the correct format required)
  • If you are not a national of your country of residence: proof that you are legally resident in that country (e.g. residence permit)
  • Proof that you hold a position of corporate representative (mandataire social) in a company established in France.
  • Evidence of a monthly remuneration at least equal to 3 times the French minimum wage.
  • Proof of seniority of more than 3 months as an employee or corporate representative in a company of the same group

The top 3 bullet points above are required for all visa applications, regardless of category. The bottom three are category-specific to the Company Representative – Talent Passport.

Translation of the above documents may also be required, but the way the consulate communicates this on the printout form doesn’t make it totally clear whether the documents need to be in French AND English, or French OR English. As a result, and as a precautionary measure, I had all documents translated into French, alongside their English originals. I also ensured this translation was performed by a consulate-recognised translator from the ‘Directory of Sworn Translators in France’, they can be found here.

Our application was a little more convoluted than if you were to just apply for a visa as an individual, since we’d attached my Wife and our two children’s visa applications to the Company Representative visa application, as ‘accompanying family’. But in the interests of keeping this post focused on the Talent Passport – Company Representative visa application process, I’ve not covered what was also necessary for these accompanying applications.

They also ask that you present photocopies of all the above – but frankly, we could have saved a heck of a lot of unnecessary paper, as none of the photocopies were taken from us when we submitted our application in-person (aside from the photocopy of the passport).

Once you’ve brought all of the above supporting evidence and application form/registration receipt printouts together, then you need to register your details and link your France Visa applications to the outsourced company that the consulate uses to compile and process applications – TLS Contact.

Once you’ve registered with TLS contact online, you’ll be asked to book your appointment date with one of their centres (London, Manchester, or Edinburgh), where you’ll need to show in-person to provide all the documents you’ve prepared, and supply your biometric data (if they don’t already hold this from an earlier visa application).

The Problem with Our Talent Passport Long Stay Visa France Application

With everything prepared, we attended the meeting at TLS Contact, paid the necessary visa fees, and gave our biometric data (the whole process, by the way, takes around 2-3 hours – so don’t be fooled by the shorter estimates they give online for the process).

Just two days later we received an email from the French Consulate.

They were asking for supporting evidence that we had apparently not provided – but the evidence they were asking for did not relate to our application type at all. They were asking for evidence that related to the Talent Passport, Long Stay Visa France – Business Creator.

This application type didn’t meet our needs – yet they’d shifted us over to this because they felt we didn’t meet the requirements of the Legal Representative option.

We contested, and asked for reasoning as to why they felt we didn’t meet the requirements. What followed was a succession of excuses:

  1. Our business hadn’t been established long enough for it to form the basis of the application

Well, firstly, there is no rule about the age of a company for which you are proposing to act as legal representative. But even if this was the case (which, it isn’t), I explained that this was not a new company, but a branch of an existing UK business that had been established for over 12 years.

They didn’t acknowledge the reply I gave, but instead came back with excuse number 2:

2. I couldn’t be the sole beneficiary of the French incorporated branch

Again, no published rulings on this – it isn’t a requirement of this visa type. I explained this, and also advised that if it was such a barrier, I could quite easily add a second Director/Shareholder to the French branch, so this was not the case. I was providing an almost immediate and direct resolution to excuse number 2.

Again, without acknowledging the points I raised, they moved onto excuse number 3:

3. I wasn’t registered for French social security yet and did not have an official French employment contract in-place

Once again, not a published stipulation for this visa type. And again, despite this, I focused on providing a solution to the problem they were creating – I had a French employment contract professionally created, and had our French accounting firm register me for social security. Points addressed – time to have our visas awarded, surely?

Nope. Excuse number 4:

4. Grace, my Wife and employee to the French branch, could not sign/authorise my French employment contract

Again, not a pre-defined requirement. And also again, instead of arguing this point, I advised that Grace was an employee of the branch and was suitably authorised to authenticate my employment contract.

The correspondence we had in response to this basically said they were no longer engaging in back-and-forth discussion with us, and our passports would be returned to the TLS Contact visa centre forthwith.

So out of the 4 excuses raised, we provided suitable, rational responses/solutions – and because we kept doing this, I’m assuming they were running out of new excuses and decided to close the file, stamped with a NO.

The Lesson

You can’t trust the French.

JOKE! Actually, all other contact with French organisations and individuals was super-helpful throughout the process. It was purely the embassy employee (and, no doubt, powers above that individual) that led to a very unreasonable, irrational experience.

The real lesson is hard to summarise neatly since, after all, the process is ‘highly subjective’ and even if you followed the same process as we did, supplying the exact same materials, you might fly through the process.

I just wanted to share our experience here so you approach the Long Stay Visa France process very carefully, and try not to incur too much expense during the process – since it can all be wasted if you’re unfortunate like us.

So what’s next for us?

If you’ve read my recently published book Angel 0202, you’ll understand the benefits of geographic arbitrage on a personal level.

After our Long Stay Visa France refusal we reassessed our situation, both from a business and a personal perspective.

As it turns out, France wasn’t the most rewarding option on the table for us. We’d simply been sucked-in by the draw of cheap property, outdoor pools, and the idea of sitting on the balcony enjoying croissants in the mornings and fine cheeses and wine in the evenings.

We’re now in the latter stages of completing our move to a place that’s far more welcoming of our family and economic contributions than France appeared to be. I’ll share more in my next post.

Angel Number 0202

New Book Launch: Angel Number 0202

Like for most people, 2020 was a crazy year for us.

We had to completely restructure one of our core businesses, Vitalife Health, so that it could continue to supply healthy food, drink and supplements to people across the Country and beyond.

It involved a brief period of having to resort to single-handedly fulfilling orders in-house for a few weeks (I’m talking 8-12 pallet loads per day, for 1 person to unload, sort, pick, pack, and despatch), whilst we established a new fulfilment partnership that was robust enough to deal with peaks and troughs in demand, and meet the demands of social distancing and safe business practice.

That one person was me, and it was exhausting.

I have a newfound insight and appreciation for the order pickers/packers in our fulfilment warehouses – they are the reason why people have still been able to have access to essentials throughout this time. I take my hat off to warehouse workers across the Country, they have coped tremendously well with the upsurge that online retail has seen.

Meanwhile, my Wife Grace did a wonderful job taking care of both of our young children at home whilst I was out of the house from the early hours to late at night (I’m not sure which task was the most tiring – probably Grace’s!).

All this, alongside the usual demands of operating and growing Love Health Hate Waste, Vitalife Vend (the most negatively-affected business of the Group during this time), and Vitalife Threads. Plus keeping momentum in the projects we have bubbling under the surface, like Wightpass, and launching our brand new ecommerce project Mailpranx.

It’s been a hectic 12 months – which will hopefully explain the complete lack of posts here.

But I’m back! And I’m back with big news.

We’ve just launched our KD Publishing exclusive book release of my course ‘Fast Track Entrepreneur: Build an Online Business in 4 Weeks’, which you can download for Kindle devices here.

The paperback will also launch in the next 24 hours.

Both versions of the book feature updated content from the original course material, which I’m hoping to feed-back as an update to the course itself very soon.

But furthermore, I have another KD Publishing exclusive book scheduled for release on the 15th February 2021 (coincidentally, in-line with the proposed end of the UK lockdown, and also my Birthday!).

The book is titled ‘Angel Number 0202’, and rather than explain the concept, here’s an exclusive sneak-peak to the introductory sections of the book – the preface and ‘about the author’ sections:

About the Author

I’m not a fan of third-party-written author introductions.

They’re either written by the actual author anyway, pretending to be a third-person as though it makes them seem more important, or they are written by someone else, but all the information has to be provided by the author anyway, so they might aswell have written it themselves!

So this is a first-person ‘about the author’.

I’m Gavin. Hi.

I’m a British entrepreneur.

I haven’t taken a single face-to-face business meeting in over 7 years. I rarely accept phone calls.  I mostly communicate via email only. I work from home in the Isle of Wight with my Wife Grace and two children, Betsey, 6, and Ralph, 2. I haven’t worn a suit since I got married. I spend life mostly in my shorts and t-shirt, and my office is the sofa. 

I feel like I’m in an AA meeting, but for entrepreneurial dossers. 

I could have worded that differently to sound a whole lot more professional, but I want to be honest. This is how I conduct my life and my business. 

Whilst wearing those shorts and t-shirt, laying on the sofa (occasionally getting stomped and sat-on by our 2-year-old Ralph), I’ve also somehow managed to:

  • Simultaneously build 3 multi-million pound turnover businesses 
  • Build an e-commerce retail offering of over 35,000 lines
  • Serve hundreds of thousands of consumers through our online businesses
  • Save over £8m of healthy food and drink from unnecessarily going to landfill, instead making it available to people at up to 90% off RRP to make healthy and dietary-specific food more accessible for all
  • Launch online business courses that have now helped over 12,000 students across the World to start their own businesses 
  • Start 17 businesses across the same number of years, many of which still operate today
  • Spend a lot of time gazing out of the window over our spectacular view of the English Channel

And, more importantly, I’ve never been happier.

I spend more time than ever with my beautiful wife Grace, and our two amazing children (I homeschooled our eldest during the last lockdown), I eat well, I exercise 4 times a week (from home, of course) and have never been in better shape, I love what I do, and we live in a beautiful place where we can enjoy the outdoors and countless beaches right on our doorstep.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that we’ve lived in a ‘lockdown’ fashion voluntarily for the past 7+ years, and we wouldn’t change it for the World. 

I understand this lifestyle might not be perfect for everyone – I don’t prescribe it in any way. 

But it definitely works for us.

It has its challenges, no doubt. But the freedom and enjoyment that our lifestyle brings is incredible. It allows us to focus ruthlessly on our outputs when it comes to business, rather than the timescale or environment in which we produce those outputs, and the rest is our time – to spend with each other and our kids, to exercise, to enjoy amazing food, to go out and explore, to travel (when not in lockdown!), and to make the most of life.

I hope this book brings you value, enjoyment, and something to take-away to apply to your own lifestyle and situation, and to achieve even more happiness and success. 

Enjoy 🙂

Preface

I’m a glass half-full kind of guy.

I guess I’ve honed this approach from my experiences over the last 18 years as an entrepreneur – starting my first business at 16 years-old in the middle of the 2008 financial crisis marked the beginning of my entrepreneurial career, so I needed to see opportunities in the midst of disruption right from the start.

If you’re an entrepreneur yourself, or if you’ve encountered your fair share of challenges in life, you’ll understand the art of (nay, the necessity of) being positive and treating what others would regard to be problems as opportunities or (exciting?) challenges to be overcome. 

So I guess you could say I had a head start when it came to adapting to the Global pandemic in 2020. 

But in all honesty, nobody was prepared. Myself included.

We’ve all had to adapt quickly and settle into what is now regarded as ‘the new normal’. 

Working from home. Limited opportunities to travel. Restrictions on spending time with extended family and friends. Wearing masks in public places. Keeping our distance from one another. You know the drill.

By the time you’re reading this, things may have started to transition back to the old ways of working – thanks to vaccines being approved and some level of immunity being achieved. 

But if you think this scenario will never occur again – think again.

The threat of destruction and disruption from Pandemics will probably always exist. 

At least until we develop some form of advanced virus detection and antibody production system that surpasses the effectiveness and efficiency of our own human capabilities, and can recognise and defeat new viruses proactively, on-demand.

For the Elon Musk’s and other pioneering super-geniuses of the World, this is the opportunity that the Pandemic has brought to-light.

But for us regular folk, we can take so much from the disruption and changes that have been introduced, and use this to shape a better future for ourselves.

A future with more freedom, more time, more health, more energy, and more happiness than ever before.

To do this, we need to understand how we can engineer each element of the disruption brought about in 2020, to our advantage – and what changes you want to keep in-place long after the Pandemic is over, because they suit you and your lifestyle better than the old way did.

This is what I want to teach you in this book.

Let’s flip 2020, and turn it into your Angel Number 0202 – you’ll wonder why you ever lived the way you did before the Pandemic began.

If you like the sound of it and want to read more, head over to Amazon where you can pre-order the book ready for its release on the 15th Feb.

Pre-order your copy here.

I’m also hoping to become more regular with posting here again now that things with the businesses have settled a little, so stay tuned.

In the meantime, I hope everyone is keeping safe and well, and that you’re finding some positives in the ‘new normal’ way of living.

How can we start a startup accelerator?

How can we start a startup accelerator?

How can we start a startup accelerator?

This was actually something we explored back in 2014, so I have some experience here.

We bought the domain http://gostart.it (looks to be owned by someone else now, and is a secure site) and secured some space in a local business centre, so that people could visit a physical location and have access to computers, free internet, free coffee, and networking opportunities.

What we discovered, during our initial research, is that the number one most important resource that small businesses and startups are looking for is investment capital.

So, to prioritise the first few steps in setting-up an innovative startup accelerator, they would be:

  1. Incorporate the company and setup the legal/financial infrastructure (this includes any legal agreements for members of the incubator ie if an equity-share arrangement is in-place, etc)
  2. Secure at least 1 physical location, to provide the resources and space for entrepreneurs to work from (we partnered with a local, Council-owned business centre, so there were no costs associated with this offering – the council were more than happy to support an incubator that could potentially contribute to local business startup rates and success)
  3. Establish a standardised startup ‘funnel’ to provide structure to startups – guide them through the various steps involved in getting started, including a funding module where you can guide them through the process of gaining investment and/or grant funding to grow (again, partnering with an existing organisation will work well here – think grant search organisations and angel investment groups)
  4. Partner with local educational institutions (colleges, universities, schools) to encourage regular feed-in of new individuals and businesses to the accelerator program
  5. Think about your own source of funding – how will you sustain offering the resources to your members? Equity-options are usually taken with members, meaning any businesses spawned through your accelerator, you will then own a share in those businesses. But shares in small, growing companies don’t generate fast returns – even if the companies are fast-growing, it’s hard to liquidate equity in small businesses, and it often pays to hold on to it for long periods of time, rather than trying to liquidate your shares in successful startups in order to sustain your model. Obviously, partnering with organisations that won’t charge for bundling their offering into your accelerator program, is a great way to minimise overheads, but what about your own wage, and your partners’ wages (if you have any)? You’ll need some other form of revenue-generating activities that can cover basic overheads from the outset (think paid-for, premium services for entrepreneurs to purchase from you, or earning referral fees from investors and other sources of funding)

Those are the basics to cover-off when asking the question, how can we start a startup accelerator?

And by the way, the idea didn’t progress due to me and my partners’ commitment to other projects – we simply did not have the available time to focus on this project properly. So make sure you do – it’s definitely not a passive form of income, and takes a huge amount of work to establish at the outset, and ongoing input.

Best of luck!

How should I proceed with a business idea of selling hand-knitted winterwear . . .

How should I proceed with a business idea of selling hand-knitted winterwear . . .

How should you proceed with a business idea of selling hand-knitted winterwear? I want to connect with the rural population of Uttarakhand, provide them with raw material and source of income. I have a lead on logistics and online marketplace.

First of all, thanks for the very thorough question!

Secondly, I love the ethics behind the concept, so bravo for working on something that intends to create positive impact/change.

I will assume, since you say you have a lead on logistics and online marketplace, that you already have plans for the business infrastructure in this regard ie the supply and production process.

So, the next step will be to decide on your route to market (doesn’t necessarily have to be mutually exclusive, you can adopt several routes) – manufacturer supply, wholesaler supply, or direct-to-consumer supply.

Depending on how efficient you can make this infrastructure, and the price-point you need to achieve on the end product (retail price) to cover all costs and make a healthy margin, whilst still remaining competitive – will dictate which routes to market will work for you or not.

You’ll need to be making around 75% gross margin (at competitive retail prices), minimum, if you intend to target the major fashion multiples with your product.

The biggest retailers command at least 50% margin from the net (exc VAT) retail price, so if you’re working on 75% gross at net retail, then this will be the equivalent to selling direct to consumers and making 25%.

If you can do this, then a wholesale model may work best for you – focusing on the manufacture and delivery of products to a select few major retailers.

If you’re making even healthier margins than this, you may be able to consider manufacturer-level supply ie supplying major fashion wholesalers. These will command around 25–50% depending on their size, and then you need to factor in the retailer margin on top of this (retailers who buy from a wholesaler will typically work on anything between 25–50%), so you’ll need to be working on around 85%+ gross margin to look at this route to market.

And anything less than a 75% gross margin may dictate that you need to focus on direct-to-consumer sales, at least initially, in order to keep the operation viable.

The former approaches to market involve following the typical ‘buying process’ of the retailers and wholesalers that you intend to supply – there will be forms to fill out and meetings to attend. You’ll need to prepare pitches and be prepared to travel to and attend lots of meetings.

The latter approach, direct to consumer, will probably involve more work initially, in order to build your route to market.

You’ll need to establish a website, connect-up any third party platforms that you intend to sell on (Amazon, Ebay, Etsy and so on), get packshots made of your finished products, list all of your range, build promotional activity (social accounts and consistent activity, PPC campaigns, affiliate programs, SEO, PR, and much more), and so on.

Either way, you need to ensure your model and infrastructure is robust enough, and scaleable, from the outset so you don’t have to revisit this and rebuild it, when you’re trying to focus on the marketing of your business.

So spend lots of time testing – stress-test the financials (what could go wrong, and how badly would it have to go wrong – from projections – to start making a loss?), test the capacity and speed of your operations, and build contingency plans for each potential outcome.

Only when you have a solid model in-place, and contingency plans for what could go wrong, should you begin to move forward and choose your route(s) to market.

I hope this answers your question ‘How should I proceed with a business idea of selling hand-knitted winterwear . . .’

Good luck, and if you need any further assistance (especially if you choose the direct-to-consumer route), my Udemy course Fast Track Entrepreneur takes you through each and every step of starting a business from scratch, so may be quite useful for you.

All the best.

What Do I Need to Know to Start an Educational Children’s Play Area?

What Do I Need to Know to Start an Educational Children's Play Area?

What do you need to know to start an educational children’s play area?

Well, firstly I’m going to side-step anything related to the experience itself for the kids – this is something you’ll need professional, qualified advice on (if you aren’t, yourself, qualified in this area), to ensure the play area is educational yet still fun and engaging.

After all, if the kids don’t want to come back, the business model won’t work, no matter how well you structure it.

Secondly, I’m also purposely avoiding any discussion around regulations and certification requirements when working with, and provided facilities for, children. This is Country/State/Area specific and should be researched thoroughly by yourself, to ensure you will meet all these requirements upon launch and thereafter.

But here’s some advice I’d give regarding the business infrastructure and establishment:

1. Don’t pay rent. Negotiate a 6 month (minimum) rent free term, with a 12 month break clause included on any lease agreement (landlords will want you to commit for a minimum of 5 years – but if it doesn’t work, you need to avoid that noose and cover your downside)

If you find all the commercial landlords to be too stubborn (most we’ve encountered, are), and if you’re lucky enough to find a unit of the size you’re after for sale, and if you can convince a bank to give you a commercial mortgage (lot of ‘ifs’ there) but IF you can do all these things – put the majority of your capital down as a deposit and buy the unit. Then test the idea in the leanest possible way.

And if it doesn’t work then – you have a valuable asset that (provided you have other means of paying the commercial rent during any void period whilst putting it up for let) you can let out and earn a return on your capital from.

2. Make sure whatever fixtures and fittings you put in there can be easily liquidised and/or returned. Request a guaranteed buy-back price from the supplier, so you know what the definite residual value of the assets will be in 6-12 months time, should you need to exit

3. Automate as many processes as you (legally) can. Automated entry systems, concession-based cafe arrangement (charge rent and get someone else to run this entire operation), basically, employ as few people as you possibly can. Money is far better spent on equipment (which has residual value and value on the books) than people (which can walk away after taking a year’s pay and leave you with zero residual value). Automation has worked far better than delegation in my experience, especially in roles that involve zero value adding processes (day-to-day maintenance and operational type roles)

4. Basically, the gist of the above 3 points are ultimately to reduce your initial risk and outlay. You don’t really want to start a project expecting it to fail, but if you build it with that expectation in-mind, you tend to cover off most downsides. Remove any frills, outsource and automate where you can, and go in to test the market with the most basic offering that you can, initially.

Then if it shows promise, take feedback from the visitors and enhance their experience with tweaks and modifications thereafter.

You’ll also probably need some form of unique angle – a USP (Unique Selling Point). To differentiate from any other kids play facility in the area. Visit these places, read reviews online, pick up on areas where they are significantly failing their audience, and use that as the focus for your USP.

The concept is ultimately to rig the entire thing in your favour. From the outside it should look like a big risk. But from the inside, it’s not all that risky.

I hope that answers your question ‘What Do I Need to Know to Start an Educational Children’s Play Area’.

Good luck!

When is the right time to start spending the profit you make from a new firm?

When is the right time to start spending the profit you make from a new firm?

When is the right time to start spending the profit you make from a new firm?

NEVERRR. Muahahaha.

No, seriously though. On a personal level. Never.

Unless your entire intention with your firm is to create a lifestyle business, and nothing more – you’ll need to be reinvesting your profits in order to grow, or create new revenue streams.

Sure, you can pay yourself a reasonable, healthy wage if you can afford to – one that provides enough income to enjoy life and a few little luxuries (if you’re lucky), but when it comes to the money left over after that – you need to reinvest it if you are going to build anything sizeable and/or meaningful.

First of all, I’m making the assumption that you’re already running a profitable firm (if you aren’t already doing so, you’ll need to focus your attention on actually making the profit, first and foremost, since this is quite a difficult thing to achieve in the first instance).

I’m also making the assumption that the profit you are making is what they term ‘corporate profit’ – in other words, a profit after you have paid yourself a healthy, reasonable wage, and all expenses.

This is different to the profitability level coined ‘ramen profitable’ – where a business is technically, marginally profitable, but the owner(s) are having to live off noodles in order to keep it that way.

That’s no way to live, and shouldn’t be in anyone’s long-term business plans.

So, if all the above is correct and accurate, you’re in a position to start thinking what you should do with your firm’s profits.

If not, you need more time and energy spent on making your business profitable – to the point of corporate profit – before you start planning what to do with these anticipated funds. You’ll need to understand your break-even point ie how many sales do you need to achieve to cover all cost-of-sales and overheads (including a reasonable wage for your own living expenses and lifestyle) – and figure out what it will take, in terms of monthly revenue, to reach this point, and work towards achieving break-even, first.

Reverting back to your initial question, what is the right time to start spending the profit you make from a new firm?, a break-even analysis will at least provide you with an understanding of when you’ll be in a position to think about what you do with your new firm’s profit.

Typically, companies can start turning a profit anywhere between 6 months to 3 years or more.

It really is dependant on the industry and business model. Those businesses that can start with an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) that requires very little, or even no, overhead, will be more likely to see a positive return quicker.

But when it comes to what you do with the profit it generates – if you want to build something significant and/or protect the future of your company, you’ll need to reinvest, diversify, and experiment with new concepts and ideas.

It’s down to personal preference, of course, and the ultimate nature of the business. If all you are intending to achieve from your business is to maximise your personal short-term financial gains, then you milk it for what it’s worth, and dispose of the company when it burns out or reaches the end of its life.

My personal preference has always been to reinvest, and to spawn new ventures using the profit my businesses generate – since this is what I enjoy, and I want to create ventures that can adapt to market changes and last a long time.

Whatever your intention is with your own business, good luck!

I have learnt furniture making and I want to start my furniture mini factory. What are the steps I should do to start up?

I have learnt furniture making and I want to start my furniture mini factory. What are the steps I should do to start up?

Build an MVP (Minimum Viable Product).

Don’t think ‘factory’ at this stage – this is more about infrastructure, once you know what your market wants – think more about your market, and how that should guide your offering.

In terms of a working space, you should be thinking of any options that require zero commitment – where there are no minimum lease terms, no expensive rent, and no business rates.

Do you have a garage or a room in your house you could convert into a workshop? If not, do you know of any friends or family that might provide you with this space?

The last thing you want to do at this stage is start elevating your fixed overheads. Build your basic infrastructure in the most agile, low-cost manner. Anything that can be borrowed, favours that can be called in, areas that could be outsourced from the outset – look at everything that will allow you to keep your fixed overheads as close to £0 at this stage, as possible.

Then, once you have the most basic setup you need in order to create and deliver your furniture products, you need to focus your energy and attention on understanding your market.

What type of furniture do they want? What features are popular right now? What styles are ‘in’?

The most cost-efficient model you can adopt at this stage is ‘made to order’.

Perhaps have some visuals made and build a basic website (or if you have a friend with programming skills – you could go one better and build a furniture-customisation tool for your site, so people can design and visualise their own pieces).

Maybe the process could begin with them selecting the type of furniture they are looking for (drawers, table and chairs, cabinet, wardrobe, bed frame and so on), then they could select the wood or other material, then move on to sizing, then onto styling and features, then finally paint colour and finish type.

If you ensure the algorithm is fed with the right pricing information for every material type and the time it will take, roughly, to produce each piece, then the end-result could be a fully-visualised, fully-priced piece of furniture, with a specified leadtime on delivery, that the user can then either save to their account, or process through an online checkout.

Not only is this model the most efficient. Provided you ensure you have the skills to deliver on any customisation that your customers request, it could also be the most profitable model, since anything custom is seen as premium, and you can price your pieces accordingly.

If you’re taking online payments, and requesting that it is all paid up-front prior to production getting underway (or using a consumer-finance provider like Klarna), then it’s also a great model for your cashflow.

This is a streamlined, super-efficient model that you can take to market for little expense and commitment (especially if you have a programmer-friend or you choose a freelancer carefully on Upwork.com).

Then from here, if your initial vision and plan for the company was to wholesale pieces for resale in furniture retailers, you can use the customer order data from your bespoke order system to guide your focus in terms of furniture types, materials, and styles.

When you start to look at mass production, this is when you either need to explore outsourcing (if you want to maintain the agile model you started out with), or you can begin to scale things up in-house by purchasing or leasing a factory, employing staff, and so on.

This is way, way down the line though and not something you should spend too much time thinking about right now.

Now, your objectives should be as follows:

  1. Create the basic infrastructure you need to be able to manufacture a small range of bespoke furniture pieces
  2. Build a streamlined order model online (preferably one with visuals, to enhance customer experience and conversion)
  3. Promote your website and furniture visuals across social media channels, maybe explore paid ads, PPC search ads, and so on (dedicate some seed financing to exploring paid channels of promotion, to discover what converts and where you should focus your promotional efforts going forwards)
  4. Scale beyond this in a market-driven manner (use the data you collect from your early sales to guide your offering and the direction of the business)

I hope this helps you to get started, and I wish you all the best of luck in your new venture!

If you need any help along the way, feel free to drop me a message via my blog Gavin Edley – Build Your Own Online Business With Me in 4 Weeks or check out my step-by-step business startup course on Udemy Fast Track Entrepreneur.

What’s the Best Way for a University Student to Enter the Business World?

Best Way for a University Student to Enter the Business World

The best way for a University student to enter the business World is the same way anyone else would enter it – with a good idea, ounces of passion, and a ton of perseverance and determination.

I started my first business at 16 years old, alongside studying at college. It was a cash management tool for individuals to plan their finances quickly and easily for the coming year.

I sold this to an accountancy firm in Ireland within 6 months, and used the money from the sale to start a copywriting agency.

I started this when I was 17, studying at college, and eventually moving on to study business at University.

I had to choose The Open University since this gave me flexibility to study in my own time, as my focus during the day was on my company.

We built a network of 127 writers across the UK, and became masters at winning work and writing tenders, then outsourcing this work to our network (with our own margin applied).

I sold the copywriting agency just prior to graduating University, took a little time off from business to focus on my final exams, then graduated with a 2:1 in business from the OU.

So at this point, I had my degree, a little money, and time to focus on what I wanted to build next.

I went on to begin importing teeth whitening kits from China – but this was soon after outlawed in the UK (with a potential jail sentence of 6 months) – so I swiftly got out of this business, and began importing green tea from Japan (a powdered green tea called matcha).

I built a brand, we got the tea into the major wholesalers and retailers in the health food space, and we went on to build an online retail business with 20,000+ lines that still operates successfully today (vitalifehealth.com).

On reflection, my business degree did very little in terms of offering direction for the next venture post-graduation.

It did help with theoretical planning (building the business plan), pricing models, and basic principles of accounting, marketing, and operations.

But in terms of influencing what the business was about, or helping with day-to-day management and growth of the company – it really didn’t offer a great deal.

Ultimately, don’t think that having a degree gives you an advantage in business – it really doesn’t. There are plenty of people out there with degree-level education these days, and the information/knowledge you have gained through study is nothing unique.

I don’t like to sound negative, but this is the truth.

So whether you’re asking this question as someone about to graduate their degree, or someone mid-way through their studies, the best way to enter the business World is to understand your passions – what motivates or inspires you the most?

Then when you understand what you truly enjoy doing, then you need to find a problem, or something that’s missing in this particular space.

When we started Love Health Hate Waste – our BBD expired health food retailer – it was spawned from a problem. We were wasting perfectly good stock under Vitalife Health, just because it had reached its BBD. Yet staff were happy to take this home and consume, since they knew it was still perfectly good and edible.

There are no laws against selling BBD expired items – so we figured we’d branch out a separate brand to make these items accessible to people that would otherwise perhaps not be able to afford them at RRP.

It grew, and we started to purchase other companies’ BBD expired items, and resell them on our LHHW platform.

This solved two problems – it helped make dietary specific and healthy foods/drinks accessible to all, and it also prevented them from unnecessarily going to waste.

So find a valid problem in your chosen space, and figure out how you can solve it.

I hope that answers your question ‘what’s the best way for a University student to enter the business World’.

Good luck – and if you need any assistance getting started, I have a step-by-step business startup guide over on Udemy called Fast Track Entrepreneur that might help.

Can I Start an Online Business with Just $10?

Can I Start an Online Business with Just $10?

Can you start an online business with just $10?

Of course.

But you will be looking at areas with extremely low barriers to entry (like, zero barriers), which are naturally saturated, since everyone can access them.

What this typically means is, these businesses take even longer to break through and start generating a profit.

So whilst it is fairly easy to start an online business with just $10 to invest, at the same time, it’s very difficult to turn a profit from such a business. What you avoid investing financially, expect to make-up in sweat equity – hard work, energy, and time.

My first piece of guidance, therefore, before we move on to the type of businesses you could start for just $10, would be to ensure you have an income from elsewhere so you can actually afford to live whilst your business gets off the ground.

When you start an online business with just $10, don’t expect it to generate an income substantial enough to live on, for quite some time.

Think about it in rational terms – people with hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of dollars to invest, they typically look for yields (return on their investment) of between 5–20% per annum for passive investments (property, stocks, other long-term investments), and when investing in trading businesses, the scale varies even more wildly depending on the industry, business model, and the investor’s appetite for risk.

Scale this back to the example of your investment of $10, and even in the best case scenario, a respectable 20% return on your investment would be $2 . . . per annum.

If there were business and investment opportunities out there that consistently and reliably yielded more of a return than this, and they were accessible to those with as little capital as $10, everyone would be doing it.

The reality is, lucrative opportunities don’t exist at this level of investment – without making-up the rest in sweat equity.

So if you’re prepared to absolutely work your ass off – every evening when you return from your day job, you’ll be working until Midnight, every morning, you’ll be waking earlier than usual to squeeze a couple of hours in before you go to work again, entire weekends will be spent on your business, and heck, even lunch breaks at work should be utilised (maybe you could be posting on your businesses’ social media on your phone?).

And you’re prepared to do this day-in, day-out, for up to 5–10 years before you even see a dime return.

Then, and only then, can you make a $10 business work.

I’m not saying this to be depressing or to put you off. I’m saying it to be realistic.

Pretty much everyone in the developed World has $10 available at one point or another, so any glimmer of opportunity at that level is going to be massively saturated.

So you’re going to have to be prepared to outwork the masses, to work harder, longer, and smarter than everyone else in that space, to come out on-top and make it work.

So, if you feel you have that level of commitment and dedication in you, read on.

If not, keep that $10 in your pocket, and stay employed (or focus on getting employed, if you aren’t already) until you can save enough money to start looking at opportunities that are a little harder to access, financially.

So, here’s a few business ideas at the $10 seed investment level, for the crazy-committed:

  • Blogging (maybe utilise an existing free platform that comes in a hosted-solution, since your $10 will be spent in just 2 months on even the cheapest shared hosting package – that’s putting the domain purchase and any design requirements aside)
  • Affiliate marketing
  • Youtube videos (provided you have a suitable smartphone or camera for filming)
  • Service-based businesses (what services require no equipment or tools, that you can offer? What are your strengths? What are you knowledgeable in? Copywriting is a good option if you can write well, social media management is another – you can use platforms like Fiverr and Upwork to bid on projects that people are looking to get completed, to get going for zero investment in advertising). More old-fashioned models in this space would be leaflet-delivery services, car washing, dog walking, grocery pick-ups and so on.

That should be enough to get your own ideas flowing regarding the areas you should be looking at when you’re wanting to start an online business with just $10.

When on offer, you can download my Udemy course Fasttrack Entrepreneur for just $9.99 – which will guide you through each step of the business idea and setup process. So this may well be the best way to invest your $10 when you’re looking to get started.

Good luck with your venture!

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