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Starting my own business any tips?

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V8MoneyPit:

--- Quote from: Boggert on April 25, 2008, 11:44:54 ---If you are looking for a loan, you'll ned to put together a business plan and work out some figures.

--- End quote ---

You should be doing this for yourself anyway. You should never enter into any business without a formal, well researched financial plan.

Look at competition in the area.
What do they do that you could improve on?
Can you market your business in a better way than them?

Look at the potential customer base.
What is the wealth demographic?
What would they really be looking for from your business?
Are there enough customers for you and your competition?
Or can you 'steal' the customers?

Ultimately, you need to be offering something that somebody wants and offering something that is better that the competition.

Working for yourself can be very rewarding. It is, as previously stated, hard work. And somethimes you will wonder why you started. But at times like that, you must take a step back and understand why you feel that way. Then do something about it!

But most of all, make sure you do it with your eyes wide open. Arm yourself with all the available facts about your proposed business before you go anywhere near investing any money. Only then will you be able to make an educated descission.

v8rangie:
Thanks all.

im not going to breaking cars on a huge scale only a few a week sort of thing as i will be on my own so too many is only a small amount.
i think the main money earner at the moment is car collection etc..

im still keeping my job till it gets to the point where im just to busy and having to turn people away.

Thrasher:

--- Quote ---im still keeping my job till it gets to the point where im just to busy and having to turn people away.
--- End quote ---

Just make sure you inform the proper authorities about any extra income, or it'll come back and bite you  :shock:

V8MoneyPit:

--- Quote from: v8rangie on April 25, 2008, 15:27:39 ---Thanks all.

im not going to breaking cars on a huge scale only a few a week .......
--- End quote ---


The first thing that springs to mind here is..... are there enough available to get in to break a few a week? And is there a large enough customer base to sell the parts?

Would you be on your own? Breaking several a week would be close to impossible!

And if you are doing the collection and the breaking, have you got enough time to do it all?

We started our business 15 years ago breaking Minis. We soon realised we had to do a fair bit of travelling to get the right cars and it left little time to break them up! We now only offer new parts. Far easier and we don't have to get our hands dirty  :lol:

The last thing I want to do it put you off, but do make sure you can cope with the hours.

Range Rover Blues:
Make sure you are 100 % covered for your waste handling licence, for both the truck and the premises.  The fines are massive.

If you are just a garage then it's a little less strict but you have a grey area between working on and dismantling cars.

Make sure you have another income, I have mates who do dispose of cars for a living, I say living, it helps pay for the truck.  It will need to be a truck too, Transits won't carry LRs so you need a Cargo.  A good one will set you back a thousand or more.  If you get a Hi-Ab one you can register it as a mobile crane and avoid tax and MOT, also recovery trucks are not on the tacho which is very useful, so you need to do recovery as part of your work.

Also have a look at your prospective market, there is a small amount of money to be made breaking newer LR products, P38 and the like but the cars will cost you thousands.  The older stuff, no money in it.  Again I know people who have left this game because it doesn't pay the rent, one of my mates had a big concern and was breaking LR for years, cars came in form all over the country and so did customers.

E-Bay has put paid to all that, he packed it in.

It's a hard business to do well in, you need to find a comlimentary business to run alongside or not be as specialised.

Asd for general busness tips, start now at the beginning of the tax year and borrow everything, don't take you own money in.  That way you canmake a loss in your first year and pay no tax for nealry 2 years ;)  Your second tax year you pay tax based on the prevous years earnings, so it pays to be a bit less succesful on paper at least.

When it's due, make sure you pay it [-X

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