What To Know Before Starting A Business

If you are thinking about starting a business, congratulations. It is both a tremendous undertaking and a great achievement. Consider this from SmartRoom as you plan your endeavor:

(1) Vacations will be few and far between.

No matter if you plan to have employees or not, owning a business is a 24/7 job. The proverbial buck stops with you so your “free” time will be spent growing and developing your business. You can also guess where the money you save from not traveling will go. On the flip side, you won’t want to go away during the infancy of your business. You will be so engrossed in your start up’s daily operations; vacation won’t be a priority for a few years.

(2) Hair dye will become a staple.

Much like raising a child, your business is your baby. It will give you moments of exhilaration, disappointment, and all the emotions in between. The stress will change your hair color (much as it does to previous Presidents of the United States.) Because you don’t want your customers to see you sweat the small stuff or age in front of their eyes, keep an ample supply of hair dye on hand.

(3) Home improvement projects will become a thing of the past.

Remember when you eyed your house and crafted a list of all the things you wanted to do to improve it. Well, you might as well put that list away for safekeeping because the time, effort, and money involved to get those projects done will now be completely absorbed by your work “home” or your business. You will revisit these projects again… someday.

(4) Don’t cut corners on the important things.

It is easy to be overwhelmed with sticker shock on the cost of starting a business. Much like planning a wedding, this is where you need to pick and choose what is truly important and worth the expense. Don’t skimp on items that compromise the longevity of your business. That includes the not-so-glamorous items like accounting processes and software. If you are not sure, read your business plan (for the 1,000th time) to see if the item or cost would sacrifice the integrity of what you are trying to build.

(5) Have fun.

Like anything else in life, starting a business is a new adventure. Don’t get so caught up that you don’t enjoy the experience, relish in your independence, and appreciate the journey. It is pretty likely that you will look back on the early lean days with fondness at some point in your life so don’t forget to carpe diem!

Consider this from SmartRoom, there are almost 28 million small businesses in the United States. Study what others have done, trust your instincts, and success could come your way before you know it. Good luck.