Starting A Business Advice :o

[Jcb33]

Well first of all hello everyone, yes its me im back some of you may remember me and some of you may not. I have had a long break from well hardware but im now back into it. Life is throwing me a few bones at the moment and because of them (Inherritance) I am considering starting my own Business. Now what i want to do is sell hardware, computers etc online. I would love to be able to one day have my own shop and warehouse and be as big as other computer companies, however that is a long long way off and ever more hard work untill i get there. So i was just wandering if any one else had done this or if they have stories of how other companies started? Also if any one could give me some advice on how to get started.

Thankyou for any help you can give me, Jason

[javalord]

Starting online will be difficult due to trust factor and brand unawareness. Your better off building your business at the small stage via local word of mouth and local adverts and progressing from there.

Also this might sound odd, but you need to know your strengths and weaknesses well before commencing any business plan. If there's something your weak on (i.e. marketing) then make sure you know someone you can refer to at times.

And most of all, you need some kind of drive. As you already know, starting a business means investing lots and lots of hours into it.

[5lab]

i'd say that starting an online computer parts shop would be very hard unless you've got a unique selling point. it'd be near impossible to get prices near to that of ebuyer and the like, and i personally believe that most online shoppers go for cheap prices ahead of anything else. to setup even a 'small' online shop like scan (which i woudl consider smaller htan dabs, ebuyer etc) would probably cost in the region of £50m.

unless you have some cunning niech in mind, you'd probably be better to open a local shop, or open an online shop selling something different..

[Kezzer]

Also, think about how many companies there are out there with exactly the same idea as you? Sit back and think if you'd really earn much out of it and if you'd really beat the competition? It would be pretty damn difficult

[Rave]

An ebay store is an easy way to start trading- but I'd echo the others in this thread in saying that the online hardware store market is extremely competitive- even the PC World Component Store didn't last long.

[IBM]

Having just started two companies in the last two years, both of them based online for the most part, I'll say that Computer Hardware doesn't seem to be the best market area to enter...it just seems like the big players have got all the bases covered.

I know of people who have started trading online selling hard to get specialist items (not in computing, traditionally automotive) and made a killing, but comp. hardware just doesn't have the demand.

Saying that, as long as you're willing to spend about 40% of your budget on advertising, anybody can make a mark in the market. But in such a heavily oversubscribed sector, you'd pretty much have to spend a fortune on PR, design and development services before you'd get a single person through the door, and even then it's an uphill struggle to get them to come back to you when you are more expensive than your competitors.

With regards to getting started, don't stock anything, unless you're 100% certain you can sell it. You see all these local shops with tonnes of 17" tfts and slow CDRW drives, and just feel sorry for them 'cause they must be drowning in debt. Do what amazon did and find yourself a good fast distributer, stick a few pence on their prices and make money through bulk selling...

Let us know what you decide to do....

Can you give us an idea of what you're looking to put into the business, or is that just being cheeky?

[Mike Fishcake]

I personally wouldn't do it. I have seen so many PC shops set up and go bust within months in the area. You just won't be able to compete with the larger companies. It's a nice idea, but I really think that it won't work without a stupid amount of capital behind it. :-(

[Jcb33]

ibm i dont want to put in more than about 25k..... To start with any way....... And what kind of thing would you suggest selling in bulk :O?

[IBM]

If I knew what item to sell in bulk, I'd already be selling it ;D

£25K isn't a bad sum to start a business...a lot of people put in a lot less and end up with a viable business plan. But at this stage you should stick it in a high interest account/investment portfolio and enjoy a solid annual 4-5% return for the time being.

The point is that until you know what you need to do, there's no point throwing the money at an idea you aren't really sure will work. Perhaps you should have a look at your life and your experiences and see if there's any areas in which you work/move which lack something which could be supplied by an online retailer. A friend of mine has family in India, and opened up a shop selling Indian made goods, and is doing quite well for themselves.

Get an idea, write a business plan, approach people for capital if you need it...but once you've got an idea, make sure your finances cover it. I started a business with the original plan of spending a small amount of money. 6 months later and I've spent 5 times as much, and plan on spending 10 times more, but it's not a problem because it's all viable justified expenses, and I've compared them to the returns, and found them acceptable.

Got any ideas other than computer store online then?

[Jcb33]

Not realy.... was realy looking at componants..... and thinking of selling overclocked pcs.... water cooled pcs and so on to save ppl the work.... need to have a think now of other good ideas because im gonna do something to make this money work for me !

[5lab]

tbh, if you've got around 30-40k sitting around, a very sensible way to invest it is in a property. get a buy-to-let mortgauge on a 3 bed place and you could end up with £1000/month coming in, and £800 going out on the mortgauge. at the end of 25 years, you have a free house too! can't go wrong imo!

[wedge22]

I agree that property is a good investment and what with the cost of houses in Bulgaria now and the countries integration into the EU in 2007 they will make you alot of money.

[Rave]

tbh, if you've got around 30-40k sitting around, a very sensible way to invest it is in a property. get a buy-to-let mortgauge on a 3 bed place and you could end up with £1000/month coming in, and £800 going out on the mortgauge. at the end of 25 years, you have a free house too! can't go wrong imo!

WRONG time to buy though. Wait for the market to stabilise (or crash).

[DaBeeeenster]

I agree with Rave. Going into residential property in the UK is pretty much a very bad plan right now. There is going to be a correction (of unknown severity) in the short to medium term.

I started my business 3 years ago. It's DAMN hard work. Personally I found the following things were of utmost importance in terms of how you approach it (in order of relevance):

- Talent
- Graft
- Luck

That's pretty much it. Personally I'd say that going into retail online hardware sales is suicide. You will lose all your money. I think you can be 99% certain of that. You need to sell into a new growing market. That's the trick. Find a market that is new and growing. Doesn't matter what it is.

[IBM]

Find something the chinese would like to buy and market it just to them...with a market of a billion people ( subtracting the 990,000,000 who haven't got Net access DOH ) and I'm sure someone wants to buy something...

Actually, that's a great point....*mutter*...keep my bloody mouth shut next time....*kicks passing dog*....

[TiG]

tbh, if you've got around 30-40k sitting around, a very sensible way to invest it is in a property. get a buy-to-let mortgauge on a 3 bed place and you could end up with £1000/month coming in, and £800 going out on the mortgauge. at the end of 25 years, you have a free house too! can't go wrong imo!

Would you give a mortgage to a person as young as JCB, with no big income (afaik) to cover the mortgage if the rent didn't come in.

Those figures are laughable too tbh, House i'm renting at the moment is £695 a month rent, cost of the house is £150K, first year of mortgage would be over £800.

Depends on where you live, but £1000 a month is in a decent area where house prices would cost you a load.

TiG