£40 in my account with my trousers down

[drum_hacker]

Hey all!

Hope you are all awesome and crushing it!

I wanted to introduce myself as I’m new!

My name is Lee. I am a step dad, business owner, musician, recovered user, writer, and lecturer from the south coast UK.

When I took on my my step son I had just left my job at a college I had lectured at for 7 years. I won teacher of the year award and the following day received a letter telling me I had lost more hours than I could afford (government cuts always seem to hit the education and health service first - our new CEO gave himself a pay rise within the first month. Awesome). I went from running one course over 5 days to running 2 courses over 3 (impossible) and using my remaining time in the day to coach students FOC as I thought it was a shitty situation for them to have lost a bunch of lessons. I’m a good guy

I decided that getting f@*ked was one thing, but bending over and passing the lube was further than I wanted to go, so I quit.

I had been running a business in the evenings and mornings and always knew I needed to double down on it, so I did.

With my co-Director and best friend at the time (you can see where this is going) we built the business up to nearly enough to pay ourselves. We took on all the jobs (even the ones we were terrible at) and had no business acumen at all.

My business partner was definitely not a risk taker, not even little risks. He would crumble under fear if I even suggested him making a sales call or similar. One time he was meant to let one of our contractors go due to them always turning up late and doing a terrible job (he hired them against my will in the first place) and he ended up freaking out on the phone and offering them more hours! *face plant*

I could tell you a bunch of super hilarious anecdotes but I want to get to the point because I need some help and guidance.

At the start of this year we had £15k stolen from us. This particular company is an entertainment agency, supplying singers, bands, and DJs to venues in the UK. We sometimes send out 10 singers on the same day.
Long story short, we found out that over the last year, many of the singers we were contracting had been stealing little amounts from one of our venues which accumulated to the aforementioned amount over the year. This was not good. These were people we had given regular work to for nearly 7 years, some were friends, some came and ate at my house.

At the same time this was happening, my wife had a cancer scare. 6 months of inconclusive scans and hospital visits. She finally got the all clear but the ride there wasn’t easy.

After we worked out the money had been stolen my then business partner and best friend bailed. He quit the company and left me with all the debt. Without taking 30+ different people to court there was no chance of getting the money back, and no chance it was worth 30 court cases worth of time credits!

I didn’t know what to do as I was living off the last little bit of savings from my lecturing years and it was about to run out. I’d never had a credit card or missed a payment so I decided to get a personal loan and use it to pay back the other staff that the £15k was meant for.

Fast forward to now and I have started a new Co (the other one is still running and ticking over) but the debt and loan repayments are crippling. I have employed needed staff, and have never missed payroll, but it’s near Christmas and I haven’t paid myself in about 3 months now.

To top it off, I had to go into my overdraft and the bank accidentally shut my account (I know, you couldn’t write it!). I am in the LONG and arduous process of getting them to reopen it but even though have admitted fault, it seems it will take months not weeks.

I do not have a business/life divide - I love what I do and I couldn’t believe the first time I read UNSCRIPTED . As it must have with all of you, it rang so true.

It’s awesome to have found some like minded people!

My time is focused between my business, my family, and my health.

So what am I asking? I need help! My new business (that I set up 2 months ago) is already doing better per month than my other business does per month after7 years. And not having my ex-business partner on board means I can take the necessary leaps of the cliff when needed, but I am really struggling at the moment and need to take a wage!

My staff and bills are always paid but on this journey back to zero I don’t know what to do.

I currently have £47 in my account and personal rent and bills coming up. I don’t know what to do.

Any help or direction super appreciated. And thanks so much for reading and having me in the forum!

Big smooch,

lee

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Welcome to the forum, happy to hear the wife is doing better.

 

[Jeff Noel]

I currently have £47 in my account and personal rent and bills coming up. I don’t know what to do.

Look around in your house. Do you need that TV? Do you need this and that other thing ?
Put them up for sale on FB Marketplace/Craigslist/whatever is working in your area. TODAY.

Think about it objectively. When was the last time you used X ? Might be a good time to put it up for sale.
If you post your stuff on FB Marketplace, you'd probably double your available cashflow tonight (maybe not tonight considering the timezone, but you know what I mean).

It's a quick and dirty start to help you catch your breath.

 

[Imgal]

It sounds like you've turned things around brilliantly and believe I know how scary it is to have next to nothing in your pocket but you have to remember you're the same amazing guy who turned things around. Don't let yourself fall into the scarcity / overwhelm mindset that's so easy to do.

@Jeff Noel is bang on the money with the suggestions he's made. You're an entrepreneur. A good one by the sound of it. Get yourself into that mindset. Solve problems for people. Most of us think that is changing the world. The reality is it can be as simple as someone getting a good deal on X, Y and Z that they really need and couldn't afford new.

Got more time to play about with (I can't tell how much your business takes up your time). Follow Gary Vaynerchuk's lead and go to yard sales and flip stuff online. Find stuff on one marketplace and flip it somewhere.

Also don't forget the skills you have. You turned around a business. Document that process so you have it clear in your head and offer strategy calls with people looking to do the same. If you've got any tech /creative skills, sign up on Fiverr and do some jobs there (rarely anything these days is $5, more like $200!)

You feel stuck inside a box right now and it's stopping you being able to see the solutions. I promise you if you just take a moment to breathe and push open that lid and pop your head out you'll see there is a world of opportunity.

 

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[drum_hacker]

It sounds like you've turned things around brilliantly and believe I know how scary it is to have next to nothing in your pocket but you have to remember you're the same amazing guy who turned things around. Don't let yourself fall into the scarcity / overwhelm mindset that's so easy to do.

@Jeff Noel is bang on the money with the suggestions he's made. You're an entrepreneur. A good one by the sound of it. Get yourself into that mindset. Solve problems for people. Most of us think that is changing the world. The reality is it can be as simple as someone getting a good deal on X, Y and Z that they really need and couldn't afford new.

Got more time to play about with (I can't tell how much your business takes up your time). Follow Gary Vaynerchuk's lead and go to yard sales and flip stuff online. Find stuff on one marketplace and flip it somewhere.

Also don't forget the skills you have. You turned around a business. Document that process so you have it clear in your head and offer strategy calls with people looking to do the same. If you've got any tech /creative skills, sign up on Fiverr and do some jobs there (rarely anything these days is $5, more like $200!)

You feel stuck inside a box right now and it's stopping you being able to see the solutions. I promise you if you just take a moment to breathe and push open that lid and pop your head out you'll see there is a world of opportunity.

Awesome advice and thanks so much for your time! Super appreciate it! And def agree! Flipping’ stock is something I’ve not gone super hard on so will 100% get involved!

I’ve spent the last 24 hours smashing outreach and going for the resale! We have a load of clients that have previously come for sessions so offering discounted rates to fill up the early 2020 diary and generate some extra rev and get past zero!
I have a meeting with a local KILLER entrepreneur who gives me mentorship tomorrow AM so I’m super gassed about that. I always leave with a much clearer mindset.
How are you doing?

 

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[drum_hacker]

Welcome to the forum, happy to hear the wife is doing better.

Legend!!!

 

[drum_hacker]

Look around in your house. Do you need that TV? Do you need this and that other thing ?
Put them up for sale on FB Marketplace/Craigslist/whatever is working in your area. TODAY.

Think about it objectively. When was the last time you used X ? Might be a good time to put it up for sale.
If you post your stuff on FB Marketplace, you'd probably double your available cashflow tonight (maybe not tonight considering the timezone, but you know what I mean).

It's a quick and dirty start to help you catch your breath.

guy!! Thanks so much for taking the time to respond!
Def agree but already got rid of the majority of our valuable shiz!
There’s a couple more stuffs but the main things have already gone. Imma’ keep pushing though - NEVER give up!! How’s you?

 

[Guest34764]

If you live in a somewhat popular area that has local selling with craigslist, there are tons of opportunity to flip low value items and snowball your profits. It can be monkey work if you know the product that you're going to flip as well.
>Look for bicycles on Craigslist
>Look at every listing
>compare price of listing using the model and year to something like BlueBicyclebooks
>Call up every single person in your area, and low ball the hell out of them until you get a yes

Using this method I was able to do things like

>Buy bicycle for 500$
>Clean it up, take nicer pictures,post on craigslist and keep the listing active
>A week later of being in my garage
>sold for $1,000

This happened more than once, people don't care about the lowball offers sometimes if they need cash and sometimes you really don't even need to lowball them. A fair deal that gives you profit is great for both parties. I just used bicycles for my own experiences but I'm sure you could do something like this with furniture, etc, and by the way I started flipping with 40$, It really does snowball if you know what you're doing.

 

[Roli]

Welcome to the forum, good to see another fellow UK entrepreneur in here.

That's so lame people you know and trusted stole from you, did you at least file a case with the police?

Anyway, it's clear what you need to do, you need to fold the first business, or sell it. You need to shed that weight from your neck, there is no point being the good guy at the expense of your family, they will not thank you for it and it'll just make you miserable in the long run.

Also have you tried getting back any old PPI? Might be a nice way of generating some quick cash and paying back the bank for screwing you over; don't accept their first offer by the way.

Glad to hear your wife is being well looked after by the NHS, hopefully the Tories don't get back in and sell it off in front of our very eyes.

Good luck!