All posts in Business

How To Start A Floral Design Business 1-2-3

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Floral arrangements and delivery service is in demand year round. I guess you could say they are seasonal products for all seasons. This makes floral design a profitable business to get into. Yet, if you don’t have the funds or desire to open a shop, but still like working with plants and have a creative flair, you have options. You even can work out of your home!

For example, you could offer a floral arranging service for flower shops, grow the flowers at home selling to stores or produce and sell floral arrangement accessories such as vases, cards or other trimmings. If you decide not to have a storefront, you may be able to cheaply lease outdoor space in a popular downtown area with lots of traffic. You can also work from home. With a delivery service, you can easily operate out of your house with a vehicle. To get started, you’ll need the items used to create your arrangements and a few basic tools.

With events and holidays happening throughout the year, the opportunities to make money are all around you. You can work with individuals to provide arrangements for holidays, birthdays, special events like weddings and graduations, etc. In addition, you can look for longer-term contracts with churches, hotels, restaurants and other businesses who need flowers delivered or arranged on a regular basis. These clients can provide a more stable and consistent income flow. It’s also an easy way to showcase your designs to other prospective flower-buyers (for free!).

As a floral designer, you can charge a certain hourly rate, and also have established prices for certain arrangements or orders that clients place. What you charge will depend on how much you pay for your wholesale supplies and also what other flower shops are charging, so you can stay competitive with the market yet still remain profitable.

Finding customers: Whether you are working from home or out of a shop, start with people who know and trust you. Offer special discounts for free flowers in exchange for referrals, and you’ll be surprised at how your prospect list will grow. If you really want to make a statement, create mini-arrangements and deliver them free-of-charge to local businesses you think could be interested your service (i.e. wedding planners, funeral homes, party supply stores). Attach a business card with a simple brochure of your services and rates. Make sure you include a coupon or special introductory price to have them like you even more. Don’t forget the advertising opportunities you have in the yellow pages, local newspapers and radio stations

Donating a flower arrangement for a large event is another inexpensive way to get your business name out there – in front of lots of people. Submitting a press release is a great example – the media will promote you for free if you send them a great news story about your business. This could be as simple is having your friend write a review about your “Store Opening” and sending it to your local paper.

So how do you actually start your floral business?

1. Learn your business. If you don’t have experience arranging flowers, get some! Take a flower arranging class, learn about plants – you want to know a lot more about your product than your customer does. Get an inexpensive start-up guide on how to start a floral business or interview a floral designer or flower shop owner who can give you helpful advice.

2. Find out who your customers are. Who is buying flowers in your community – and what for? What extra service can you provide that they are not already getting, and how much is it worth to your potential customers (what are they willing to pay)? What are other flower shops charging for their designs? As long as you offer more value (i.e. unique products, faster service, weekend or evening hours, etc), you don’t necessarily need the lowest price to gain market share.

3. Find out which licenses or permits you need from your local government office. Talk with an accountant, insurance agent and banker (you can get referrals from other local business owners or friends) to get helpful tips on financing, tax issues, insurance and business management that will save you time, money and hassles in the long run.

Get Started!

Owning a floral business can be very rewarding. Working directly with customers will help you learn the ropes faster and grow your company. Use your creativity to offer a truly unique service that you really enjoy – after all, it’s YOUR business.

Business Slogans

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Businesses want to be ranked #1 in the eyes of their customers; they want their businesses to be talked about. However, there are many businesses in the same industry, targeting similar markets, fighting for the same potential clients’ attention. The same is true for politicians: they compete with each other for the same voters.

If you want your customers to select you instead of somebody else, you need to be different. It is not enough just to be different, but also different in a way your customers will appreciate. For instance, if you are the only one in your industry packaging the items in a blue case … this will make you different; but maybe is something your clients don’t care much. On the other hand, if you are the only one in your industry offering free shipping, chances are that you will be at the top if the rest of your service also matches your clients’ expectations. You have to find what makes your business unique (usually called “unique selling proposition” in marketing terms) and tell everybody.

The question now is how to articulate your “unique selling proposition” in a way that your clients and potential clients will not only understand, but effortlessly remember. The solution is: use a slogan. A slogan is a short sentence that explains what makes you unique. Good slogans are easy to be remembered, they stick on people minds. A slogan makes it easier for your business to be remembered and talked about. It can help setting your business in a privileged position in a competitive industry.

Finding the right slogan is both a difficult and easy process. While it is difficult to come up with good slogans, it is easy to recognize good ones. You, as business owner, can easily recognize if a slogan is appropriate for your business. No one else knows more than you about your business. The question is who can come up with the slogans? You could involve your employees for instance. After all, they know the message that you want to transmit … In fact, they know it so well that they most probably suffer from the “Curse of Knowledge” syndrome. The curse of knowledge means that they know so much about your business’ unique selling proposition that for them, an also for you, it is difficult to realize what it feels like not to know it. Any slogan crafted under the curse of knowledge syndrome effect will not take into account that potential clients do not know yet about what makes you unique.

Therefore, the slogan development process must include outsiders. You need sloganeers that are not affected by the “curse of knowledge”. They can provide you with their slogan suggestions and you can recognize what works for your business. It works best when the process follows an iterative refinement: sloganeers suggest slogans first, then you tell them what works for your business and what does not and sloganeers provide suggestions again. This way, your preferences are taken into account in successive slogan suggestions. It is hard to tell how many slogans suggestions you will need. Usually, business owners get the right slogan after 20 – 30 slogan suggestions, but more may be needed.

You have done already the hard work of building your business and differentiate from your competitors. Now, all you need to do is to communicate in an effective way what is especial about you, what makes your business unique. Find some outsider sloganeers and get a slogan for your business; it is a small investment with a huge return.

Start A Successful Concession Trailer Business

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Starting a concession trailer or food cart business is not easy for those who are interested in having their own food trailers. In fact even an experienced entrepreneur might not do well without proper planning. Since past few years, there have been few decisive factors coming out to be good for being successful in this business to make money.

Choosing a concession trailer as per your needs

One common problem seen with many of the concession trailer owners is related to capital investment kept for buying a good trailer. What most of the people do is, they spend a lot of bucks in purchasing trailer which eventually puts them in to debt and lowers the further funding for stocks and other stuffs needed to get the business going. I have one of my friends from Georgia who couldnt recover the cost of concession trailer itself even 5-6 months before him actually seeing profit in his business. When asked about what he should have not done in this business, he wished to have bought old or used trailer and save some money. Now that gives a good clue to those who are looking to start this business.

The goal of every business: attracting customers

Now its not a rocket science that more famous your counter gets more bucks you will earn. So the real deal is how to attract food seekers to your trailer. What else can give you a better idea than chatting with a successful concession trailer owner with one or more trailers running well in different places!

I talked to a guy in Georgia who owns about 4 trailers in the city who left me with 2 great tips, i.e. pitch area and presentation of a trailer. I found him correct when I saw the big queue of customers before his bright colored Humpty Dumpty concession trailers!

Work smart, make more money

We have always heard this but nobody tells how to exactly implement it in a given business. But this is surely not the case about concession trailer business. Few tips for the same go as follows,

Purchase food supplies like meat, sauces, vinegar and salads wholesale in advance of your vending days. Try to place as much surplus products in your trailer as possible, then store the rest in a large refrigerator at home.

Working everyday on a trailer would not be recommended if you look at it in a business point of view. You can hire some person to handle your concession trailer rather than managing it on your own. This gives you more time to spend in actually growing your business. You can emphasize more on promotions and stuffs like that. Rather if you want to have more than one trailer, then hiring someone is must. Develop a system for collecting money. If you can, engage someone to handle the money individually from the trailers.

So bottom line would be work less or I would say smart, buy other peoples time and gain a far more better insight for your concession trailer business.

Learn How Make Your Trevo Corporate Business Grow

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Trevo Corporate History

Trevo is a Network Marketing Company that was started by Mark and Hollie Stevens who are very well experienced in the MLM Industry and their headquarters is located in Oklahoma City. But if you are in Trevo Corporate you may be asking yourself if its an excellent way to make money or not?

The Trevo Corporate Product

Well first of all the companys main objective is to be able to revive the body into good health by offering a nutritional product or beverage that contains tons of nutritional supplements such as camu camu berry, acai berry, mangosteen, maqui berries, goji berries I mean I could go on and on.

These products are also good for losing weight, having more energy, reversing the aging process while building up your immune system. This nutritional drink is about 32 oz in size and you only take need 1 to 2 ounces daily. Another good thing about it is even safe for kids to take it.

Trevo Corporate Compensation Plan

Lets talk about the compensation plan for a minute. It seems to be pretty interesting because you can earn income from others who join the business opportunity.

Trevo has 8 different ways you earn money with them:

1. Retail Sales- You can purchase products at wholesale price and resale them at retail price. They also have a Preferred Customers Program that you can enroll in and earn bonuses from it.

2. Power Start Business System Every time you personal enroll a Life and Health Coach with the purchase of one of their Power Start Business Systems, you get paid based on your qualification and the system your enrollee purchased.

You also gain access to Trevos back office system along with a lead capture system, email campaign and a personal website. Depending on your qualifying level and the system of enrollee purchases the commission is 40%.

3. Matching Bonus- As your team duplicates the matching bonus is 20%.

4. Group Volume Commissions- Depending on your qualifying points earn Group Volume commissions $10 for the first and second generations of your group. $5 for third through eigth.

5. Bulk Pack Commission- First through fourth generation receives commission up to $183.

6. Pool Bonus- Up to 15% paid out to of companys group volume.

7. Leadership Bonues and Incentives- Earn up to $1,500 monthly for a luxury vehicle as well as trips.

8. Charity Bonus- Charity donations

I personally am not in the Trevo Corporate Business Opportunity but it seems like they are a really good company to work for. I am going to share some secrets with you just in case you are one of the many trying to figure out how to seriously grow your business.

Most MLM Companies focus on sponsoring and recruiting a ton of reps. Their aim is on telling people to be duplicatable by getting out here and recruiting family members and friends while standing around talking to people.

The problem is most of the time family and friends are the ones that arent really interested in your business anyway.

Which is the main reason why 97% of distributors are falling in this industry.

Secret To Trevo Corporate Sucess

If you are an independent distributor for this company then the secret to being successful is learning how to market and generate leads for your business. Personally this company wont teach you how to do this because marketing isnt duplicatable. Especially when the companys main goal is on recruiting tons of people as fast as they can.

One of the main reasons you need to learn how to market is because you may have a hard time trying to persuade people into buying your products if you are unaware of what you are doing.

what’s In A Name – Just Your Business Survival!

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What’s so important about how I sign my name?”

I get asked that question all of the time from my business consulting clients.

I tell them that a better question to ask me is this:

“Who cares about how I sign my name?”

The answer is a simple one.

NOBODY.

FINE PRINT: Except… your customers and clients, your creditors, your bank, your mortgage company, your landlord, the I.R.S… oh yes… and anyone else that wants to SUE YOU (and don’t forget ALL their lawyers!).

As in many areas of the law, the exception to the rule swallows up the rule!

What do I mean by this?

Well, let’s start with some basics. For instance, if you’ve already formed a corporation or limited liability company (LLC), you may think that you’re already protected from personal liability in the event of a lawsuit against your business.

In general, the rule is that a corporation or LLC, if formed correctly, and if all of the formalities required under the law of the State where the entity was formed are followed, does protect you from personal liability for business debts and lawsuits.

FINE PRINT: Except… when you choose to do business as an individual, and not as the corporation or LLC that you initially formed.

You see, whenever you sign documents like contracts, purchase orders, contractual agreements, leases, loans, mortgages, promissory notes, and most other legal documents involving your business, you need to make sure that you sign your name only in your business capacity.

You MUST avoid signing your name in your individual capacity.

And how do you do that? It’s pretty simple. You see, the format that you use to sign your name is the controlling factor.

In many cases, you as the business owner, sign your name without knowing how to properly sign your name to business documents. In fact, most business owners of corporations and LLC’s still sign legally binding agreements in their individual capacity…and not as the business.

SIGN AS AN AGENT OF YOUR BUSINESS

If you have formed a corporation or an LLC, you must remember to sign all contracts, agreements, invoices, etc… as an agent of the business.

For example… Many business owners haphazardly, or perhaps inadvertently, sign legal documents like the format shown in

EXAMPLE 1 below:

EXAMPLE 1

(signature)
————————
John Doe

“But what is the consequence of signing my name like in EXAMPLE 1 above to invoices, agreements, or documents?”

EXAMPLE 1 and the above signature format legally establishes that YOU have signed the contract, invoice, loan, or agreement as an individual.

And not as an agent on behalf of your business.

If you sign your name to agreements in the form depicted in EXAMPLE 1 above, YOU could very well be liable personally to meet all of the terms of the agreement.

And you likely don’t want to do this!

Why Simply out, because you’re therefore subjecting all of your business assets and personal assets as well to the risk of a lawsuit.

If you sign agreements as depicted in EXAMPLE 1 above, YOU will very likely be named personally, as well as your business, in any lawsuit filed against the business.

Remember then:

Signing your name like in EXAMPLE 1 above DOES NOT establish that you have signed the agreement as an agent on behalf of your business.

“Okay. So how should I sign my name to my invoices, contracts, leases, loans, or any other business agreements?

What simple step can I take to protect my business, and my personal assets as well?

SIGN DOCUMENTS ONLY AS AN AGENT OF YOUR BUSINESS

Make sure that you only sign legal documents, letters, memos, invoices, loans, leases, etc… as an agent of your business.

How must I sign my name to any legal document or agreement to show that I am signing only as an agent of my business?

Follow EXAMPLE 2 below:

EXAMPLE 2

ABC CORPORATION, INC.

(signature)
———————————–
BY: John Doe
President (Company Title)

If you sign your name on the dotted line following the exact format depicted in Example 2 above, you legally establish that you are only signing as an agent on behalf of the business…and not in your individual capacity.

But you MUST follow the Example 2 precisely.

CAVEAT: Another very important point on this topic.

AVOID SIGNING documents that state “PERSONAL GUARANTY” on them.

A Personal Guaranty is usually a separate legal document attached to the main agreement. You generally see a Personal Guaranty in a loan, mortgage, or lease. However, sometimes a Personal Guaranty can be established just by the way you sign the legal document, invoice, lease, or agreement.

How?

Simple. If the agreement merely has a signature line that has your individual name on it without any reference to your business name, you are signing the document as a Personal Guaranty. You are therefore personally liable for that agreement if you sign the agreement with such a signature line.

But, what do I do if I am being required to sign a Personal Guaranty, like for a business loan or commercial lease for example?

If a Personal Guaranty is required, you or your lawyer should negotiate a limited period of time (the shortest possible) that the Personal Guaranty will bind you as an individual.

Remember, if you formed a corporation or LLC in the first place, you did it to avoid personal liability and to protect your personal assets. Anyone who does business with your company should, and usually does, know this. So, be careful. Other possibilities can be negotiated too. Just do your best not to sign in your personal capacity by signing a Personal Guaranty.

It’s important to remember to only sign legal documents, invoices, and even letters as an agent of your business. (Follow the format found in EXAMPLE 2 above).

How else can I make sure that I am signing my name properly to all of my business documents?

Call your attorney to review all of your agreements, invoices, leases, and legal documents BEFORE you sign them. Your attorney will offer sound advice that protects YOU, your loved ones, and your business.

Now, let’s review.

What’s in a name?

Well… besides your business…

…it could be all of YOUR personal and family assets!

The best advicve especially in the midst of tough economic times or a Recession, is to have any document you sign first reviewed by your lawyer or business consultant.

Copyright (c) 2008. Miguel Mendez, Jr. All rights reserved.