Gas Prices & Freight Cost VS Customer Alliance

With gas prices driving up the cost of getting freight delivered lately, and the economy soaring the opposite direction, dollar store owners must either pay the freight delivery fees to get the merchandise in their stores or just give up and reduce hours of operation or never open their doors for business again. In a recent conversation with a dollar store owner, the way things were going for his business, he was actually consider no longer selling products for $1.00 or less, but selling the same exact products for more than a $1.00!
The logistics of his idea may have some sound basis for offsetting the cost for rising cost of freight delivery charges, but there is also certain implications to doing this that will forever change his stores market share of the $1.00 store industry. Below are several points of interest I like to make stating this is not a good idea for $1.00 store owners that have a business that has a steady clientele that frequent their store.

The same customer that is used to paying $1.00 or less for a product you sell, will instantly be turned off, even possibly disgusted you are now charging more.
The present customer base will greatly change. No longer will some customers frequent your store, or share their shopping experience with others that would normally increase your customer base.
Signage – Imagine all the signs that were once displayed proudly that you sell all items for a $1.00 or less. The money spent on that signage is now overhead loss, and new signage would have to be purchased. Very possible you would have to pay for materials & labor cost to change what you display for signage out side your store.
Possible profit loss because you buy less in bulk items for a higher price, when your trying to reduce your freight cost.

So what do you do?

There are some ways to combat freight cost! It takes a little foot work, and valuable time, but can be well worth the effort in the long run.
As best I have known since the late 1980’s when dollar stores started popping up all over, some independently owned $1.00 stores had the right kind of idea in my personal opinion.
What they did that made so much sense that, customers would flock to the front door of a store on certain days just waiting for the doors to open that business day. At times I could see customers lined up early just so they can get in first, before certain products were gone from the shelves within hours.

Here’s what made the customers flock to the store: Simply supplying top brand name items everyone needs for $1.00. These products sold are a gallon of milk, cheese, ice cream, various frozen foods, even Petridge Farms line of cookies & snack, Lays or Frito’s brands potato chips in the large to medium sized bags. At times sirloin, or T-bone steaks sold for just $1.00 each!
Freezer & Refrigerated items never stayed stocked for longer than three hours max, which it rarely lasted that long, for customers would be grabbing the merchandise before the stock person could even put it on the shelf.

Where do you get these brand names items that you can sell for $1.00 and make a profit?
It is simple in some ways but as I mentioned before it will take a little leg work at first. So I’m going to explain the way you do it step by step, and while you read this try not to beat yourself up to much for never thinking of it before.

Every day manufacturer’s of various products distribute these products to local vendors, even if the manufacturer is local or not. Freight charges are charged to either vendor or waved, which is not your concern as a store owner. By Federal Regulations & Laws the FDC mandates that many products must display a “Expiration Date” on the product. Where this comes into play, is when the vendor is involved, the vendor must pay the seller for products sold, but credit the seller for items not sold from supplied inventory to seller.
Yes that makes sense to so far I am sure of. But think of the loss both vendor, and manufacturer, lose on their profit margin? Loss of profit, because a product that which was not sold is always bad for everyone.

Here is how you can change the thoughts of loss profit margin from what the manufacturer & vendor lose.
Remember it is going to take some initial effort at first, but will have a big pay off to your store, and make everyone truly happy in the long run from Manufacturer to customer.
Because vendors must remove the almost outdated products from shelves of major retailers to make room for new product received, the vendor, as well as the manufacturer shall take a loss. And product is deemed non-sellable, and eventually they will mark the product for destruction or disposal.

EXAMPLE: Manufacturer makes 1,000 gallons of milk to be sent for distribution to a local vendor that will stock the shelves of various retail sellers in the vendor’s area for retail. Manufacturer sells the product for $0.65 per gallon to vendor. Vendor sells the gallon of milk to seller for $1.25 per gallon. Seller sells gallon of milk for $2.50 per gallon for each gallon of milk sold. Retail seller only pays vendor for product sold and vendor is held responsible for maintaining updated expiration dated product.
Now let’s say Retail seller only sells 900 gallons of milk before vendor is required to pull soon outdated merchandise. This leaves the vendor to remove 100 gallons of milk from the shelves and loose profit. In turn the manufacturer is asked to credit the vendor for product not sold, and loss of profit remains to them as well.

How fast does a gallon of milk go in your house even if the “Expiration Date” is one day away?
Because its one day expired from the date listed, it’s still not considered un-drinkable right?
What about chips, bread, cookies or crackers? Just because the expiration date expired yesterday will you throw it away if it’s sitting on your shelf?
Now legally you as a retailer can not sell outdated products, but if the expiration date is one or two days away from expire date, you can sell for a price you name.

With a little of real early morning leg work most of the time it will require it at first, you can catch the local vendors when they are restocking retailer shelves as well as removing older stock. From 7-11 stores to your local supermarket the vendors are out there! Now imagine if you will, talking to the vendor and letting them know that the product they are removing that is still sellable from a particular retailer or retailers those items can still be sold at your store.
A vendor will be more than happy to sell you these items for a fraction of their original cost just to make a profit on what they might never have gotten for items not sold at all.

1)Vendor removes close to outdated merchandise from large retailer shelves.
2)Vendor re-stocks your $1.00 store shelves with same merchandise. (You never pay for
freight of merchandise, or labor to re-stock shelves)
3)Customers find merchandise for $1.00 while telling friends and family where to get the
merchandise for cheap.
A vendor would rather make a little money from merchandise than not at all! Go out and in the wee early hours of the morning talk to the vendors. You can find them easy because their trucks are parked just outside the door of major retailers!

What you get from this, is well, a reduction in what you have to purchase from your usual wholesalers, reducing your freight cost, reducing labor cost of stocking shelves, and offer a more immediate important product line to your customers needs.

Vendors keep your shelved stock fresh, and you get more customers in these trying times!

So How do I buy the quality stuff, and make profit?

Hm.. just how do you make profit? Or even sell quality?

It's a question not many ask when they open their dollar store, ok the profit part they may ask themselves, but lose sight of of what the quality they sell.

Nany store owners get cuaght up in the what I like to call the 1 cent theory. This is where merchants sbuy products for one penny a piece, thats as long as you buy say the 24 to 100 cases of them at a time, and you end up with 1000 tooth brushes because you got to buy them for one penny a piece.

The penny a peice works when you have 1000 tooth brushes, and your the local dentist!

But buying even 24 tooth brushes for your store , well you may sell two or three in six months. So That leaves you with a inventory you have to pay taxes on if there are items on your shelves or even in your storage room if you have one. Why do you want to buy produducts for a penny a peice if you have to pay twice the tax on them because you can not sell them fast enough for profit?

It's the age old thing of "Hey that's cheap!"

To many times store owners, and I say that singular , as in people only own one store, and will either close down later or sell their store to someone else later all because the buying stuff for a penny seemed like a gold mine to them, but a gold mine instead that collasped around them. Buyining merchadise to sell fore $1.00 later, and making a profit from it comes from not what you paid for it but what people realy want to but. Then again there are store owners trapped in the corprate franchise way of buying. Those poor souls that think getting all the junk for one penny a piece, and thinking they are going to get rich from it it have only the bad taste in their mouths when someone talks about owning a a dollar store.

If you could get a loaf of bread for $1.00 you would buy it, but how many times in a month do you need a cell phone case for the same price of $1.00? Unless your your real clumsy, or have a strange need to match you cell phone to every article of clothing you wear each day, you probly buy the loaf of bread more often, right?

That's where owning a $1.00 store you can own more than one store.

Yes you can be sucsesful! It's real simple sort of, it all depends on the way you look at it. I look towards owning thousands of stores. Hell, I can't wait for the day when Dollar Tree, Inc. Lawyers come knocking on my door to say " We want to buy you out, here is our offer", that's when I write a simple note at the botton asking how much will it cost to buy them out?

It's all about what you offer the customer!

Where's the quality products at $1.00 stores?

A most recent comment from a person reading my blog made a good point recently. The person that made the comment may have been from New York city, but the same comments he made about the Big Apple, also hold true in many other cities across the nation. Where there may be a $1.00 store either right done the block, or just around the corner, they all sell junk people do not always need.

Merchandise these stores sell for the most part are not the things you or I need every day to survive.

No it is items like that figurine of a frog I might put in my garden out front or the hard back cover book of author’s interpretation of how you should live your life that you never heard of before?

Quality items are sold at most ever major supermarket, or mega-store, but you must pay retail value so they can make profit from it. But with today’s economy many people are doing without certain things or buying them in minimum quantity. Cost of many things are rising, bring a large strain on everyone, except the people that are making top dollar profit from selling you an item they get well over sometimes 250% profit from. Their excuse is “Hey we have payroll, utilities, insurance, etc.” to me that’s just plain means one of two things, either you need to fire who buys or purchases products you sell, or you are real happy making people make you rich while others struggle!

Now running my $1.00 store does have all the same financial responsibilities as same as anyone else, how can I sell the same quality products for just a $1.00? Hell I can make as much as I want selling quality products for a margin of 40% to 75% profit, for the same products sold in the other stores.

So how do I stay afloat without crying about the cost of the merchandise of quality?

It’s real simple really. The words most everyone has ever heard some time or later is “Supply & Demand”. Now yes the word Supply comes first, but let’s talk about demand first.
Demand for quality products at a price people can afford has become a major part of people’s lives these days no mater what their budget is. No one wants to buy a product that does not work as well as the quality brand product. Sure they may try it once to save a few bucks but if it does not work the way they want, they never buy it again.

Now the Supply thing, well that brings me back to who is buying or purchasing your products for your store?

Where are they buying these products, and agreeing to pay top dollar for these items? Well I can’t speak for most individually owned dollar stores because I know most of them are dealing with importers from China, that get the products for cheap they can sell for a high profit margin even at flea markets. But they fall under a category I call “Being Stupid”, this where the low quality products are bought and put on shelves, as the owner or merchant at the flea market think “Oh yea we got that screwdriver for $0.05 a piece and sell them for $1.00!” Geez they had to buy 100 or more of them to get that price, but they only sell that same screwdriver maybe if they are lucky once a week!

So what do people need all the time?
We need, Food, Paper products, Baby items, Stationary products, Household cleaning products, just to name a few. This is what we use everyday to maintain our lives.
Even the President of the United States gets off the toilet; the first thing he is thinking about is where the toilet paper is?

But there is a way to buy quality brand name products at a fraction of the manufacturers suggested price, and that’s one of the secrets to running a successful $1.00 store, and another entry later to this blog.

I welcome your comments anytime, good or bad.

Part #2 continued....

Money equals business which equals power,

all of which come from character and trust.

J. P. Morgan - Founder J. P. Morgan & Co.

The Financials have got to be the hardest part of all to come up with when everything you need to consider requires alot of math, and a bit of more research.

You have to consider everything from leasing cost, to what every bit of operating expense will be. Then add & subtract profit , and losses of all sorts that when you have to repeatedly figure out the stuff that eventually becomes the bottom line you hope will make an investor smile, and give you the loan without question.

The profit & loss statement... Jeez how many times I have to write about it?

Gross profits are just the part of the dream of what you can do with a $1.00 store. But to be honest when you start doing the numbers and figuring out that $900,000 is the gross profit for just the first year, your eyes go wide open, and your mouth begins to drewl down your chin! That's when the reality set in when I figured in all the other factors of owning the store in the first year.

How I went from $900,00 to 156,358 in one reading of a statement!

My gross profit margin looked great, hell it looked awesome from what I could see! Little Red, and i would be in the big bucks in no time!

Yea right? That's until I started getting the averages for utilities, payroll, freight charges, and all the other stuff that makes it to where you can run the store.

With each cost to run run the darn store the profits began to fade. My hopes of actually being independent of having to work for someone else almost began to fade as well! But there was still hope in the long run.

With net profit as it would be, hey that was not to bad at all. Hey it could help pay for the holes in the wall from when my head connected with the drywall. To own a $1.00 store it takes work, and work you have to be dedicated at if you want to make a profit. Yes there is earnings out there just waiting for a store just like mine but you have to go the distance, walk the line, zig when others zag, and everything in between!

Go for the profit! And all your dreams!

Wounds heal, and so do the wow effect of what it takes. Begin to dream, write it down, bang your head against the wall at times, but remember it can work!

Never stop looking at your dream!

Part #2 The Business Plan & where the stiches come from.

When you expect things to happen - strangely enough - they do happen

J.P. Morgan -J.P. Morgan & Co.

When I started to realise that there are so many things I needed to consider to get my business going, it boiled down to one thing, and one thing only! I needed to write the whole idea on paper, or as like to use, the Microsoft Word program I have on my computer. Spell Check even though it has some flaws it still helps alot!

So I started with the Pro's & Con's of why I want to open a $1.00 store, hey we are talking about selling products for $1.00 or less, but what will it do for me as well as the community in the long run? Why do I want the inevitable burden of owning a business, ie. the long hours, the managing of employees, getting the right products that sell more often, and the list began to grow.

This was simple at first, since all I did was write all the questions on the left side, and then creating two columns at the top labeled "PRO's" & CON's". Needles to say the results were outstandingly leading me further into believing that I should just keep moving forward with the grand idea of starting up my own $1.00 store.

This list I created also was a good starting point in creating the "business plan" I needed before I could move any further!

This is where things began to flow like the Alaskan oil pipe line providing the precious liquid the the Continental United States needs. I being not to bad with expressing myself with words on paper, used what I had first with my list of Pro's & Con's list, and the help of a little research on what dollar stores actually do in real life. The words flowed, and the excitement gain ground within me, I believed what i was writing was the real deal, and could actually work with dedication, and hard work.

The "Business Plan" was the next step into reality, and why I needed one!

In the creation of a business plan it has no real beginning or end really. It does require alot of input in so many ways that can become overwhelming at times, or as simple as watching the microwave popcorn in the microwave so it does not cook to long so you don't end up with a bag of burnt kernels of corn. There is no starting point to where you start your draft of the business plan, but there is always an end. It is this point where you the draft you must organize all that you have wrote. Myself I started by getting sample business plans from all over the Internet.

What makes the other companies business plans tic?

Yes I started with investigating other dollar store web sites, but never stopped there! I looked at just about every business out there on the Internet to see how they wrote their own business plans. Shockingly to myself I was on the right track so far. What I noticed was organization of their business plans, and a true belief in what they were doing. I will share with you several web sites in which if you need that can provide samples of business plans to model from. My own business plan draft started with the sacred "Executive Summary", and I loved it! With a little editing here, and there it looked great. Even Little Red thought it looked great!

As a small gesture into what I'm talking about, here is what my original business plan looked like. I started as I said with the "Executive Summary", and hey comments are always welcome on this if you like?

Dear Loan officer;
We are requesting a loan to start-up a unique retail dollar store business. I have over seventeen years experience in the retail industry.

The market for retail dollar shops has increased
The EL Dollar Shop is a business specializing in general merchandise. It will be located in the Albuquerque, NM city limits and location which is in a high traffic area. The space will be next to other retail stores and specialty shops. The space will be easily accessible and provides ample parking for its customers. The space will be visible from all points within the center itself as well as the traffic from major cross streets. The business is a retail establishment selling current dollar variety merchandise at retail. The majority of the merchandise is priced within a one-dollar price range, thus attracting the widest possible range of customers.
El Dollar Shop has access to the purchasing power of buying centers offering merchandise at prices 30 to 60 percent below wholesale with immediate delivery and low to no minimum orders. These centers are well stocked and prepared to meet the increased demands of the peak selling seasons such as Seasonal Changes, Back-to-School, Holiday Needs, etc. Since delivery from these centers to the business takes only five to ten days, El Dollar Shop is assured of a well-stocked store regardless of seasonal demands. Also, since these buying centers are able to deliver in such a short time, there is not a necessity to carry an extremely large inventory in advance of peak selling periods.
El Dollar Shop will attract its customers through the use of specialized advertisements, handbills, news releases in newspapers, as well as the traffic flow of which the area itself generates.
A Grand Opening will commence after El Dollar Shop has been in business for six to eight weeks. This event will be held on a Saturday. El Dollar Shop’s owner Ellisa Eisenbaugh will coordinate the Grand Opening. It will include a local political official, ribbon-cutting ceremonies, pictures, speaking, etc. Professional news releases will be submitted to the local and market area newspapers, and possibly radio and television.
The store owner of El Dollar Shop has access to over 250 of the best buying centers in the country. The buying centers provide inventory and fixtures. Ellisa Eisenbaugh will take a buying trip for initial inventory with her husband and professional buyer Michael Eisenbaugh. All staff will be provided with outstanding and professional in-store training.
Long-Term Goal: In a three year period of operation of the El Dollar Shop, we will have a steady consumer base that which will give us the assets to acquire another location for expansion of the store merchandise, and additional store openings under the El Dollar Shop Name.
Industry: There are is only one traditional retail dollar store providing merchandise for $1.00 or less. This store being what would be our competition known as “Dollar Tree” has seen growth throughout the country but yet still can not stop competitors from stealing their market shares in communities. This is due to their known failure to provide what the local area product demands are; instead they provide merchandise on a general scale set to their buyer’s product attainability which is distributed nation wide. Other small $1.00 merchandise sellers are so few that most only commit to weekend sales at flea markets.

Oh there is alot more to than that, but that's the total belief of what I wanted to do!

Could I really make this happen? Will this really work the way we needed it too? Man I really need the money to get it going! Where do I turn for help?

These are many new questions I asked myself as I progressed through the business plan. I had spent over all almost three months of my family time not spent with them but instead coming home after a hard days work at my job with Home Depot, then eating dinner, and turning on my computer to start working on the one thing I knew I needed if I was to succeed.

Let it not be said where the quality time was spent helping my little girl do her home work from school or sharing with Little Red who gets to make dinner tonight. This is one thing anyone in business already, or is planning to start one, always needs to remember! Family comes first! Their needs are your needs, and must not be ignored at all cost! Hell there were times where I would spend the day with a cooler full of food, so we could have a family day out. Here in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and just a mile or less from the mountains, my daughter, and I like to climb the mountains called the Sandia's. Never forget to take a break from things when you can, and let your mind become clear to accept things you failed to see before, that just might help you see farther.

A good example of this is when recently i stood on a rock at over 10,000 feet looked to the west, and saw the whole Albuquerque area where everything from the neighborhoods to areas of future development stood within my view. I stood there and pointed westward with great awe. Little Red asked "what are you pointing at?" I just laughed and said it was where our empire of $1.00 stores would lay across the land, and there before us was where it would start, only now we could see the land first hand without using the Internet for satellite pictures, but in real life!

My dream was there before me, and gave me insight as to how small one store would be, but how many places my stores would envelop the area markets from the western desert of Arizona, and Nevada, to the mountains of Colorado.

Envision your dreams by looking forward!

Now to provide those reading this blog with some help full web sites to get the help they need with writing their own business plans.

• SBA - Small Business Administration http://www.sba.gov/index.html
• SCORE - http://www.score.org/index.html
• Scribd - http://www.scribd.com/word/embed/294192?slag=Sample-Business-Plan-Outline

Now for the fun part:

I was doing pretty good up until I got to the financial portions of the business plan, and well being much better of an Idea Man than with figuring out the financials, I can only wonder now how much hair I lost just from pulling my hair back from front to backwards with both hands as I rubbed, and stroked from forehead to neck? "Wow sweetheart! Got a bit to figure out here was my first problem, I said to Little Red.

Though I had to do alot more research on what, and how much I needed to fill the shelves with the stuff that people were going to buy. that also added to the financial portion of the business plan. We needed to purchase the items which now became part of the financial portion as well.

Seems like I'm jumping ahead right now, and need to back up to other parts of the business plan that help dictate why the financials were so important.

The Marketing & Management portion of the business plan surely weighed heavy on most things that would govern how we would run the business in the future.

I do not want this to become a blog where "Hey you need a business plan!" but what's it like to own a $1.00 store? This is where the stitches in the head come from. How do I make the numbers reflect the truth? How do I make the numbers look like it is going to be profitable, without lieing? what do all the numbers, and their descriptions mean? Little Red felt dumbfounded when she looked at everything needed.

5lbs. of All purpose joint compound for patching the drywall, and a few head stitches later I think I got it all together, well at least I thought so!

When it came to figuring out the exact numbers, well banging my head against the wall only cost me more money than I needed!

Read more in my next post....

Part #1 The Business Plan & the darn stitches in my head, ouch!

"The wise man bridges the gap by laying out the path by means of which he can get from where he is to where he wants to go."
J.P. Morgan -Founder J.P. Morgan & CO.

Wise words from someone that was ahead of the industrial revolution the United states transformed into. But what exactly did he mean by these words?
Ask any professional that is operating or managing a successful business or career that question, and they will tell you it's all in the "Business Plan".

The business plan to many professionals is something they should be familiar with but, then again there are those out there that have the next great invention, or business idea, and shutter when asked several questions. The first one always being "Do you have a business plan I can see? This indeed always leads to the verbal description, and belief of the benefactor that what they know will work, if only someone would believe in it as well!

This is where it begins, not just the idea, but letting others know exactly what they need, right after you explain what you need to give it to them!

The business plan is the most essential tool to anyone in business, but also in their personal life! Think about a young married couple that now has a child on the way? How will they afford all the added expense, and changes in their own lives, as the child grows? The same thing happens as often in business as well! Whether someone has a invention, or business idea, it is much like the new child. It is up to them, like the parent to nurture the idea. As a child's needs grow, so do the needs of the business owner, both references act in the same nature, because as parents they want their child to succeed, no business owner says "Hey we broke even again this year, Woo Hoo!" In fact the very idea was that they wanted to have their business grow with the ever changing environment around their business, and basically make a profit so they can enjoy the fruits of what they have created.

A neglected child suffers, much as the business owner can neglect their business.

Now please do not get me wrong about what I just referred to, because even a child with loving parents can fail to see what their child's developments have become, and their needs of change, yet they do not educate themselves, and the child begins to become less in their own development. The same holds true with business professionals, they care about what they are doing, devote attention to it, but fail to help the development of their business's needs as the environment changes daily.

Go as far as you can see; when you get there, you'll be able to see farther.

What am I saying with this psychology stuff, when all you were expecting was 1. What is the Business Plan? Or 2. Where does the stitches on his head come from?

The answer is simple to both questions really! When you begin to write a business plan, it is of the utmost importance you start with all that you believe, and all the energy of what it takes to demonstrate your fervour in why someone would want to invest in you! That becomes the toughest thing you can ever write. It's what makes them believe in your dream right from the start! You must project everything that you feel deep inside yourself, in words that will make others keep reading or place your business plan in the rejected pile!

The Executive Summary: That's where you begin!

You can begin babbling why you are the next best thing to sliced bread, or begin intelligently to where you capture the person reading it!
Like myself I wanted to open a store that sells products for $1.00 or less. Okay, ask yourself "geez there are other dollar stores that already do what I want to do, right?
Wrong I plan to do what the others are not doing, which is my belief that will become a customer need, and I got it! The demand that the competitors do not provide regularly fulfilling their needs!

Ask yourself, what do I have that is what they need?

Okay, but where do the stitches in the head have to do with this? That's because when I believed in my dream, I had to come up with alot more than just telling a lenderor investor my great idea!

Next post I will continue with why the stitches in the head?

OK this one subject will have many parts and I can only write so much in a day, sorry.

Where it began, WOW! What a begining

Greetings and Salutaions All! Welcome to my Blog!

Now the title of this blog is "What's it like to own a $1.00 store?" So guess I should start from the begining, and hopefully give some decent insight to others that just might want to open their own store, or just curious as to what is it actually like? Is there profit in it? What about the compettitors? What makes my store better then them? Do I buy into a franchise, or go it alone? Who do I buy my merchandise from? How do I even get the money to buy a dollar store?

Yes there a lot of questions that can run through your mind when considering owning a dollar store. With this blog you get a real treat from reading exactly what I, and my wife started to believe it was almost impossible, but now a dream come true for us!
I will give many links as I continue this blog as often as possible on a regular basis. It is my hope that you become not only delighted by what you read, but become educated in some way that will give you insight.

So for the first entry I'll explain just how I got started.

My wife due to injury making it hard for her to work at most jobs that require long periods of standing or heavy lifting needed to do something to help supplement our income. I was working for Home Depot as a sales associate in the Lumber & Building materials Dept., and with a 10 year old child growing fast, we needed the extra cash.

So my wife, I like to call "Little Red" decided she would search for "Work at home jobs". She tried everything from taking surveys for cash to getting free stuff. needless to say it never turned out to be worth it, and started also receiving email offers that filled he email inbox. Though there was one offer she didd seem to think had potential, and it would only cost her $1.00.

For a trial period of 30 days, Little Red could own her very own dollar store online for a fee of just $1.00!

Yea it seemed great, and a web site was set up with her name on it, but the only problem was it was not without the sponsors domaine name first in the listing. Also there were thousands of others as well doing the same thing. We contacted family, freinds, and darn near everyone we came into contact with to let them know Little Red had her own online dollar store. Ok lots of people looked at the darn thing but no one actually bought anything!

Frustrated as we were, I had a idea!

I had just come back from the Dollar Tree store in our neighborhood where I browsed the the paper goods isle, hey toilet paper just $1.00, then headed over to the food isle to get those jars of marinated mushrooms we like so much. My daughter then said to me "Why don't everyone buy their food from here, cause they wanted like a bunch of money at the local grocery store for the same thing?".

Thats when the wheels in my head started turning!

I got home, and asked Little Red, what did she think about owning a real store where we would sell food and other consumables for $1.00 or less?
She replied, "I think it sounds like a good idea, but how would we get it going?" Now this was a good question indeed. But with the internet at my finger tips, what could lose from doing some research, right?

Man there is a lot to learn out there!
I found hundreds of wholesale merchants selling products people use everyday for pennies!

Ok now I had a way of buying products that we could sell for anywhere from 40% to 80% profit. But forgot one thing. We needed to have a store with shelves to put the product on! So I discovered with research several companies that for a price, will set you up with everything you need to open a dollar store. One company Liberty Oppertunities Inc. sure stood out above the rest as the best way to get things done.

Then it dawned on me, where are Little Red, and I gonna get the money to do it?

We were barely making ends meet as it was, how would even finance everything we needed? This is where it got hard on the brain, and Little Red began to think it was but a dream that would never come true.
Ok I know a bit about business to realize we would need a loan, and not just a small loan either, and it would take creating a "Business Plan", oh geez this was not gonna be easy, but I'd give it a try. This will be something I'll share at another date, of just how well that went.

The research continues:

Not satisfied with the wealth of information I had now, I needed more!

What I needed next, and where I found it! Thank-you freind indeed!

In the comming days I shall update this blog, and give the true thoughts, and ideas that always are on my mind, even as they continue to shape, and change as I progress through my own business life. In time I will be providing everything from thoughts, ideas, videos, and even maybe my very own E-Book.

Thankyou for visiting my blog, and come back soon for the next entry that I'm sure you will enjoy reading.

What I plan to write about in my blog soon:

* Not Satisfied with the wealth of information I had now, I needed more!

* The darn Business Plan, and the stiches on my scull.

* What I needed next, and where I found it!

* Oooo my credit rating, ouch!

* Becoming a corporation.