Latest

The Importance of Planning

Proper planning can reduce excess inventory, cost mismanagement, and other issues for most businesses.  When uncontrolled, a business can face inadequate cash reserves and even bankruptcy.

To mitigate these issues, proper industry and market research coupled with financial planning for contingencies is crucial for any business.  Whether you’re in the ideation phase or are already up and running, knowing how much to allocate to the various activities a business engages in is difficult so contact me and let’s create a strategy that works for your business.

Bike shop Business Plan

Your Startup Guru helped the good folks at Ride On! Bike Co-Op with their business plan to present to investors.

Ride On! is a full-service bicycle shop and cooperative located in Leimert Park, Los Angeles.  Their goal is to introduce the cycling community to youth and other participants in and around Leimert Park.  They hope to teach a rewarding activity and lifestyle that is not readily accessible to the local community.   In addition to bicycle products and services, they offer free bike clinics to members and non-members of the cooperative.

Contact us today for help with your bike shop business plan.

Brazilian Jiujitsu Academy Financial Planning

Your Startup Guru helped Mr. Lee with the financial planning and analysis that helped him predict his break-even points, pricing strategy, location, and more.

As mentioned in a previous post, financial planning and analysis is a crucial step for any startup because it helps the entrepreneur with budgeting, how much capital to raise, when to make capital expenditures, etc.

Bookkeeping Client – Outie Tool

Outie Tool came to us for help with their bookkeeping. Like many newer companies, they had a friend do their bookkeeping which resulted in incorrect entries and overall disorganization. After cleaning up, streamlining, and reorganizing its bookkeeping, Outie Tool had a clearer view of its accounting and overall financial position.

About Outie Tool

The OUTIE TOOL is a compact and convenient tool to easily and safely remove clear invisible braces such as TRU-LINE™, ClearCorrect, SmileCareClub, and Invisalign®.

Outie Tool is a bookkeeping client that I have been working with for several months. Bookkeeping is a crucial day-to-day task that new and established businesses alike need to stay organized and up-to-date on their financial position.

Launch and Grow Your Business

Bookkeeping is one of many professional low-cost services at Your Startup Guru.  See the full list of services here.  If you have any questions or are ready to take your business to the next level, Contact us today.

Industrial Machine Servicer – Business Plan

Titanium Coating Services is an industrial machine servicer in need of a business plan for its PVD operations. PVD (physical vapor deposition) is a method of depositing thin films of a material onto various surfaces. PVD coatings are used in machine components to reduce wear and friction on equipment.

We created a business plan complete with 5-year financial projections that were used to attract investment capital for Titanium Coating Services.

Contact us for help with your industrial/manufacturing business plan.

True Religion files for bankruptcy

true-religion-jeans-size-custom-crop-1086x637
High-priced denim jeans maker True Religion has filed for bankruptcy protection and announced it would be closing at least 27 stores.  (BOB CHAMBERLIN / TNS)

Fast fashion’s continued domination in addition to the popularity of yoga pants/leggings has helped finish a 15 year run.

Consumer purchasing habits have changed due to the great recession.  However as consumer spending has increased with the improved economy, tastes have changed.

But that growth has reversed in recent years. Sales of super premium jeans — brands like 7 For All Mankind, True Religion, Joe’s Jeans and Hudson — fell 8 per cent last year, according to market research firm Euromonitor International. Overall, jeans sales grew slightly in 2016 after two years of declines, as Americans traded down to lower-priced brands like Levi’s, H&M and Forever 21.

Instead, buys are increasingly filling their closets with yoga pants and leggings, which they’re wearing not just to the gym, but also to run errands and meet up with friends. True Religion’s $319 skinny jeans have been replaced by Lululemon’s $98 yoga pants.

Read the full article here.

Last year, surf brand Quiksilver has faced a similar fate and I laid out a strategy that it could use to save its brand.

On a related note yoga brand Lululemon is selling board shorts (in the ad shown below) to expand their product categories to meet the ever-changing demands of their market.  Food for thought.

luluad

Festivals, Farmer’s Markets, Conventions, oh my!

It’s summer and festival season is here.  Events are big business with over 87 million people attending trade shows, conventions, & conferences; while 32 million people attend music festival.  Some annual industry and market stats:

  • Trade shows, conventions, conferences
    • Number: 284,600 annually
      • There are 248 convention centers in the US with a total of 56.29M prime exhibit space.
      • The majority of conventions (21%) have 1,000 – 2,499 attendees
    • Participants: 87,728,000
      • Average attendee spends 8.3 hours viewing trade show exhibits
      • 81% of trade show attendees have buying authority
  • Music festivals, fairs, and other festivals
    • Number: 1,413 annually. Music festivals alone total over 800 annually
    • Attendees: Over 102 million people annually. 32 million people go to at least one music festival annually.
      • Attendees spend on average, $207 a year on live music events and digital music/streaming
      • 1/3 of all festival fans go to more than one festival per year
  • Farmers’ Markets
    • Number: +8,400 markets that convene regularly
    • Attendees: 310,800,000
      • Farmers’ market shoppers spend a mean dollars/week was $25.38
      • Shopper visit an average of 6.12 times/month

What It Means To You

Events are targeted.  So attendees are in your market, many in your target market.  Renting a booth, depending on the event, can be fairly inexpensive.  This is an economical means of raising awareness for your product/service for the following reasons:

  1. You are not locked into a commercial lease contract
  2. Can test the viability of your product/service
  3. Get targeted market feedback

Some of what you may need depending on the event:

  • Mobile merchant services such as Square
  • Email collection method
  • Banners and booth appeal
  • Ready-for-market product/service
    • Or compelling marketing materials (videos, images, samples) of your product/service.

Read more about festivals and marketing.

Contact us to see what strategy works best for your business.

Up ↑