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A challenge for people with no idea (noobz only)

sparechange

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Alot of new people in the world of entrepreneurship struggle with coming up with an idea, so I will give you a free idea I'd love to see someone execute on. I'm pretty sure the majority of people struggling to come up with an idea and stumble upon this thread will not execute on it and opt to go for something cooler, like finding $10,000,000 for their startup to compete with Tesla, or partner up with their buddy to create another crappy website.

Ok, let's begin. I'll start off by saying that because you are new to this, you will totally suck at doing business, not to discourage you, but to just open up your eyes and face reality. I'm talking from my own personal experience.

#1 You don't know what you are doing
#2 You have no idea how to sell
#3 You have no idea how to market

Along with a million other things, you will quickly discover problems constantly pop up.. Even when you do think you have it ''figured out'' The point of all this is you need to learn all these process's. Take any successful entrepreneur and have them race against someone that has never started a business to create $1,000 in revenue. Who wins? Get the point? Great. Let's start learning.


Industry Insights

The global writing instruments market size was valued at USD 13.9 billion in 2018.


Hmm, writing instruments..you mean like pens and pencils? Yep! How much does a pencil cost to produce? And what cost do you think you could buy it at?

33883

So about 10 cents a pencil you could sell at retail, is it possible you could buy tens of thousands of pencils from a factory and sell them somewhere online or in retail? Absolutely!

But wait, this idea sucks and I want to make huge profits to buy Lambos and Mansions! Oh? Do I hear a heckler in the crowd? Check this out below.

Faber-Castell is one of the world's largest and oldest manufacturers of pens, pencils, other office supplies (e.g., staplers, slide rules, erasers, rulers)[1] and art supplies,[2] as well as high-end writing instruments and luxury leather goods. Headquartered in Stein, Germany, it operates 14 factories and 20 sales units throughout the globe. The Faber-Castell Group employs a staff of approximately 7,000 and does business in more than 100 countries.[3] The House of Faber-Castell is the family which founded and continues to exercise leadership within the corporation. They manufacture about 2 billion pencils in more than 120 different colors every year.

Revenue887 million (2005)
Number of employees6,500 (2006)
Websitewww.faber-castell.com


Oh? A simple set of products generates nearly a Billion dollars yearly? The point I'm trying to make here is that it's not about the product idea, it's mostly about the execution. How many people would start dropshipping pencils from alixpress on Shopify driving traffic with just facebook ads then giveup after they make $0 in sales? I'd say quite alot. Now ok, before you start ordering thousands and thousands of pencils, another point I'd like to get across is the execution part.

The way the company above executed followed a different way of conducting business and during that process I'm sure they had to learn the ropes. So I challenge you kind reader, can you buy a set of pencils, and successfully sell them for a profit? That is a small (but massive step) you can take in your entrepreneurial journey, maybe you won't actually create a multi billion dollar company just selling pencils..........

But you will learn the process of how to build a multi billion dollar company

Then perhaps in your next venture after you fail the first which is extremely likely, you can have some success, it's all about building up your skill set and experience points, just like in a video game you ''level up business skills''

Have a great day.
 
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RazorCut

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Derek Sivers says be expensive.

Faber-Castell 2H Triangular Grip Pencils are, for me, the pinnacle of pencil design. They cost me about $1.20 each and are worth every single cent.

If they were good enough for Van Gogh they are certainly good enough for the likes of me.

If you can produce something as simple, elegant and fit for purpose as the faber-Castell 2001 pencil you richly deserve success.
 

Wil22

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Alot of new people in the world of entrepreneurship struggle with coming up with an idea, so I will give you a free idea I'd love to see someone execute on. I'm pretty sure the majority of people struggling to come up with an idea and stumble upon this thread will not execute on it and opt to go for something cooler, like finding $10,000,000 for their startup to compete with Tesla, or partner up with their buddy to create another crappy website.

Ok, let's begin. I'll start off by saying that because you are new to this, you will totally suck at doing business, not to discourage you, but to just open up your eyes and face reality. I'm talking from my own personal experience.

#1 You don't know what you are doing
#2 You have no idea how to sell
#3 You have no idea how to market

Along with a million other things, you will quickly discover problems constantly pop up.. Even when you do think you have it ''figured out'' The point of all this is you need to learn all these process's. Take any successful entrepreneur and have them race against someone that has never started a business to create $1,000 in revenue. Who wins? Get the point? Great. Let's start learning.


Industry Insights

The global writing instruments market size was valued at USD 13.9 billion in 2018.


Hmm, writing instruments..you mean like pens and pencils? Yep! How much does a pencil cost to produce? And what cost do you think you could buy it at?

View attachment 33883

So about 10 cents a pencil you could sell at retail, is it possible you could buy tens of thousands of pencils from a factory and sell them somewhere online or in retail? Absolutely!

But wait, this idea sucks and I want to make huge profits to buy Lambos and Mansions! Oh? Do I hear a heckler in the crowd? Check this out below.

Faber-Castell is one of the world's largest and oldest manufacturers of pens, pencils, other office supplies (e.g., staplers, slide rules, erasers, rulers)[1] and art supplies,[2] as well as high-end writing instruments and luxury leather goods. Headquartered in Stein, Germany, it operates 14 factories and 20 sales units throughout the globe. The Faber-Castell Group employs a staff of approximately 7,000 and does business in more than 100 countries.[3] The House of Faber-Castell is the family which founded and continues to exercise leadership within the corporation. They manufacture about 2 billion pencils in more than 120 different colors every year.

Revenue887 million (2005)
Number of employees6,500 (2006)
Websitewww.faber-castell.com


Oh? A simple set of products generates nearly a Billion dollars yearly? The point I'm trying to make here is that it's not about the product idea, it's mostly about the execution. How many people would start dropshipping pencils from alixpress on Shopify driving traffic with just facebook ads then giveup after they make $0 in sales? I'd say quite alot. Now ok, before you start ordering thousands and thousands of pencils, another point I'd like to get across is the execution part.

The way the company above executed followed a different way of conducting business and during that process I'm sure they had to learn the ropes. So I challenge you kind reader, can you buy a set of pencils, and successfully sell them for a profit? That is a small (but massive step) you can take in your entrepreneurial journey, maybe you won't actually create a multi billion dollar company just selling pencils..........

But you will learn the process of how to build a multi billion dollar company

Then perhaps in your next venture after you fail the first which is extremely likely, you can have some success, it's all about building up your skill set and experience points, just like in a video game you ''level up business skills''

Have a great day.
I like this post. For me I struggled for a long time to select one business model. It was tough. Once selected my next hurdle was controlling my expectations. If revenue falls short (or never materializes), I question my biz selection. I never get out of my way. Then I look for another biz model.....rinse, repeat and lose. This article tamps down expectation, says pick one and place focus on need and process irrespective of revenue. Place your focus on learning the process. Learn by failing.
 
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Cyberthal

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So I challenge you kind reader, can you buy a set of pencils, and successfully sell them for a profit? That is a small (but massive step) you can take in your entrepreneurial journey, maybe you won't actually create a multi billion dollar company just selling pencils..........

But you will learn the process of how to build a multi billion dollar company

Dropshipping a commodity with no market insight is a bad idea.

FLF talks about entrepreneurship, but there are prior degrees of freedom.

First sacrifice lots of freedom to become useful quickly:

1. Zero-learning entry-level hourly job
2. Hourly job that teaches you something useful
3. Performance compensated job (professions, sales)

By now you've seen enough to have ideas on how to improve an industry or fill an underserved niche. So sacrifice some pay upfront for about half your freedom back:

4. Flexible hours (vacation, commute, part-time, etc)
5. Flexible location (WFH, geo-arbitrage)
6. Multiple employers (create first company as freelancer/consultant)

Then invest (time * expertise) to create profit and value:

7. Business is worth more than sum of parts (not just a shell to sell your time)
8. Business can function without you
9. Scale or sale

Some of this is from WSP's Efficiency and Ebizfacts. The latter recommends starting with a remote job or freelancing to learn Internet business before trying affiliate or dropshipping.

Entrepreneurship used to seem like jumping off a cliff to learn wingsuiting to me, but now I see employment-entrepreneurship as a gradient that can be as smooth as one desires. Which greatly reduces anticipated stress and risk. Just as there's a smooth gradient possible between human walking and flight.
 
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TheGreatGatsby

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So I challenge you kind reader, can you buy a set of pencils, and successfully sell them for a profit?

So you will do this by private labeling your set of pencils and sell on your site or Amazon. How does it fulfill a market need. How we will be different from other pencils company ? How can you convey the superior quality of your pencils ?
One way we can do this, is to create an Instagram page where you post videos of the pencils confronting to different challenge like a hammer, hydraulic press... but I don't know why people will subscribe to an Instagram page with pencils.
So the other solution is to compete on ppc on amazon but we are noobz and don't have a lot of money.

It will be better to start something where you are sure to make money (job, learning a skill and selling your services) and save until you have enough to launch a real business with better research. It's been 2 years and I haven't done nothing which got me closer to my fastlane goals so I am certainly thinking something wrong.
 

Raoul Duke

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So I challenge you kind reader, can you buy a set of pencils, and successfully sell them for a profit?

So you will do this by private labeling your set of pencils and sell on your site or Amazon. How does it fulfill a market need. How we will be different from other pencils company ? How can you convey the superior quality of your pencils ?
One way we can do this, is to create an Instagram page where you post videos of the pencils confronting to different challenge like a hammer, hydraulic press... but I don't know why people will subscribe to an Instagram page with pencils.
So the other solution is to compete on ppc on amazon but we are noobz and don't have a lot of money.

It will be better to start something where you are sure to make money (job, learning a skill and selling your services) and save until you have enough to launch a real business with better research. It's been 2 years and I haven't done nothing which got me closer to my fastlane goals so I am certainly thinking something wrong.


pLLZuxW.gif
 
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sparechange

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Dropshipping a commodity with no market insight is a bad idea.

FLF talks about entrepreneurship, but there are prior degrees of freedom.

First sacrifice lots of freedom to become useful quickly:

1. Zero-learning entry-level hourly job
2. Hourly job that teaches you something useful
3. Performance compensated job (professions, sales)

By now you've seen enough to have ideas on how to improve an industry or fill an underserved niche. So sacrifice some pay upfront for about half your freedom back:

4. Flexible hours (vacation, commute, part-time, etc)
5. Flexible location (WFH, geo-arbitrage)
6. Multiple employers (create first company as freelancer/consultant)

Then invest (time * expertise) to create profit and value:

7. Business is worth more than sum of parts (not just a shell to sell your time)
8. Business can function without you
9. Scale or sale

Some of this is from WSP's Efficiency and Ebizfacts. The latter recommends starting with a remote job or freelancing to learn Internet business before trying affiliate or dropshipping.

Entrepreneurship used to seem like jumping off a cliff to learn wingsuiting to me, but now I see employment-entrepreneurship as a gradient that can be as smooth as one desires. Which greatly reduces anticipated stress and risk. Just as there's a smooth gradient possible between human walking and flight.


I never said to drop ship pencils, my post is more about simply starting something easy (like pencils) to get started on the journey. Alot of people struggle to find ideas, but I can personally guarantee you, if you throw a new person into the market with a magical million dollar idea they will get completely crushed like a bug by competitors in the market space very quickly.

It has happened to me before, my product was a 6 figure seller yet I achieved jack **** selling the same, in fact I can proudly say I lost pretty much all of my money and took a loss. Why is that? Different execeution style, the point I want to make here is to just get started and learn how to actually run a business. The objections above prove my point that people will opt to go for something else, as a pencil business (which is a billion dollar industry) is not as cool as selling electric cars or some fun gadget.

As for @Charbel why only the focus on Amazon / PPC? How about selling b2b, or b2c? Maybe getting into retail space? Or a tiny shop on a corner street? The goal here isn't necessarily to make money, heck you may even lose money, but I promise that you will learn how to run and build a business in the meantime. As a new entrepreneur it's important to know what you are doing. My first product, I didn't have a clue. Now I'm just a little bit less clueless :hilarious:
 

J.Galt

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Alot of new people in the world of entrepreneurship struggle with coming up with an idea, so I will give you a free idea I'd love to see someone execute on. I'm pretty sure the majority of people struggling to come up with an idea and stumble upon this thread will not execute on it and opt to go for something cooler, like finding $10,000,000 for their startup to compete with Tesla, or partner up with their buddy to create another crappy website.

Ok, let's begin. I'll start off by saying that because you are new to this, you will totally suck at doing business, not to discourage you, but to just open up your eyes and face reality. I'm talking from my own personal experience.

#1 You don't know what you are doing
#2 You have no idea how to sell
#3 You have no idea how to market

Along with a million other things, you will quickly discover problems constantly pop up.. Even when you do think you have it ''figured out'' The point of all this is you need to learn all these process's. Take any successful entrepreneur and have them race against someone that has never started a business to create $1,000 in revenue. Who wins? Get the point? Great. Let's start learning.


Industry Insights

The global writing instruments market size was valued at USD 13.9 billion in 2018.


Hmm, writing instruments..you mean like pens and pencils? Yep! How much does a pencil cost to produce? And what cost do you think you could buy it at?

View attachment 33883

So about 10 cents a pencil you could sell at retail, is it possible you could buy tens of thousands of pencils from a factory and sell them somewhere online or in retail? Absolutely!

But wait, this idea sucks and I want to make huge profits to buy Lambos and Mansions! Oh? Do I hear a heckler in the crowd? Check this out below.

Faber-Castell is one of the world's largest and oldest manufacturers of pens, pencils, other office supplies (e.g., staplers, slide rules, erasers, rulers)[1] and art supplies,[2] as well as high-end writing instruments and luxury leather goods. Headquartered in Stein, Germany, it operates 14 factories and 20 sales units throughout the globe. The Faber-Castell Group employs a staff of approximately 7,000 and does business in more than 100 countries.[3] The House of Faber-Castell is the family which founded and continues to exercise leadership within the corporation. They manufacture about 2 billion pencils in more than 120 different colors every year.

Revenue887 million (2005)
Number of employees6,500 (2006)
Websitewww.faber-castell.com


Oh? A simple set of products generates nearly a Billion dollars yearly? The point I'm trying to make here is that it's not about the product idea, it's mostly about the execution. How many people would start dropshipping pencils from alixpress on Shopify driving traffic with just facebook ads then giveup after they make $0 in sales? I'd say quite alot. Now ok, before you start ordering thousands and thousands of pencils, another point I'd like to get across is the execution part.

The way the company above executed followed a different way of conducting business and during that process I'm sure they had to learn the ropes. So I challenge you kind reader, can you buy a set of pencils, and successfully sell them for a profit? That is a small (but massive step) you can take in your entrepreneurial journey, maybe you won't actually create a multi billion dollar company just selling pencils..........

But you will learn the process of how to build a multi billion dollar company

Then perhaps in your next venture after you fail the first which is extremely likely, you can have some success, it's all about building up your skill set and experience points, just like in a video game you ''level up business skills''

Have a great day.
Hi, JG here. This is my first response/post on this forum as I am new here.
I wanted to say I enjoyed reading your post and found it to be mentally stimulating... pretty unique idea if you ask me. I did want to argue the ease of executing this idea (not that you insinuated it was easy) though. It seems to me that an item such as a pencil (in most cases) is not a product that is bought online... mainly due to the time of shipping. In my opinion when someone has a problem that requires a pencil to solve it will likey need to be solved asap... not in two or three days. You will be competing with one of the greatest competitors that ever lived..- convenience. It will be very difficult to make up for that lost value of time with a price mark down and when the product is as cheap as a cple bucks at the store. For most ppl, a dollar is not worth a day.
-Just my 2 cents, again great post and happy fishing
 

Cyberthal

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Arbitrarily starting with pencils is the furthest thing from easy. It's a commodity and one has no market insight. It sounds like you can teach people how to lose all their money failing their first business, which is not a goal for most.
 
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sparechange

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Arbitrarily starting with pencils is the furthest thing from easy. It's a commodity and one has no market insight. It sounds like you can teach people how to lose all their money failing their first business, which is not a goal for most.

Most people will infact fail their first business, and how can someone lose all their money? Whole sale prices are like 1-2 cents. Someone could do this and spend less than a couple hundred bucks which is mere chicken feed. Interesting to hear your objections.
 

Isaac Oh

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How many people would start dropshipping pencils from alixpress on Shopify driving traffic with just facebook ads then giveup after they make $0 in sales?

Haha throwing shade already. Did the other thread inspire you to start this?
Following
 

sparechange

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Haha throwing shade already. Did the other thread inspire you to start this?
Following

Yes :cool:

While I am by no means an expert (someone like biophase or jasonr, ptp and tons of others) can kick my a$$ in terms of knowledge.

But I just wanted to share some of my thoughts for the community.

@Cyberthal

If the pencil idea is bad to start with, what do you think about rocks? Would rocks be a good product to sell? Or is that a bad idea?
 
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Cyberthal

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You're telling people to start their first business as something that violates CENTS. Low per unit cost is no proof against bankruptcy if the goal is actually to make a profit. Presumably it takes deep pockets to compete in a mature commodity space without experience or competitive advantage. If the goal isn't to make a profit, then it's not a business, it's just ecommerce practice.

If one's goal is to gain ecommerce practice selling pencils, one could get paid to do that by a business that's already profitable selling pencils, and also get to observe a business that is actually profitable.

The actually relevant experience is not in pencils but whatever ecommerce skills are used, and those can be learned for good pay and quickly leveraged into a free lifestyle.

If one doesn't have a good idea for a business, then the easy way to get some is to gain market exposure working for profitable businesses. Starting with a random bad idea generated without market exposure won't work because the market is competitive.

The ultimate material goal of economic activity is for humanity to climb the Kardashev scale, and just randomly doing whatever won't accomplish that. There is only one idea; the rest is execution.
 

sparechange

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You're telling people to start their first business as something that violates CENTS. Low per unit cost is no proof against bankruptcy if the goal is actually to make a profit. Presumably it takes deep pockets to compete in a mature commodity space without experience or competitive advantage. If the goal isn't to make a profit, then it's not a business, it's just ecommerce practice.

If one's goal is to gain ecommerce practice selling pencils, one could get paid to do that by a business that's already profitable selling pencils, and also get to observe a business that is actually profitable.

The actually relevant experience is not in pencils but whatever ecommerce skills are used, and those can be learned for good pay and quickly leveraged into a free lifestyle.

If one doesn't have a good idea for a business, then the easy way to get some is to gain market exposure working for profitable businesses. Starting with a random bad idea generated without market exposure won't work because the market is competitive.

The ultimate material goal of economic activity is for humanity to climb the Kardashev scale, and just randomly doing whatever won't accomplish that. There is only one idea; the rest is execution.

I don't think you understand my point, so I will clarify.

Beginning entrepreneurs have no idea what they are doing, kind of like entering in a martial arts class, they are going to get beat up over and over again, they don't even know how to properly throw a punch. What they need to do is start learning how to punch.

That's my point. Much to learn young grasshopper, like I asked before, how about rocks? Is that a good product to sell?
 

sparechange

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Hi, JG here. This is my first response/post on this forum as I am new here.
I wanted to say I enjoyed reading your post and found it to be mentally stimulating... pretty unique idea if you ask me. I did want to argue the ease of executing this idea (not that you insinuated it was easy) though. It seems to me that an item such as a pencil (in most cases) is not a product that is bought online... mainly due to the time of shipping. In my opinion when someone has a problem that requires a pencil to solve it will likey need to be solved asap... not in two or three days. You will be competing with one of the greatest competitors that ever lived..- convenience. It will be very difficult to make up for that lost value of time with a price mark down and when the product is as cheap as a cple bucks at the store. For most ppl, a dollar is not worth a day.
-Just my 2 cents, again great post and happy fishing

Welcome to the forum! ah... you could be onto something here. Maybe people don't want to buy a pencil online and that's a great point.

How could we sell these pencils then? Is it possible we could have customized pencils decorated in super hero themes? Maybe you could even do a fund raising activity by selling pencils at a local school and donate money from the proceeds to some type of charity? What about expanding into artist niches? Oohhh now that's tickling my brain, how many pencils do artists go through on a yearly basis?

As you can see, the above poster said pencils are a bad business. Ok, maybe I'm wrong, or am I?


It goes to show, it's not about the idea, but the execution. How many people will think, meh pencils what a stupid idea, like the posters above? Tons of people! Or give up after spending hundreds of dollars on crappy Facebook ADS and getting 0 sales?

As for the selling rocks idea, I'll answer my own question. Yes, selling rocks is an awesome idea.


How many people can become a millionaire selling rocks? What actions will they take? PPC? Amazon? Shopify & FB ads? oOooOOoOOo
 
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sparechange

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Ok fine, rocks, pencils....boring stuff. What about socks?


Is anyone noticing a trend? Geez, socks are boring to, I want to create electric cars, if only I could contact Elon Musk and Warren Buffet for an investment.

How about razor blades?

Michael Dubin Net Worth: $200 Million. Imagine growing and selling a billion-dollar business within just five years. For Michael Dubin, this was a reality. He’s the founder of Dollar Shave Club, a popular subscription-based shaving club. Dubin built one of the most successful e-commerce brands for men in the span of just five years. We recently spoke with Michael to get insight into his business tactics and learn more about his story.

Once again, the idea doesn't matter, it's the execution.
 

Cyberthal

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I do understand your point, and it's a bad one. You're encouraging people with no entrepreneurial experience to start with a bad plan that violates CENTS and common sense.

Obviously anything that is sold profitably can be a good product. However a beginner should not start with a an arbitrarily-selected commodity in which he has no competitive advantage.

Moreover, it isn't a good idea for a beginner to "just start" entrepreneurship. Instead one should do common sense earning that gradually moves towards entrepreneurship.

For example, a startup often begins by doing consulting work for clients before identifying a common element they can productize. Then they pivot.

Jumping straight to entrepreneurship without validating the idea via employment is for experts, not beginners.

A common exception is when one has a local advantage in entrepreneurship and an employment disadvantage, e.g. kids who resell stuff to their friends but are too young to get a real job.

The fact that most first businesses fail does not mean one should seek failure, much less teach it.
 
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sparechange

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I do understand your point, and it's a bad one. You're encouraging people with no entrepreneurial experience to start with a bad plan that violates CENTS and common sense.

Obviously anything that is sold profitably can be a good product. However a beginner should not start with a an arbitrarily-selected commodity in which he has no competitive advantage.

Moreover, it isn't a good idea for a beginner to "just start" entrepreneurship. Instead one should do common sense earning that gradually moves towards entrepreneurship.

For example, a startup often begins by doing consulting work for clients before identifying a common element they can productize. Then they pivot.

Jumping straight to entrepreneurship without validating the idea via employment is for experts, not beginners.

A common exception is when one has a local advantage in entrepreneurship and an employment disadvantage, e.g. kids who resell stuff to their friends but are too young to get a real job.

The fact that most first businesses fail does not mean one should seek failure, much less teach it.

You are recommending someone with 0 experience to start consulting? What an awesome idea, should they rent a Lamborghini and stand beside it while filming an Iphone video to?
 
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MTF

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Jumping straight to entrepreneurship without validating the idea via employment is for experts, not beginners.

Wow tell that to countless successful entrepreneurs who never had a job. Guess they were all experts from the moment they were born... They most certainly didn't start a business and just figured it out along the way like every entrepreneur does.
 

Cyberthal

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You are recommending someone with 0 experience to start consulting?

No, but that display of reading incomprehension does persuade me to ignore you.

Wow tell that to countless successful entrepreneurs who never had a job. Guess they were all experts from the moment they were born.

Why don't you name one and we'll examine his biography to see whether my principles are sound.
 
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Conscripted

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Thanks for the interesting idea. I'm a noob. I certainly don't know how to execute on an idea like this.

I can think of a few ways to differentiate from other pencils. They could be engraved. Famous quotes, personal affirmations and jokes all come quickly to mind. I'm positive i could come up with a few more.

They could be wrapped with custom graphics. Perhaps it would be possible to build in a "secret" compartment and sell it as a spy pencil.
 

sparechange

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@sparechange
Thanks for the interesting idea. I'm a noob. I certainly don't know how to execute on an idea like this.

I can think of a few ways to differentiate from other pencils. They could be engraved. Famous quotes, personal affirmations and jokes all come quickly to mind. I'm positive i could come up with a few more.

They could be wrapped with custom graphics. Perhaps it would be possible to build in a "secret" compartment and sell it as a spy pencil.

No problem, I wanted to start this thread so newer people can start exercising their thinking muscles. Some great ideas you have, all these skills you learn can be transferred over to any niche you operate in the future.
 

MTF

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Why don't you name one and we'll examine his biography to see whether my principles are sound.

Richard Branson. Never had any job.

I also never had a day job. I created all of my businesses by launching them and learning along the way, not wasting my life "validating the idea via employment."
 
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Kak

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@Cyberthal and @MTF

I am another example that got basically zero training for entrepreneurship through employment.

My last job was at 19 years old... I worked at a sporting goods store stocking shelves and selling guns.

I have been a business owner ever since.

The greats of the world reach beyond their own expertise level and fill that void with leadership. It is the only way a business becomes bigger than you. There is limited time in the day and a limited amount of skills one person can apply anyway. Instead of being an expert in violin, play the orchestra.
 

Cyberthal

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Richard Branson. Never had any job.

Challenge accepted. Immediately I notice this:


> Branson has dyslexia, and had poor academic performance; on his last day at school, his headmaster, Robert Drayson, told him he would either end up in prison or become a millionaire.

That is obviously a major disadvantage in employment pushing him towards entrepreneurship.

> Branson's parents were supportive of his endeavours from an early age.[14] His mother was an entrepreneur; one of her most successful ventures was building and selling wooden tissue boxes and wastepaper bins.

He is not starting from scratch, but with familial support and entrepreneurial expertise and probably personal participation.

> In London, he started off squatting from 1967 to 1968.

He began with incredible hardship that employment would have easily averted.

> After failed attempts to grow and sell both Christmas trees and budgerigars, Branson launched a magazine named Student in 1966. The first issue of Student appeared in January 1968, and a year later, Branson's net worth was estimated at £50,000

He achieved a middle class life by 1969.

> His parents re-mortgaged the family home to help pay the settlement.

Ouch.

Poster girl principle: If the opposition's best cherry-picked case proves the opposite of their thesis, then there are no actual examples supporting their thesis.

Quod erat demonstrandum.
 

EternalX

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Challenge accepted. Immediately I notice this:


> Branson has dyslexia, and had poor academic performance; on his last day at school, his headmaster, Robert Drayson, told him he would either end up in prison or become a millionaire.

That is obviously a major disadvantage in employment pushing him towards entrepreneurship.

> Branson's parents were supportive of his endeavours from an early age.[14] His mother was an entrepreneur; one of her most successful ventures was building and selling wooden tissue boxes and wastepaper bins.

He is not starting from scratch, but with familial support and entrepreneurial expertise and probably personal participation.

> In London, he started off squatting from 1967 to 1968.

He began with incredible hardship that employment would have easily averted.

> After failed attempts to grow and sell both Christmas trees and budgerigars, Branson launched a magazine named Student in 1966. The first issue of Student appeared in January 1968, and a year later, Branson's net worth was estimated at £50,000

He achieved a middle class life by 1969.

> His parents re-mortgaged the family home to help pay the settlement.

Ouch.

Poster girl principle: If the opposition's best cherry-picked case proves the opposite of their thesis, then there are no actual examples supporting their thesis.

Quod erat demonstrandum.
What are you trying to prove? That your point of view is the greatest one and other people's opinion are wrong?

If you come here to just be negative towards other members your time would be more worth it doing your own things and building your business
 
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MTF

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Challenge accepted. Immediately I notice this:


> Branson has dyslexia, and had poor academic performance; on his last day at school, his headmaster, Robert Drayson, told him he would either end up in prison or become a millionaire.

That is obviously a major disadvantage in employment pushing him towards entrepreneurship.

> Branson's parents were supportive of his endeavours from an early age.[14] His mother was an entrepreneur; one of her most successful ventures was building and selling wooden tissue boxes and wastepaper bins.

He is not starting from scratch, but with familial support and entrepreneurial expertise and probably personal participation.

> In London, he started off squatting from 1967 to 1968.

He began with incredible hardship that employment would have easily averted.

> After failed attempts to grow and sell both Christmas trees and budgerigars, Branson launched a magazine named Student in 1966. The first issue of Student appeared in January 1968, and a year later, Branson's net worth was estimated at £50,000

He achieved a middle class life by 1969.

> His parents re-mortgaged the family home to help pay the settlement.

Ouch.

Poster girl principle: If the opposition's best cherry-picked case proves the opposite of their thesis, then there are no actual examples supporting their thesis.

Quod erat demonstrandum.

I rarely discuss with people on this forum because the vast majority is cool and capable of normal discussion but this got to be one of the most ridiculous posts ever written here. I'm not even going to bother to respond to any of it because it makes zero sense.

The Latin phrase at the end topped it off to make you sound even more arrogant than I thought before.

You should start your own forum where you'll sell people your ingenious ideas to become an entrepreneur by becoming an employee.

You ruined a solid thread for people who want to become real entrepreneurs by actually DOING STUFF by poking holes in whatever @sparechange is saying and telling everyone on a forum for ENTREPRENEURS to go find a job. Congratulations.

Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
 

Isaac Oh

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Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
(Whatever is said in Latin sounds profound.)
 

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