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Hi guys,
I'm Rob and based out of the UK.
I have recently read both Fastlane and Unscripted which brought me here. Wow did both of those books resonate with me massively.
So, my history is quite varied, but I have always wanted to make my own money and be in control of my life.
Between 2006 and 2016 I was a professional poker player online. Starting with $500 I was able to build up my 'bankroll' and consistently make decent enough money to support myself and my family (I have a son who was born 2007). During this time, I completed my education as well, gaining A Levels and a degree in History from University of Leeds. Looking back, I failed to see what an opportunity online poker was at this time and I should have dedicated myself to it much more than I did. I was happy to make circa £40k per year and be able to support my family, whilst some other people I know pushed themselves much harder at it, (one in particular) and have now achieved financial freedom to a certain extent. By 2016 my interest, ability and commitment to online poker was very much on the wane and the market conditions within the industry had also significantly declined causing my earn rate to drop and drop. Thus, I decided to look at other paths.
Cashing out a large amount of the money I had built up, but knowing that I wanted to be in business I launched myself stupidly headfirst into a business and industry I knew very little about and which crucially failed to obey what I now know as CENTS. I launched a catering trailer business called Tastywrap. We sold different types of food wraps from a catering trailer in Leeds City Centre and at various events and festivals. My execution of the task was poor and although the learning experience was significant it was financially costly. Over the course of the next 18 months I lost all the money I had invested in starting the business (which I now know was way too much) and basically ended up broke and with no income. Below is a picture of me serving customers from the trailer.
Thus, for the first time in my life I couldn't make my own money and had to move into the job market. After a couple of sales and recruitment type positions that lasted only a few months each I thought I had found a longer-term career when I was accepted into West Yorkshire Police. I successfully completed the basic training program and began the role. Despite liking some aspects of the job, especially compared to previous employment, I had extreme difficulty accepting that this was it for me. That for the next 25-30 years this would be my life. This nagging doubt was compounded by listening to people who had been in the job a long time. They seemed discontent and unhappy about the job but had become prisoners to the pension etc or so they thought. I decided that I just couldn't do this way of living and left after less than a year.
During this time of employment, I set-up my second business which still exists to this day and still provides a level of income monthly (although not significant). This is a tutoring agency. From looking at my first business I realised that I needed a way to earn whilst not actually working in the business. Thus, I set-up a tutoring agency to provide private tuition to school students from ages 5-18. This business has worked better than my catering trailer in some respects. Firstly, I invested only a couple of hundred pounds to get the business up and running. Secondly, I was earning whilst not necessarily working as I got other tutors to carry out the tuitions and I simply took the commission for arranging it. However, it remained flawed in other areas. It is difficult to scale up because commission rates and actual hours of tuition arranged are low. There is a further scale problem in that in order to send tutors to homes to carry out tuition we need to have a tutor on our books that is local to the customer. This makes it a very local based business and we often have the problem of not having a tutor for a certain subject in a certain geographical area. This means that there are many occasions when I have a customer wanting to pay for the service, but we can’t fulfil the service.
To bring my story up to date then. As my current tuition business hasn’t been able to support me financially, especially following the pandemic I have taken further employment working in a supermarket. This is the first time I have found a position of employment that is tolerable, and I have recently been promoted to a shift manager position. I mainly work night times starting between 12pm-2pm and finishing between 8pm-10pm. The job is okay and between this and my tutoring agency I can financially survive month to month.
However, as this is the Fastlane then I’m sure people will know that this is far from enough for me. In August 2020 I began working on my third business which is a digital course business to help people gain A Level (university entrance level) qualifications in the UK. This is where I hope to be able to build a business that makes a lasting financial change in my life. The links to my process thread are below and here you will find links to my current business.
I thought it would be a good idea to document my journey here so that it can provide potential value to you guys in terms of the process I am going through and also I will be able to learn from the community myself. This is my thread here – Building Digital Education Business
Cliff Notes –
Pro poker player for 10 years
Went broke trying to start a catering business
Tried many jobs and couldn’t settle in any of them
Have a small-scale private tuition business that is limited by scale and other problems – currently work as a supermarket shift manager to supplement income from this and survive financially month to month.
Recently began to launch a digital course business which I wanted to document the journey of here.
Link to that thread is here - Building Digital Education Business
I'm Rob and based out of the UK.
I have recently read both Fastlane and Unscripted which brought me here. Wow did both of those books resonate with me massively.
So, my history is quite varied, but I have always wanted to make my own money and be in control of my life.
Between 2006 and 2016 I was a professional poker player online. Starting with $500 I was able to build up my 'bankroll' and consistently make decent enough money to support myself and my family (I have a son who was born 2007). During this time, I completed my education as well, gaining A Levels and a degree in History from University of Leeds. Looking back, I failed to see what an opportunity online poker was at this time and I should have dedicated myself to it much more than I did. I was happy to make circa £40k per year and be able to support my family, whilst some other people I know pushed themselves much harder at it, (one in particular) and have now achieved financial freedom to a certain extent. By 2016 my interest, ability and commitment to online poker was very much on the wane and the market conditions within the industry had also significantly declined causing my earn rate to drop and drop. Thus, I decided to look at other paths.
Cashing out a large amount of the money I had built up, but knowing that I wanted to be in business I launched myself stupidly headfirst into a business and industry I knew very little about and which crucially failed to obey what I now know as CENTS. I launched a catering trailer business called Tastywrap. We sold different types of food wraps from a catering trailer in Leeds City Centre and at various events and festivals. My execution of the task was poor and although the learning experience was significant it was financially costly. Over the course of the next 18 months I lost all the money I had invested in starting the business (which I now know was way too much) and basically ended up broke and with no income. Below is a picture of me serving customers from the trailer.
Thus, for the first time in my life I couldn't make my own money and had to move into the job market. After a couple of sales and recruitment type positions that lasted only a few months each I thought I had found a longer-term career when I was accepted into West Yorkshire Police. I successfully completed the basic training program and began the role. Despite liking some aspects of the job, especially compared to previous employment, I had extreme difficulty accepting that this was it for me. That for the next 25-30 years this would be my life. This nagging doubt was compounded by listening to people who had been in the job a long time. They seemed discontent and unhappy about the job but had become prisoners to the pension etc or so they thought. I decided that I just couldn't do this way of living and left after less than a year.
During this time of employment, I set-up my second business which still exists to this day and still provides a level of income monthly (although not significant). This is a tutoring agency. From looking at my first business I realised that I needed a way to earn whilst not actually working in the business. Thus, I set-up a tutoring agency to provide private tuition to school students from ages 5-18. This business has worked better than my catering trailer in some respects. Firstly, I invested only a couple of hundred pounds to get the business up and running. Secondly, I was earning whilst not necessarily working as I got other tutors to carry out the tuitions and I simply took the commission for arranging it. However, it remained flawed in other areas. It is difficult to scale up because commission rates and actual hours of tuition arranged are low. There is a further scale problem in that in order to send tutors to homes to carry out tuition we need to have a tutor on our books that is local to the customer. This makes it a very local based business and we often have the problem of not having a tutor for a certain subject in a certain geographical area. This means that there are many occasions when I have a customer wanting to pay for the service, but we can’t fulfil the service.
To bring my story up to date then. As my current tuition business hasn’t been able to support me financially, especially following the pandemic I have taken further employment working in a supermarket. This is the first time I have found a position of employment that is tolerable, and I have recently been promoted to a shift manager position. I mainly work night times starting between 12pm-2pm and finishing between 8pm-10pm. The job is okay and between this and my tutoring agency I can financially survive month to month.
However, as this is the Fastlane then I’m sure people will know that this is far from enough for me. In August 2020 I began working on my third business which is a digital course business to help people gain A Level (university entrance level) qualifications in the UK. This is where I hope to be able to build a business that makes a lasting financial change in my life. The links to my process thread are below and here you will find links to my current business.
I thought it would be a good idea to document my journey here so that it can provide potential value to you guys in terms of the process I am going through and also I will be able to learn from the community myself. This is my thread here – Building Digital Education Business
Cliff Notes –
Pro poker player for 10 years
Went broke trying to start a catering business
Tried many jobs and couldn’t settle in any of them
Have a small-scale private tuition business that is limited by scale and other problems – currently work as a supermarket shift manager to supplement income from this and survive financially month to month.
Recently began to launch a digital course business which I wanted to document the journey of here.
Link to that thread is here - Building Digital Education Business
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