It's Never Too Late to Start!

[Ramble On]

Today was my first day of freedom and I am 46 years old. My last day at my corporate job was yesterday. I had been with that company for 8 years and had been in the industry for 25 years.

I read the book 3 years ago and started from there. I had never built a website, never sold anything online, and at the time wouldn't have known what Google Analytics was if it feel into my lap!

My wife and I both had full time jobs when we started this journey. Luckily we have been able to build this as a team. She left her full time job after a year and a half and ran with it from home while I continued to work. I also enjoyed a 2 hour commute each day back and forth to work! Our goal was to be able to replace both of our incomes before I left.

Speaking of work, it has been A LOT of work. THREE YEARS of non-stop work, 7 days a week. Countless hours day and night of researching, building, shipping orders and the list goes on. Along the way there have been victories, failures, tears, and laughter. There were many times we thought of quitting but always pushed it to the back of our minds.

With that said I want to thank everyone that has contributed to this forum that I have learned so much from. I also want to thank everyone behind the scenes that have helped us out. I don't post here very often. I just don't have time! I don't know how some of you guys do it with your amazing progress threads!

So if you think your too old to get started, you're not. I have seen posts on here saying "I am 35, should I even try to start?" "I am 40, it's too late for me". Forget that, just start putting one foot in front of the other and you will get there!

We are not in the Fastlane yet but heading in the right direction! Maybe we can retire by the time we're 50. Maybe by 55. Who knows. At least we will be able to get there on our own terms.

Ramble On guys and gals.......

 

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[Tiago]

Reading stories like this make me smile. That's why this forum is better than any other out there.

 

[Hackdroot]

Congrats on the newfound success. Would you be willing to share a little more about your business? Not looking for specifics, but more like:

Are you importing and reselling? Created a new product? Repurposing something old?

Any advice you have for others who are juggling work and trying to start a side business?

 

[Vigilante]

@MJ DeMarco

 

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[Ramble On]

Congrats on the newfound success. Would you be willing to share a little more about your business? Not looking for specifics, but more like:

Are you importing and reselling? Created a new product? Repurposing something old?

Any advice you have for others who are juggling work and trying to start a side business?

I would be glad to. I just had something come up that I need to deal with but I will jump back on a little later.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

My last day at my corporate job was yesterday. I had been with that company for 8 years and had been in the industry for 25 years.

This is huge! Congrats. Is your business venture in your industry? Did you spot a need there?

We are not in the Fastlane yet

Freedom is Fastlane. Being relieved of the job is an awesome start.

 

[Ramble On]

Sorry about that. Didn't mean to post and run. I had something unexpected come up that I had to deal with. Just another day as a business owner!

Anyway, a few of you have already asked about our story so I will share what I can and hopefully be able to help some others.

It started three years ago. I had read the book and was motivated to get something going. I spent a couple of months trying to come up with an idea before it hit. I looked at building an app, an online store, selling on Ebay, etc.

One night we got online and were looking for a product for one of our children's needs. We couldn't find the product anywhere here in the US. There were some similar things but not exactly what we were looking for. Finally after digging deeper and deeper we found a company in Scotland that sold what we needed. We ordered one from them and it worked great.

That was my moment! We contacted the company to see what their interest would be in expanding into the US. Keep in mind that I had never built a website or anything at this point. I was winging it! Amazingly they decided to give us a shot. We negotiated a deal with them to be the exclusive distributor for their products here in the US.

Fast forward to today. We now sell on our website, on Amazon, and to brick and mortar stores. Our product has actually been the number one selling product in our category on Amazon a few times. The product we sell is for children with special needs. Given that, we also sell to therapists, counselors, and school districts.

It has been a wild ride and had reached the point that we could hardly handle it any more. We did hire one part time person to help my wife but they were overwhelmed even after that. So yesterday was my last day at my 9-5. I had to get home to help or it was going to implode.

 

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[Ramble On]

This is huge! Congrats. Is your business venture in your industry? Did you spot a need there?



Freedom is Fastlane. Being relieved of the job is an awesome start.

Thanks for the kind words MJ. It was a pleasure meeting you at the meet up in AZ.

 

[tbfmiss]

A great personal motivation for me. Thanks.

 

[Ramble On]

A great personal motivation for me. Thanks.

Glad I could give you a lift. Whatever your road, just stay the course.

 

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[Hackdroot]

How awesome. Filling a need for yourself and leveraging it into a business.


A few questions, if you don't mind.

Did you have to purchase a bunch of stock in advance, or were you on Net D terms?

What was your initial method of advertisement?

How exactly do you gain exclusivity on distribution?

 

[Ramble On]

We did have to purchase stock up front to get started and also spent money on the new website, merchant account, shipping materials, etc.

Our initial method of advertisement was mainly social media. We are now doing PPC advertising, banner ads on industry related blogs, sponsored posts on blogs, print advertising, etc. Social media has been our biggest driver of traffic along with our PPC campaign. Print advertising has worked surprisingly well for getting our product into stores.

Now to your question on distribution rights. The company we made an agreement with in Scotland was a small family owned business. They were just happy to get their products to the states. I had an attorney draw up an agreement and we went from there. Since then we have found other products in the UK that were not in the states yet. We have made similar agreements with those companies and are now importing their products.

Next on the horizon is importing directly from a factory in Hong Kong. We have just about finalized distribution rights with another company and will be importing their products soon. We are currently working on finalizing the contract with them and getting ocean freight options nailed down.

 

[Chris Mbori]

This is great. Super encouraging


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

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[JaxAttacks]

Congrats on you success and being able to leave your job!

 

[BackOnTrack]

Inspirational stuff! A huge achievement! A massive well done, the feeling of quitting the corporate job must be something special...

 

[craig1928]

you my friend are awesome

 

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[Andy Black]

Congrats to you and your wife.

Tell us again about the bit where you left your job. . How did you feel handing in your notice? What did it feel like driving home? What about the next morning? Has it truly sunk in yet?

All the best and hope to hear how your business grows and helps more kids and families out there.

 

[Ramble On]

Thanks Andy. Giving my notice was quite nerve racking. I really liked the company I worked for and enjoyed what I did there. Given that, I knew it would never get me where I wanted to be financially. I gave my two weeks notice hoping they would tell me to just go ahead and leave. Unfortunately, they wanted me to stay for the two weeks. I guess this is the drawback of being a good employee!

I don't know if it has really sunk in yet. So far it just feels like I am on an extended weekend! I need to develop a new routine after such a drastic change. But, there is no time for rest. We spent a good portion of yesterday putting together a large shipment to resupply our Amazon inventory.

Your last point is what has been very rewarding for us in this process. We have had so many families come back to us and thank us for our product. It has had such an impact on their children's daily life. It has also been fun attending industry conferences and trade shows and interacting with the special needs kids and families. As MJ has said, provide value and you will be rewarded.

 

[eekern]

Awsome post "Tamble On"

In my life i've had a ton of challenges in both business and my personal life.

Sometimes when people hear my story they almost think I made it up with what I went through at an early age.

My struggles and being miserable with my life was what started me on the road to change.

During that process I've had tons of struggles with business and my personal life.

Every time I wanted to quit on something that was important to me I always remembered why I got started in the first place.

If you're at point in your life that everything just seems to be playing against you, I challenge you to remind yourself why you started in the first place.

When you first got started you were excited, hungry and you were passionate about getting what you wanted.

It's easy to be happy and excited when things are perfect, but when things go wrong and you hit ruts is when you have to push harder.

When things don't go right in your life it's sometimes a test.

Something bigger than yourself is standing in your way asking you how bad do you want it.

Every time this happens to me in life I sit back, reflect and think about how excited I was to get started and I think about what the pay off will be if I can just keep pushing through those barriers.

If you want something bad enough be prepared to fight for it.

Your message is clear here "it`s better to do it late than never" thanks for the inspiration

 

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[p0stscript]

This may be an old post but it's just what I needed, thanks.

 

[RobD88]

Today was my first day of freedom and I am 46 years old. My last day at my corporate job was yesterday. I had been with that company for 8 years and had been in the industry for 25 years.

I read the book 3 years ago and started from there. I had never built a website, never sold anything online, and at the time wouldn't have known what Google Analytics was if it feel into my lap!

My wife and I both had full time jobs when we started this journey. Luckily we have been able to build this as a team. She left her full time job after a year and a half and ran with it from home while I continued to work. I also enjoyed a 2 hour commute each day back and forth to work! Our goal was to be able to replace both of our incomes before I left.

Speaking of work, it has been A LOT of work. THREE YEARS of non-stop work, 7 days a week. Countless hours day and night of researching, building, shipping orders and the list goes on. Along the way there have been victories, failures, tears, and laughter. There were many times we thought of quitting but always pushed it to the back of our minds.

With that said I want to thank everyone that has contributed to this forum that I have learned so much from. I also want to thank everyone behind the scenes that have helped us out. I don't post here very often. I just don't have time! I don't know how some of you guys do it with your amazing progress threads!

So if you think your too old to get started, you're not. I have seen posts on here saying "I am 35, should I even try to start?" "I am 40, it's too late for me". Forget that, just start putting one foot in front of the other and you will get there!

We are not in the Fastlane yet but heading in the right direction! Maybe we can retire by the time we're 50. Maybe by 55. Who knows. At least we will be able to get there on our own terms.

Ramble On guys and gals.......

Thanks for sharing! I am 47 and just starting my journey. It's nice to know there is light at the end of the tunnel.