How to decide between heart and brain?

[Nuno da Silva]

Hello,

So how does one decide between heart and brain when it comes to deciding what business to start.

Some of you would have ready my previous threads about starting a perfume brand or a body care, skincare brand and my thought process on that.

My heart tells me to start a perfume brand as that is what i really like and love but thinking on how to sell, how to start, costs, market, it is easier for lack of a better word (not easy at all) to start a body care as people will invariably more open to buy a product blind (fragrance wise) if the product fits and provides what they want and need instead of a perfume which is very personal.

it has been a difficult decision so far as my heart keeps telling me to go with perfume but my brain tells me that the body care might provide me with a better chance of success.

So the question is how do you decide between one or the other? I read before that passion and love for the business comes if it is successful and not the other way around but at the same time I always look at it that if if one is successful then whay not the other.

Any inout on this would be helpful from people who have been there before and decided to go for one or the other.

 

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[Subsonic]

Hello,

So how does one decide between heart and brain when it comes to deciding what business to start.

Some of you would have ready my previous threads about starting a perfume brand or a body care, skincare brand and my thought process on that.

My heart tells me to start a perfume brand as that is what i really like and love but thinking on how to sell, how to start, costs, market, it is easier for lack of a better word (not easy at all) to start a body care as people will invariably more open to buy a product blind (fragrance wise) if the product fits and provides what they want and need instead of a perfume which is very personal.

it has been a difficult decision so far as my heart keeps telling me to go with perfume but my brain tells me that the body care might provide me with a better chance of success.

So the question is how do you decide between one or the other? I read before that passion and love for the business comes if it is successful and not the other way around but at the same time I always look at it that if if one is successful then whay not the other.

Any inout on this would be helpful from people who have been there before and decided to go for one or the other.

I have a window cleaning business. It's tedious and uncool. However making 50 to 80€ per hour at age 18 is cool.

Once your business is above 1 million a year it won't really make a difference anyways since then it's just management and numbers.


Choose not based on passion or what you want to do but rather based on what the market wants. Let me tell you, following your heart will lead to a broken heart. Nobody cares that you love perfume.

 

[Nuno da Silva]

Appreciate the time you took to answer my question.
Yes it seems to be the opinion of others as well.
As I heard before as well, sometimes that love comes from the business been successful.
Thank you for that

 

[Kevin88660]

Hello,

So how does one decide between heart and brain when it comes to deciding what business to start.

Some of you would have ready my previous threads about starting a perfume brand or a body care, skincare brand and my thought process on that.

My heart tells me to start a perfume brand as that is what i really like and love but thinking on how to sell, how to start, costs, market, it is easier for lack of a better word (not easy at all) to start a body care as people will invariably more open to buy a product blind (fragrance wise) if the product fits and provides what they want and need instead of a perfume which is very personal.

it has been a difficult decision so far as my heart keeps telling me to go with perfume but my brain tells me that the body care might provide me with a better chance of success.

So the question is how do you decide between one or the other? I read before that passion and love for the business comes if it is successful and not the other way around but at the same time I always look at it that if if one is successful then whay not the other.

Any inout on this would be helpful from people who have been there before and decided to go for one or the other.

Too early to judge until you try.

Develop some mvp to get customers feedback.

 

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[heavy_industry]

So how does one decide between heart and brain when it comes to deciding what business to start.

Both are needed.

You either follow your brain, and you take your heart with you.

Or you follow your heart, but use your brain to make it profitable.

 

[Nuno da Silva]

By the way when I mentioned that I would start a perfume business I don't mean that I would create the perfumes myself, they would be done by a professional perfumer. So this is not following your passion and doing it yourself.

 

[RisingStars]

I've not read your other thread but you are most likely right that selling perfume (online) is much harder because people can't test if they like the smell beforehand & can't return a used bottle.
Something I found recently was snif.co - maybe you can do something similar with your brand.
They ship the whole bottle to the customer (free of charge I think) and put a little sample inside the package for the customer to try. If the customer doesn't like the perfume he can just return the unopened bottle for a full refund. It really is a no-brainer for the customer.
Of course I don't know their profit margins and if this makes sense from a numbers standpoint.
I found that idea really smart nonetheless, maybe something you can look into if you are going with the perfume.

 

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[Nuno da Silva]

That is a brilliant idea actually never thought about that.
I also thought about doing the best of both worlds.

My thinking was to start 5 different fragrances but why not start with 3 and instead of create just the perfumes, have 3 fragrances that would include perfume but also things like hand wash, body cream and shower gel, shampoo.

So this way I will have 2 less fragrances (which is obviously not ideal) but would then allow me to get the body care products.

Please bear in mind that i would also have samples to sell at a much reduced price, so for example 2ml samples for around £5 so around $7 each on a box of three.

So easier entry level, of course the whole marketing would have to work and would work with influencers, reviewers, retailers etc...

 

[Nuno da Silva]

I have a window cleaning business. It's tedious and uncool. However making 50 to 80€ per hour at age 18 is cool.

Once your business is above 1 million a year it won't really make a difference anyways since then it's just management and numbers.


Choose not based on passion or what you want to do but rather based on what the market wants. Let me tell you, following your heart will lead to a broken heart. Nobody cares that you love perfume.

Thank you for your advice and opinion, difficult to decide as both have pros and cons.

Still not sure if the names I have at the moment: Mayfair (London), Tibidabo (Barcelona), Tram 28 (Lisbon), Riad (Marrakesh) and Cap d'Antibes (French Riviera) are winners in a sense that what Rituals do with their collections looks great while using my names like above might make things more difficult to sell as people (mass market) will not necessarily look or buy them via that name while it is easier for consumers to buy into collections like Relaxing or Ayurveda as they are quite known then do something like the above.

For Body Care I would try something like ancient routes or world exploration so could use something like Spices Route, Silky Road, Cote d'Azur, etc...more general than very specific like then ones I use above.

Even Rituals have perfumes so I know both can work but Rituals started with Body Care and then launched perfumes.

Also looking from a market point of view, things like Body Care, Home and Skin Care do tend to be more popular or easier to sell to the masses than perfumes with all the designers, and big brands as competitors.

A quick search on companies house made me see that body care, skincare brands like Rituals (around 200 million in the UK alone), Neom (around 50 million) Grace Cole (around 4 million and very new brand) can grow very quickly while even brands like Byredo which are very know had a turnover of 5 million last year, Truefitt & Hill around 3 million and Floris around 5 million and those are well established. So from a fast lane point of view they are great but not a good as body care, skincare.

I don't know maybe I am overcomplicating things.

Thank you again.