Tell Me About Your Small Bizness (Wooly's Shark Tank)

[woolybug25]

That's why Jesus invented food trucks. They're the perfect medium between a restaurant and a banana stand.

I've been told that a lot of cities are imposing a tax on food trucks in order to justify property tax on brick and mortar business. Plus, the insurance is through the roof for those things. Fires are quite common, which makes sense. I mean, start frying calamari in the back seat of your Buick and tell me how long that lasts. Ha.

 

[Veritate Duce Progredi]

I've always wanted to open a place next to Ohio State on High Street and sell to the droves a walking students. Too many kids are spending $11 for lunch at a god damn Pita Pit when they could be stopping at Buster's place for some bomb-ass (the technical term) lunch that is way better, way cheaper and way faster. Superior in every aspect.

There's a place in Toledo that some Mexican immigrants opened that is insanely good and cheap. San Marcos. They sell authentic tacos for like $1.50. You can spend like $6 and get wayyyyy better food than the chains on High Street:

But wait, there's more, there's also so much great street food in Asia. Vietnamese is my favorite cuisine. You get the Asian influence (durr), but it's tropical so there's all kinds of spices and such that you don't get with Cantonese or Korean, plus there's the French influence from the colonization that basically just makes their cuisine the shit. It's certifiable.

How am I going to do it? Well, my sister went to the Culinary Institute of America and chose to be an organic farmer doing CSAs and farmers' markets, so I need to convince he to quit her life and do this instead. haha

Basically it's cheap and amazing Mexican and Asian street food. I want to call it Juanton. Yes I think about this a lot when I'm high.

The food pics you posted are making me very hungry. Vietnamese is also a favorite food of mine. I used to get a rice dish with some type of bar-b-q'd meat, shrip and a fried egg on top. Then they added a sweet sauce to pour over it. Garnished with carrots and cucumbers and a fried spring roll.

Mexican and Vietnamese are among my top 5 favorite ethnic foods.

 

[woolybug25]

The food pics you posted are making me very hungry. Vietnamese is also a favorite food of mine. I used to get a rice dish with some type of bar-b-q'd meat, shrip and a fried egg on top. Then they added a sweet sauce to pour over it. Garnished with carrots and cucumbers and a fried spring roll.

Mexican and Vietnamese are among my top 5 favorite ethnic foods.

I could take a bath in Bánh Canh Bột Lọc.

 

[Junkhead]

This thread needs to be renamed "Wooly's Shark Tank" immediately.

I don't do much around here, but I took care of it. The boss is off this week I heard.

 

[no.1IrishFan]

That's why Jesus invented food trucks. They're the perfect medium between a restaurant and a banana stand.

There is always money in the banana stand.

 

[T Town Tommy]

There seem to be a lot of entrepreneurs floating around here. So tell me about it. I'm a stuffy banker that has only sat back and watched clients pursue opportunities. Never actually having the balls to take part in them myself. Would love one of you jokers to inspire me to do something. Let's get the creative juices flowing, shall we?

- What's your business?
- How did you come up with the idea?
- How did you finance it?
- How did you learn the business?
- How did you find customers?
- Success Stories
- Epic Failures
- Best Practices
- Get fuq'd, Wooly

All comments welcome!

T Town is not your man here wooley. The two biggest opportunities of my lifetime passed me by and I missed out on both - the dot com craze and Viagra. While I was not able to profit monetarily from either, I at least have the satisfaction of knowing that one led to the internet of today and the other led to bigger things as well. It was a stiff lesson to learn but one I will cherish as I enter my fifties.

#noregrets

 

[Whiskeyjack]

T Town is not your man here wooley. The two biggest opportunities of my lifetime passed me by and I missed out on both - the dot com craze and Viagra. While I was not able to profit monetarily from either, I at least have the satisfaction of knowing that one led to the internet of today and the other led to bigger things as well. It was a stiff lesson to learn but one I will cherish as I enter my fifties.

#noregrets

 

[BeauBenken]

I sell propane and propane accessories.

 

[TheTurningPoint]

Wooly

You should start a fishing charter. Find a lake in Michigan and do fish it like hell or lie out the ass to your clients and pray theres fish in it haha.

Good money in that. I have paid out the ass in Florida and Colorado for fishing charters on vacations haha.

Hell, make one on the St. Joe River on game weekends. Buy a nice boat. Buy some nice TVs. Charter while the game is going on. Beer-Fishing-Football. #WinnerWinner

 

[woolybug25]

Wooly

You should start a fishing charter. Find a lake in Michigan and do fish it like hell or lie out the ass to your clients and pray theres fish in it haha.

Good money in that. I have paid out the ass in Florida and Colorado for fishing charters on vacations haha.

Hell, make one on the St. Joe River on game weekends. Buy a nice boat. Buy some nice TVs. Charter while the game is going on. Beer-Fishing-Football. #WinnerWinner

Ha. I used to guide in AK during the summers when I was in college.

Honestly, guide work is hard and there's not much money in it. There are three really good guides in the Michiana area already, so I am not sure how good of an idea it would be. Plus, guides don't get to fish personally on trips. So they spend a lot of time on the water watching other people fish. I prefer to participate.

I used to float the SB section of the Joe on gamedays when I was a kid. We would bring a radio and listen to the game while fishing for smallmouth. It was always so much fun. When a TD would happen, you would hear it from the stadium before the radio.

 

[Old Man Mike]

You fellows are very complicated people. I'd suggest that one of you opens a mail order "Freeze-Dried Water" business. Like all Freeze-Dried products, the directions are simply: Add Water and Stir. Mailing empty cartons around the world should be easy. I firmly believe that the American [and probably the Japanese] consumers are easily stupid enough to purchase large quantities of this.

 

[GoldenToTheGrave]

My Business: My company is Weil Industrial Hardware, we're a screw, tool, and fastener distributor specializing in selling to window and door manufacturers nationwide.

Idea: My brother are I are third generation in the business, but had no experience when we started. My grandfather bought it from the founder in the 60s, who passed the business to my uncle, and my brother and I took over when my uncle passed away in 2010 (I was 20, my brother was 24).

Financing: I am fortunate enough that my parents have been able to put money into the company, and have had to accept that we don't currently make enough money for me to live on my own. I'm not down on myself for that fact but I immensely respect anybody who's started a business without that kind of support, blows my mind really.

Learning the biz: Had to learn the entire business from scratch, neither of us had any experience and the company was in shambles. Couldn't even describe or identify a lot of the product when we first started. Had to find out who the old customers were from old invoices.

Finding Customers: My uncle had a lot of relationships with companies for years, even if he/we lost a lot of them in the transition (his was in poor health for a while), got names of companies from trade journals, google, etc. Cold call people all the time.

Biggest Success: Some of the successes I'm most proud of would be that this summer, I have at least two big clients that I was on the phone with for almost five years that are now placed their first orders.

Biggest failures: One of our biggest customers for a short period of time has screwed us out of thousands of dollars worth of invoices, currently in the process of taking them to small claims court. They apparently have by their own admission done this to over 30 companies. Assholes.

 

[GowerND11]

That's why Jesus invented food trucks. They're the perfect medium between a restaurant and a banana stand.

I didn't know he'd be allowed to after his felony....

 

[Whiskeyjack]

You fellows are very complicated people. I'd suggest that one of you opens a mail order "Freeze-Dried Water" business. Like all Freeze-Dried products, the directions are simply: Add Water and Stir. Mailing empty cartons around the world should be easy. I firmly believe that the American [and probably the Japanese] consumers are easily stupid enough to purchase large quantities of this.

In law school, I used to joke that one could make a killing selling artisanal ice to hipsters in Seattle. Organic, gluten-free and hand-chipped for your pretension.

Looks like someone beat me to it, though.

 

[zelezo vlk]

In law school, I used to joke that one could make a killing selling artisanal ice to hipsters in Seattle. Organic, gluten-free and hand-chipped for your pretension.

Looks like someone beat me to it, though.

Well how else should one enjoy Brugal extra Viejo rum?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk

 

[woolybug25]

In law school, I used to joke that one could make a killing selling artisanal ice to hipsters in Seattle. Organic, gluten-free and hand-chipped for your pretension.

Looks like someone beat me to it, though.

Bottled water is probably the biggest scam in the world.

Do you know what Evian is spelled backwards? hehe

 

[connor_in]

Looking into starting an otter farm where I would breed them and sell them for pets to ACamp

 

[BobbyMac]

We're currently in the angel round of a start up in the technology sector. Meeting with an ND guy the weekend of Texas (on a charter boat the morning of the game, so TP's on to something Wooly) to discuss funding for the entire venture. So my $5M joke on the first page wasn't a full joke, just the part about the ping pong table.

My background is in classified and display advertising focusing on internet lead generation since the 90's. I was the first salesperson for TraderOnline's beta testing in Chicago which became AutoTrader. com. Have been selling cars, flipping houses, waiting for the next deal. Now it's go time.

.

 

[WestCoast]

Have been selling cars, flipping houses, waiting for the next deal. Now it's go time.
.

Crusader is Mandelbaum!

 

[BobbyMac]

Crusader is Mandelbaum!

That's where it comes from... Guilty as charged. lol Oh how I covet Izzy's bangs.

I wonder if Izzy lifted weights with Mr. St. brown back in the 80's?

.

 

[ND NYC]

My Business: My company is Weil Industrial Hardware, we're a screw, tool, and fastener distributor specializing in selling to window and door manufacturers nationwide.

Idea: My brother are I are third generation in the business, but had no experience when we started. My grandfather bought it from the founder in the 60s, who passed the business to my uncle, and my brother and I took over when my uncle passed away in 2010 (I was 20, my brother was 24).

Financing: I am fortunate enough that my parents have been able to put money into the company, and have had to accept that we don't currently make enough money for me to live on my own. I'm not down on myself for that fact but I immensely respect anybody who's started a business without that kind of support, blows my mind really.

Learning the biz: Had to learn the entire business from scratch, neither of us had any experience and the company was in shambles. Couldn't even describe or identify a lot of the product when we first started. Had to find out who the old customers were from old invoices.

Finding Customers: My uncle had a lot of relationships with companies for years, even if he/we lost a lot of them in the transition (his was in poor health for a while), got names of companies from trade journals, google, etc. Cold call people all the time.

Biggest Success: Some of the successes I'm most proud of would be that this summer, I have at least two big clients that I was on the phone with for almost five years that are now placed their first orders.

Biggest failures: One of our biggest customers for a short period of time has screwed us out of thousands of dollars worth of invoices, currently in the process of taking them to small claims court. They apparently have by their own admission done this to over 30 companies. Assholes.

Tommy Callahan, is that you?

 

[IrishinSyria]

Yeah. Almost all of my clients were once entrepreneurs that simply took a chance. I still haven't been able to figure out what the secret sauce is though. Some just had a great idea, some were really skilled and life forced their hand, some just broke off of their employers, but some just plain out got lucky.

I worked with a guy once that told me;

"Wooly, I never meant this to be a business. My wife got pregnant and I needed a job. So I started working in my garage. Then my garage got too small for my inventory. So I bought my neighbors lot and put up that barn. Then the barn got too small, so I bought the neighboring farm land. Then my dipshit son went out and found a bunch of new business. Now I have this huge company. I have no idea what i'm doing, I don't even have a high school diploma, that's why I pay you."

A good buddy of mine is a banker who helped a guy close out a 10 figure sale of his chemical recycling business. Said the guy started by taking a $5,000 loan out from his mom and used to drive the truck from business to business buying up their waste chemicals (pre-clean water act days) and selling them to companies that could use them. Built it up into a multi-billion dollar business.

I'm more likely to win the lotto than to pull off something like that.