How many people have actually owned a real business?
'Entrepreneur' seems to be the buzz word of the 21st century – as though by using the word alone, it will make you a successful business man.
‘Entrepreneur’ is a glib, sexy concept, that discounts all the graft, sweat, stress, blood and tears, that go into making a business.
‘I’m going to be a entrepreneur’ as if that is a fucking job title in itself - and not a mindset needed with which to launch a business.
I see the word banded around, shouting it out - like enthusiastic children shout out ‘merry Christmas’ on a Christmas day morning.
It’s just a word.
Nothing more.
It is not ‘doing business’.
And so I’m gonna write a series of posts about my life.
My 'business' life.
My very hard working life .
My non flashy business(es).
‘Entrepreneur’ is a mindset, not a destination.
Most people do not have that mindset – no matter how much they love to use that ‘E’ word.
The way I see it....
...If you don’t prefer the ‘living on the edge’ kind of life (good and bad), then don't try to be an entrepreneur.
If you have to 'try' at it, then you're already in the wrong mental space.
Contrary to the cultural enthusiasm of attaching that word to describe yourself – most people can’t handle it. …And for good reasons, btw...
So, I’ll tell you a real story of events of my life – and my mindset.
You don’t need a degree for it (I would posit quite the opposite ) and if you feel the need to have a degree, it’s more indicative of the non entrepreneurial mindset.
...If you find the ‘security’ of a job more attractive than not knowing where the next meal’s coming from, it’s indicative on a non entrepreneurial mindset.
Anyways, let me descend from my philosophical pontifications, and lets get down and dirty in to what it really means ‘to do the business’.
Lucylin, aged 14…
I wanted some money. I wanted LOTS of money.
I wanted a gun.
And some telescopic sights for said rifle.
This didn’t come cheap.
They cost a good two weeks work. (at that time, around $500 - ish)
My family was very cash poor, very work ethic rich, and supportive of me trying my new idea with which to obtain my $500 for the gun.
....My Idea?
A car washing round.
At the weekends. (I was still in school at the time).
This was decades before the car washing ‘drive thru’s’ emerged, and I saw an opportunity.
I lived on a farm, and three miles away, was the ‘rich part’ of town. It was the ‘business commuter belt’ into the city.
It was detached houses on a very ‘well to do’ housing estates.
It was two car families.
It was full of cash rich, lazy people who thought their image was important.
It was ripe for extracting wealth from - with just a little bit of hard work.
(I’ll work in dollars, but I was actually working in GBP).
I charged $3 FOR A FULL CAR WASH.... AND $3 MORE FOR A WAX AND SHINE.
(They hardly ever refused 'the wax and shine' – ‘keeping up appearances’ and all that - the idiots).
I had to walk there (and back - around 6 miles in total) each Saturday and Sunday with buckets, polish, detergents, and cloths in hand.
If I worked hard, and did a good job – I could wash around 6 cars per day.
My overhead costs were so minimal - to be calculated at virtually zero.
10 cars per weekend.
Around $60/70, per weekend….
Within a couple of months, I'd ‘hired’ some friends, who I paid. $2 per car wash, and $2 per wax.
I then started to make around $120 per weekend - for a few months.
Then I got bored ( I had a shiny new gun to go shooting with at weekends, now!).
I gave the car wash round away to my friends – and they never really stayed motivated enough to keep it going...which gave me my first insights into human behaviors..
I was not greedy.
I loved the capitalistic , free market nature of my endeavor.
I loved making money by myself, for myself.
Money was never my god.
Working for things that I wanted was my motivation.
(acquiring money just for it’s own sake – is, from my perspective - indicative of an intelligence just slightly less than that of a low IQ'd amoeba).
That was my first foray into free markets, business, profits, employing people, and enjoying the whole process.
A couple of years later, I decided to ‘get a real job’, while waiting to go college for my certs to get me into studying law.
'Employment’ would be new experience - and my passion for cleaning cars was, alas, no more.
So, I woke up in the morning, and - quite literally – got on my bike!
I knocked on every door that I came across , that looked like a business of any kind, and asked them if 'they had any work'...
...By 3:30 that same day – and 14 miles away from home – I landed a job for the summer in a textile warehouse.
28 miles a day of cycling! - just to get to - and from - work.
And eight hours a day of shifting around boxes - of very heavy textiles.
And a wage packet each week.
I liked that money in my pocket.
...After three months working there, I left and went to college for my so called ‘education’.
It took me less than a year to realize that the 'corporate route’ that I would be enrolling for, by going through the system ‘ was not for me'.
And deep down, I knew it never would be.
So I left the indoctrination camp.
The warehouse (the one where I’d worked during the summer) told me that if I'd ever want a job, there was one there for me – so I returned.
...Two years later , I was the UK sales manager for the company (19 years old ffs! lol), and was in charge of a multi million dollar business.
I got the job in sales because – without being taught – I would service the customers needs and advise them, when I was delivery product to them .
(‘living’ in the warehouse and running that - meant that I knew my stock better than most of the sales team).
Serving the customers needs without being asked , was a natural – entrepreneurial, mindset.
It’s NOT something that can be taught in my experience (from my own observations).
Actually, that's not strictly true, but the 'instinctual entrepreneur' will always be better at this kind of endevour.
You either ‘have it’ - or you don’t.
In Part two...
I’ll share my journey of further entrepreneurial endeavors, as walked away from the job I just mentioned above ( I got bored!lol) ... and went globe trotting for two decades!
...and LOTS of entrepreneurial opportunities!
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Ah so you're a Brit too? Didn't realise that! I love reading about mindsets and learning the differences. I have read some articles about the differences between entrepreneurs and "wantrepreneurs".
There is another billionaire I watch on YouTube from time to time called Dan Lok who says that people start "trying" to be entrepreneurs due to an employee crisis. I.e. They think they can do a "better job" because they are frustrated in their current job but it turns out, they can't!
I like what you said about wanting to get the money so you can afford things, rather than thinking you'll just buy something first - a lot of times people buy stuff on credit with money they don't have... Naughty naughty.
Anyway, looking forward to reading about your globetrotting experiences - thanks for sharing your story!
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Yup - from just outside Manchester, originally.
Debt free - it's the only way to not be a slave....anything else is just pretending - so as to avoid facing the piss poor reality of the situation (imo).
I've posted my second part !
(I didn't get as far as my travels yet!...doh! - I forgot to mention one of other 'entrepreneurial gigs' from landing that job I mentioned in this post..)
Ah Manchester, can see why you went away 😜 yeah agree with you there re debt. Hate the thought of having a debt chain around my neck for 35 years with a mortgage and having to stay in a job for time. But I'm not an entrepreneur so just gonna have to suck it up barring a miracle with crypto lol
Cool, I'll have a read later today!
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But I'm not an entrepreneur...
You sure about that? (why not?)...where about in the UK ?
I'll set you up in your own gig !! lol...
Lots of opportunity everywhere - if you know how to look, and your not of a fearful mindset.
Nothing wrong with not being of the entrepreneurial bent, matey.
There are strengths in that also - again it's all about perspective.
(I couldn't have done half the things I'll be telling you about in these posts without having people of the non entrepreneurial mindset, being honest)
Well it might just be a confidence/conviction thing and who I surround myself with on a day to day. I have some ideas but I've suffered from the "jack of all trades" syndrome and probably spread myself too thin this year. In a bizarre twist of fate, all 4 of the major projects I was heavily involved with all came to an end this week so suddenly, I've got 4x the free time back for 2021 and could be just the ticket to dedicate some focus on one of those ideas that I feel most strongly about.
I'm in the South East, between Oxford and London.
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Well it might just be a confidence/conviction thing and who I surround myself with on a day to day
That can really effect your perspectives...
(what kind of projects?- tech - or tangible?)
Why focus on the things you feel strongly about? (bias).
Are they compatible with what your're good at? (many times not they're the same thing).
The modern day adage of 'follow your passion' is self indulgent bullshit, imo.
That's vocational , not entrepreneurial , in it's nature.
I'm good at selling. ('was' rather - in a my life long ago...I'm sure I still 'have it' - if need be!lol)
What I sold was irrelevant.
If the product fit comfortably within within my own moral/ethical framework, then I'd sell the shit outta it!
The M4 corridor....nice.
My motivations for selling was to make money - for whatever particular reason at the time - I was passionate about making the sale - the product was always secondary.
Being brutally honest with yourself, and your motivations, is a good start.
Thanks for asking challenging questions, it's been eye opening.
Tangible but could easily be made in to a "tech" I guess - this one is a card game my friends and I invented out of boredom based around poker. We'll need to do some research on if there's a demand for new card games like it before we go all guns blazing!
Other than that, I'm pretty good at making games out of anything, even mundane shit so it's just a case of creating something that people want and find fun enough to keep coming back - got a few others in mind but that card game is at the top of the pile at the moment.
Yeah agreed with this - I always say that hobbies are there as an escape - if it turns in to a "job" then what are you going to do to escape...
Ditto, you feel like you can get behind a product if it aligns with your ethics.
Appreciate you getting back, let me know when your next blog is up in the series!
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Yeah, I can relate to a lot of that.
Can't be arsed working hard these days, but I did used to sometimes, long ago.
Not always though, procrastination is the key to creativity
...that explains why i can't around to doing my website - I'm scared of losing my creativity! lol
I like your narration. Such life stories are the gold.
Running a business means dealing with all kinds of bureaucratic red tape, dealing with all kinds of insurance companies and so-called cooperatives that seem to think they are important for business. If you then have employees who can't think enterprisingly themselves, want a fully equipped workplace, good pay with as little responsibility as possible, then you have people fresh out of school or university who have never really worked and are completely unprepared for business. You can't blame anyone who has their own insights later in life, through their own experiences and also through failures. The education system does not provide for thinking for oneself. When I was a school kid and started working for our local photographer, I wasn't even fit to make coffee.
What is called "jobbing" for me was such casual work where I learnt the most, not because I gained any expertise, but just got to know different companies and fields that gave a broader view of life.
It's like you say: when you don't know exactly if you're going to get through the next month, when the food is not enough, when the cupboards are empty and you have to improvise: These are the teaching methods that make for liveliness. However, only if not everyone is at the same hunger pangs with you at the same time.
Such lean times caused me not to let myself be blackmailed at work. When bosses were too authoritarian towards me, I refused to obey and said: "Are you dissatisfied with me? Then give me notice. Otherwise, I'll do my work my way and not to please you."
Companies have demanded everything possible and impossible from me. I rarely gave a damn about making myself popular by giving in to everything. When I was younger, I allowed myself such impertinent behaviour. Now I am less rebellious, it would also be inappropriate for my age, but I still don't like to be given orders. I had a career then, but not for long.
Money is unimportant, basically. Of course, it's only important because everyone else thinks it's important. I prefer to work from hand to mouth. The more you have, the more you can lose.
I hope to die sooner than later. But of course, I do not have a death wish. Live can be full of wonders. Maybe even more so under the current circumstances. ....
Running a business means dealing with all kinds of bureaucratic red tape, dealing with all kinds of insurance companies and so-called cooperatives that seem to think they are important for business
Me, and regulations and red tape never got on too well. I found that the more I ignored them, the less we talked - which then made for a great relationship! lolol
This was so interesting to read! I'm really looking forward to the continuation.
As for myself, I like the idea of entrepreneurial life and I know I can handle the pressure but in practice I've always struggled to either see the opportunities or to take them while knowing that there's a risk of failure.
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I've met my fair share of "entremanures" along the way. They were usually to be found at Chamber of Commerce "Networking Mixers," collecting "contacts" for their little black books from lots of other entremanures who were collecting "contacts" for their little black books. Few of them actually did any work, they just had lots of "connections." Not quite sure what that was ever good for, because everyone at these business nerd meat markets was selling and nobody was buying.
We lived in a pretty swank area with nice yards, and at about age 7-8 I became aware that birds would eat berries/seeds and then shit... after which little trees and bush saplings would sprout. So I carefully dug them up and replanted them in an unused part of the land behind a hedge before they'd get weeded out. After maybe 3 years I had a nice little "nursery" of pretty exotic stuff I sold to all the yardmen taking care of the upscale gardens... for about half what the local nurseries charged.
And now you basically know why I tend to have a long term perspective...
lol - so true.
Interesting take on the 'long term perspective and your plants...
Mine is the total opposite - 'get what you can, when you can'.
I wonder how much of an influence our first 'money making' strategies has been ingrained, to shape our future behaviors/perspectives..?
let's see , what did i do at 14 years old , .... hmmm , i had a air-gun , bought it for about 12 euro from a Turkish friend . I went to school and spend my free time roaming the streets looking for fun . Making money was not on my mind only when summer holiday started , then i worked 2 of the 7 weeks at a flower-bulb factory for some money to spend the other 5 weeks ,... mostly getting high in a park or on a beach .
At night i walked the streets shooting out street lights as a protest against light pollution , for i really wanted to see more stars . ( did that only ones , when shooting can's got bored ). I do not see myself as an entrepreneur , i do not completely understand the word or meaning either . Just a vague label someone carries to me . Anyways , nice to read that , while you where washing car's on those Saturdays i was at the hockey club , being sportive and learning about fake social appearance and image most "rich" people keep up . ;-)
I'll do a chronological account/series of my 'entrepreneurial events' - Lots to go at! lol
Ho'jolly , i might learn to put words to some of my unexplored natural skills . 😏
The new buzz word as well is “startup” that makes me cringe lol.
I like your work ethic! When I like the work, I’m all in. I had a paper route but hated it and ended up just stop delivering it lol.
I loved working with my dad though doing electrical work for a number of years while I was in college. My career job is great as well but it’s all stuff I enjoy so it makes it easier. The worst part is a lot of that is going to get shit on by this scam they are pulling on the world.
Looking forward to the next installment.