Here we go. My name is Drew.
I decided a few years ago that I want to be an entrepreneur, and ever since then it truly has been a burning desire. There have been a multitude of reasons for me deciding that entrepreneurship is the right path for me, though I’m sure my reasons are very similar to everyone else’s: Money, freedom, sense of purpose, gratification of ultimate independency – to name a few.
I found this forum, read MJ’s story and a few others and I knew this is a place for me. I’m here to learn, keep motivated, network, and hopefully make friends with professional minded business guys in my area (you know they say you are the sum of the 5 people you spend most of your time with).
Stop here if and skip to the end unless you want a short (probably boring) biography. – It was fun for me to write. I am not a writer, and I tend to have a million different things bouncing around in my head at the same time, so bear with me.
Here’s a little back-story of myself. I grew up (and still reside) in Delaware County, PA. I have one older brother (2 years older) who does IT for a French based bank in New York City. My parents would have been considered “middle class†and I certainly was never handed anything on a silver platter – nor would I have wanted to be. I started working a paper route at a young age, probably around 8 or 9 years old. Not long after I started I took on 2 more routes to make more money to feed my hobby as a guitarist. When I was 10 years old I bought a Gibson Les Paul Custom (a $3000 guitar). This is (probably) when I started to realize that in life you can have anything you want as long as you have a plan to get there and your not afraid to get down and dirty doing whatever it takes to get there.
As I got older I worked a few other odd jobs, but spent most of my summer days working for my dad doing sub contractor gigs, mostly kitchens and bathrooms. I went through numerous expensive hobbies, and I always had a problem with wanting to buy the “best of the best†in everything I did. My hard work and diligence always made it possible to get whatever I set my mind to.
High school, oh boy! Where to start? I went to a catholic school my freshman year. That was short lived. As it turned out, I was quite an a**hole that year and couldn’t seem to keep myself out of demerits, detentions, and suspensions. I really didn’t do anything too bad, honestly. Most of the time I’d get in trouble for my hair being too long or some other “dress code violationâ€. The straw that broke the camels back was when I told the disciplinarian to go f**k himself. That’s a story for another time, but with that I was off to public school.
The school I ended up going to was NOT the best of schools, to say the least. I was one of the few white kids, and one of the ONLY kids that didn’t want to be a “gangsterâ€. I had a small group of friends, but for the most part I kept to myself. Academically, I did fantastic all throughout school, when it came to attendance…not so much. Around my junior year I really grew tired of the school. I was spending most of my nights at my brothers college drinking, partying and meeting girls. I guess I felt I belonged at the college more then I did at my high school. This all led to me getting kicked out of my school, due to attendance, my senior year. Again- that’s another story (that pisses me off) all in itself.
So there I was, 17 years old, technically a high school dropout (don’t ever call me that, it does NOT make me happy). So I did all I knew, I worked. I made money. I played in my band. I partied.
Fast forward about a year. I met a girl at a party and we hit it off. Around the same time a real good buddy of mine got me a job at a manufacturing company. I was doing total grunt work. I started off making $8 an hour, and it was the BIGGEST slap in the face, being the lowest wage I had ever been paid. At the time I didn’t see a big opportunity at the job, but as time passed I got promotion after promotion. I worked my a$$ off, and some months I would work 12-16 hour days, 7 days a week.
About 2 years later my girlfriend was pregnant and we were moving into an apartment together. We had a little girl! This obviously changed my life in a HUGE way in itself (again that’s another story to keep this as shore at possible).
At work, the promotions kept coming. I kept learning EVERYTHING I could that would help me progress in my professional life. I read books relating directly and indirectly to my position. I really started to see the world differently. Where other people saw problems, I saw opportunity. When no one wanted to be bothered with a task or responsibility, I stepped up to the plate and completed the task to my 100% best ability.
Skip forward to today.
I am now titled the Quality Manager. I make over 4 times what I did when I started working and work far less hours. I wear many hats and I have grown to be known as the “go to guy†for literally everything in my shop. My responsibilities are HUGE. My job IS hard. There IS a lot of stress, I wouldn’t have it any other way though- I love what I do. Not to pat myself on the back, but I am CERTAIN that anyone that tried to fill my shoes would fall short.
I work with a fantastic group of guys that I have learned so many priceless things from, including the owner of the company, who I am now pretty close with.
I think one of my best qualities, is that I look for the best qualities in other people and try to learn things from them, and at the same time look at their worst qualities and rid my life of those traits. I guess the way I look at it is, if I were to combine all the positive characteristics of everyone I know, that’d be a smart, professional, bada** m****rf****r!
I already have such a sense of satisfaction because I feel that I defied the odds. The cards I had been dealt weren’t the best, but I played the s**t out of that hand -
ANYWAY -
As much as I love what I do, I decided a long time ago that I really want to be an entrepreneur. I have a few ideas bouncing around right now. The one idea I have just started acting on involves a product that solves a legitimate issue for many people. It is an ingestible product, and has virtually no demographic limits. I feel it will be extremely marketable and plan to sell online. I believe this is exactly the kind of thing you guys would call “fastlaneâ€.
I have the same fears as I’m sure any one else would have. It’s going to cost me a good bit of money up front, and I have to figure out all of the legalities, insurances and all the other goodies.
So here I am, I’ll be reading around and hopefully getting to know some of you guys!
-Drew :icon_super:
I decided a few years ago that I want to be an entrepreneur, and ever since then it truly has been a burning desire. There have been a multitude of reasons for me deciding that entrepreneurship is the right path for me, though I’m sure my reasons are very similar to everyone else’s: Money, freedom, sense of purpose, gratification of ultimate independency – to name a few.
I found this forum, read MJ’s story and a few others and I knew this is a place for me. I’m here to learn, keep motivated, network, and hopefully make friends with professional minded business guys in my area (you know they say you are the sum of the 5 people you spend most of your time with).
Stop here if and skip to the end unless you want a short (probably boring) biography. – It was fun for me to write. I am not a writer, and I tend to have a million different things bouncing around in my head at the same time, so bear with me.
Here’s a little back-story of myself. I grew up (and still reside) in Delaware County, PA. I have one older brother (2 years older) who does IT for a French based bank in New York City. My parents would have been considered “middle class†and I certainly was never handed anything on a silver platter – nor would I have wanted to be. I started working a paper route at a young age, probably around 8 or 9 years old. Not long after I started I took on 2 more routes to make more money to feed my hobby as a guitarist. When I was 10 years old I bought a Gibson Les Paul Custom (a $3000 guitar). This is (probably) when I started to realize that in life you can have anything you want as long as you have a plan to get there and your not afraid to get down and dirty doing whatever it takes to get there.
As I got older I worked a few other odd jobs, but spent most of my summer days working for my dad doing sub contractor gigs, mostly kitchens and bathrooms. I went through numerous expensive hobbies, and I always had a problem with wanting to buy the “best of the best†in everything I did. My hard work and diligence always made it possible to get whatever I set my mind to.
High school, oh boy! Where to start? I went to a catholic school my freshman year. That was short lived. As it turned out, I was quite an a**hole that year and couldn’t seem to keep myself out of demerits, detentions, and suspensions. I really didn’t do anything too bad, honestly. Most of the time I’d get in trouble for my hair being too long or some other “dress code violationâ€. The straw that broke the camels back was when I told the disciplinarian to go f**k himself. That’s a story for another time, but with that I was off to public school.
The school I ended up going to was NOT the best of schools, to say the least. I was one of the few white kids, and one of the ONLY kids that didn’t want to be a “gangsterâ€. I had a small group of friends, but for the most part I kept to myself. Academically, I did fantastic all throughout school, when it came to attendance…not so much. Around my junior year I really grew tired of the school. I was spending most of my nights at my brothers college drinking, partying and meeting girls. I guess I felt I belonged at the college more then I did at my high school. This all led to me getting kicked out of my school, due to attendance, my senior year. Again- that’s another story (that pisses me off) all in itself.
So there I was, 17 years old, technically a high school dropout (don’t ever call me that, it does NOT make me happy). So I did all I knew, I worked. I made money. I played in my band. I partied.
Fast forward about a year. I met a girl at a party and we hit it off. Around the same time a real good buddy of mine got me a job at a manufacturing company. I was doing total grunt work. I started off making $8 an hour, and it was the BIGGEST slap in the face, being the lowest wage I had ever been paid. At the time I didn’t see a big opportunity at the job, but as time passed I got promotion after promotion. I worked my a$$ off, and some months I would work 12-16 hour days, 7 days a week.
About 2 years later my girlfriend was pregnant and we were moving into an apartment together. We had a little girl! This obviously changed my life in a HUGE way in itself (again that’s another story to keep this as shore at possible).
At work, the promotions kept coming. I kept learning EVERYTHING I could that would help me progress in my professional life. I read books relating directly and indirectly to my position. I really started to see the world differently. Where other people saw problems, I saw opportunity. When no one wanted to be bothered with a task or responsibility, I stepped up to the plate and completed the task to my 100% best ability.
Skip forward to today.
I am now titled the Quality Manager. I make over 4 times what I did when I started working and work far less hours. I wear many hats and I have grown to be known as the “go to guy†for literally everything in my shop. My responsibilities are HUGE. My job IS hard. There IS a lot of stress, I wouldn’t have it any other way though- I love what I do. Not to pat myself on the back, but I am CERTAIN that anyone that tried to fill my shoes would fall short.
I work with a fantastic group of guys that I have learned so many priceless things from, including the owner of the company, who I am now pretty close with.
I think one of my best qualities, is that I look for the best qualities in other people and try to learn things from them, and at the same time look at their worst qualities and rid my life of those traits. I guess the way I look at it is, if I were to combine all the positive characteristics of everyone I know, that’d be a smart, professional, bada** m****rf****r!
I already have such a sense of satisfaction because I feel that I defied the odds. The cards I had been dealt weren’t the best, but I played the s**t out of that hand -
- My parents weren’t rich
- I didn’t grow up in the best neighborhood
- I never graduated high school
- I had a child at a very young age (I heard countless times that because of this alone I was destined to fail)
ANYWAY -
As much as I love what I do, I decided a long time ago that I really want to be an entrepreneur. I have a few ideas bouncing around right now. The one idea I have just started acting on involves a product that solves a legitimate issue for many people. It is an ingestible product, and has virtually no demographic limits. I feel it will be extremely marketable and plan to sell online. I believe this is exactly the kind of thing you guys would call “fastlaneâ€.
I have the same fears as I’m sure any one else would have. It’s going to cost me a good bit of money up front, and I have to figure out all of the legalities, insurances and all the other goodies.
So here I am, I’ll be reading around and hopefully getting to know some of you guys!
-Drew :icon_super:
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