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Amazon Dropshipping Question

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Deleted78083

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Hello,

Welcome. This forum is full of people which have a +10-million euros net worth and beyond, without ever having worked in the corporate world before, nor even having studied at university.

Of course, this doesn't mean that going corporate isn't a good idea. It all comes down to the type of business you want to create ultimately.

I'd recommend you read Richard Branson's biography "losing my virginity". His life is an amazing example of how one can offer value without having any technical skills and barely finishing high-school.

There are plenty of ways to make money offer people value, but they need to be approached with an open mind.

Best,

Monfii


Edit: that being said, you may also benefit from reading the book "Rework" which i summarized here: BOOK - Book discussion: Rework
 

jpn

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A specialization in a skill like Web Development, Copywriting or SEO + hard work might make it possible to become a millionaire over the years, but I did not find one current example of someone who built a 10 million euros net worth via this way.
I know several entrepreneurs, including in Germany, who made a lot more than 10Mio following a route like this. Usually they could code or sell, built an agency doing that, then used proceeds of those agencies to build products and then sold those businesses. They did not need to take on VC money because they were self funded, so they could sell a company for 100 mio, and take home 100 mio themselves. If you sell a VC funded company for 10 mio, you failed and probably didn't make any money (look up "liquidation preferences" if you want to know why).

A few thoughts:
  1. You analysed data on start-up exits. This data set is likely biased. Many company sales are not publicly recorded. This data set likely comes from a national association of Venture Capitalists. So of course every recorded exit would have VC investment. This isn't meant as a bad thing, just that the data was recorded for a different analysis than you are doing.
  2. Germany is traditional. German VCs are traditional and look at what has worked in the past. And German VCs invest in people like them. German VCs are overwhelming ex-consulting, ex-IB folks who spent a few years at a Rocket Internet company before they failed their own start-ups and became a VC. Also, rocket internet would recruit from consulting and IB, give these people "near" entrepreneur experiences and allow them to start.
  3. The data set and route you're looking at are the "tech start-up" route. This is not the route that most people on this forum would recommend. This type of route is high-risk - extremely high reward. Most routes advocated on this forum are medium risk - high reward and not needing investment.
The path you are suggesting is a fine path to take. But if your desired end-goal is to start a scaleable, investable tech-start-up, then you're better off joining an early stage (think 5-10 people) tech start-up founded by experienced founders who've done it before and learn from that.

You will not learn entrepreneurship at an IB or consulting job. You will learn how to work hard and deal with big corporates, these are valuable skills, but you'll still start from scratch as an entrepreneur. Funnily enough, you will also not learn entrepreneurship in business school, it's something you can only learn by doing.
 

jpn

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@jpn Thank you for this.

Your remarks about the German startup scene are true, and of course my dataset is highly biased too.

The advantage of this analysis were detailed, real world examples of people who have made it or at least were very close to making it and this gave me a clear route to take which can lead to success - although it might not be the one with the highest probability and your high risk comment is true as well.
To clarify: I think high risk - extremely high reward is fine. It's the path I'm on myself. The main point is to make sure you understand the game you're about to play.
I would love to find a bunch of concrete examples of people who have made it to 10 million euros following the route you pointed out. I spent hours in this forum trying to extract the success stories and then the concrete information out of those stories, but this doesn't give me nearly as many insights as my German startup analysis. It's understandable that the contributors in this forum don't want to give details about their specific business, but this also prevents me from deriving valuable common patterns.
You did not get "insights" you found a pattern that has appeared in the past in a particular data set. The forum actually tends to give amazing insights, the stuff that really matters. The problem is, unless you're running a business, you don't recognise them for what they are. You don't understand it until you've been exposed to the same problems.

That said, the problem with trying to find patterns on successfully starting a business is that luck and personal circumstance play a massive role, you're looking at lottery winners and trying to copy their strategy for picking numbers.

To be clear, graduating at a top tier German business school and working hard are good things to do career/life wise. I'm a big fan of excellent higher education and developing good work habits. That will be valuable whether or not you go the fastlane route. I only want to point out that its not the only route, and many successful entrepreneurs did not follow that route.
Without specific examples, I feel like the route I outlined will be the one with the highest success chances for me, as there are clear role models and a visualizable goal. But the non-corporate or VC route is likely to fit my personality much better and I will invest more research in success stories before going all in on the corporate route. If I find specific examples, I'll share.
Instead of spending your time looking at numbers, talk to people. People are real and realities are complex. Go on LinkedIn, pay for LinkedIn premium/sales navigator if you have to, and reach out to people who are the founder of a business with a certain size, lets say, 20-200 people, tell them you are a student working on a research project and you are qualitatively analysing entrepreneurial journeys. Ask if they're willing to talk to you about their story for 15 minutes. I will guarantee you that if you try a few variations of this a lot of people will say yes. And they will happily tell you about their journey.

DO NOT SEND THEM A SURVEY, approach them like humans with a story to tell.

If this feels uncomfortable and you're struggling to do it because of a fear of rejection: Welcome to entrepreneurship. it's about doing a lot of uncomfortable things. Now go out and do it.

As a side note, doing this a few times a week for a year will put you in a better position to start a successful business than any amount of internships and IB or consulting jobs.
 

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