What business do you own and how did you get into it?

[Fallon]

I love this thread! I'm always interested in reading/listening to individual stories of other people.

I'm now a full-time writer following a fairly standard and largely uninteresting career in a variety of employed and self-employed office based roles. I produce copy and content for websites, blogs, brochures and general marketing literature across a range of industries.

I previously ran my own property management company for ten years.

I'm also involved in the arts in a few different ways: I administrate community arts schemes and one-off projects for councils, charities, corporate and private clients. I've also run retail gallery spaces, artist studios and produced exhibitions.

I'm always looking for new and interesting ways to showcase the work of talented and unique artists, and regularly open my home for short-run exhibitions, enabling local visitors to purchase high-quality work by artists who may not necessarily 'put themselves out there' to gain exposure through the traditional gallery route.

I'm really interested in architecture and how people use domestic space - especially from a sustainable, space-saving and multi-use perspective. I'm currently exploring ideas for collaborating with my Father, a talented carpenter and cabinet-maker, for a range of furniture and home accessories/fittings.

I love working with people who can re-purpose, re-use and turn something destined for the scrap heap into something useful or beautiful.

My ultimate 'dream job' would be to run my own creative/conceptual design studio dreaming up fantastical ideas for everything from film treatments, stage and theatrical sets, public access environmental and landscape schemes (mazes, interactive sculpture, playground equipment, for example - especially for people with sensory impairment) and anything that needs an idea. I can't actually 'make' very much myself, but I can think creatively on loads of subjects and bluesky 'til the cows come home!

[Kingdom35]

TheRingDing said:

Hi PH'ers!

I'm curious and need some inspiration! What business do you own and how did you end up doing it?

I'll start. i run a Facebook Ads business as a side business, helping small companies gain exposure through Facebook!

Can you direct message me please, I may need your assistance :-)

[daemon]

Gemaeden said:

strudel said:

I was actually thinking of starting a thread just like this myself. So if I can be permitted a slight hijack of the thread...

How long did it take to see a decent return on money? Curious to know if it was easy enough from day one or you only had one sale for the first six months.

Easy to make twice the national average salary from day one as a high ticket driving instructor. Even a trainee can earn over £1000 per week in London and the South East.

Before or after costs?

[Transmitter Man]

[quote=StevieBee]My business; Behavioural Change Consultancy for the Waste and Sanitation Sector

I think I need to introduce you to my elderly cat :-)

I messed with electronics since aged around 9. Continued the electronics hobby through my teens (the London pirate radio scene in the 70's) got as far as an HND at college.

Ended up repairing fruit machines & video games in the pubs & clubs. Yes, I was the guy with the equipment keys while you were enjoying your pint in the pub at 9pm, I was repairing a jammed coin mech.

Jump forward nearly twenty years I run an online store supplying broadcasting and studio equipment to radio & television stations mainly export with little business in the UK.

I also run a commercial FM radio station here in Cyprus. After running costs & salaries there's little left for my business partner & I but hey ho.

Dipping my toes into designing a mobile dating app with a twist with the promise of crowd funding once it goes live.

A colleague has also designed an advanced trading platform so if anyone's involved in hedge funds it may be of interest or to see if you think has some mileage? It does nothing magical, there is no 'print money button' as not selling snake oil.

Phil

[Gemaeden]

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

strudel said:

I was actually thinking of starting a thread just like this myself. So if I can be permitted a slight hijack of the thread...

How long did it take to see a decent return on money? Curious to know if it was easy enough from day one or you only had one sale for the first six months.

Easy to make twice the national average salary from day one as a high ticket driving instructor. Even a trainee can earn over £1000 per week in London and the South East.

Before or after costs?

After.

[daemon]

Gemaeden said:

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

strudel said:

I was actually thinking of starting a thread just like this myself. So if I can be permitted a slight hijack of the thread...

How long did it take to see a decent return on money? Curious to know if it was easy enough from day one or you only had one sale for the first six months.

Easy to make twice the national average salary from day one as a high ticket driving instructor. Even a trainee can earn over £1000 per week in London and the South East.

Before or after costs?

After.

So average wage = £26,000. Twice that = £52,000.

Lets assume hes managing 42 hours a week billable time, being 7 billable hours a day six days a week. And lets assume he works 47 weeks a year.

42 * 47 = 1974 billable hours a year = £26.34 per hour in your £52,000 pa.

Lets assume £9 an hour to cover fuel, insurance, advertising, maintenance & depreciation on the car.

So £35 an hour for a driving instructor?

If thats how it is then great - i'll be the first to admit though that i never saw being a driving instructor as a £50K pa role after costs.

Edited by daemon on Sunday 9th April 21:43

[Transmitter Man]

TheRingDing said:

Hi PH'ers!

I'm curious and need some inspiration! What business do you own and how did you end up doing it?

I'll start. i run a Facebook Ads business as a side business, helping small companies gain exposure through Facebook!

ring Ding,

You don't permit e-mails!

Can you message me re Facebook ad's which I already use.

Maybe you know something I don't.

Phil

[Gemaeden]

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

strudel said:

I was actually thinking of starting a thread just like this myself. So if I can be permitted a slight hijack of the thread...

How long did it take to see a decent return on money? Curious to know if it was easy enough from day one or you only had one sale for the first six months.

Easy to make twice the national average salary from day one as a high ticket driving instructor. Even a trainee can earn over £1000 per week in London and the South East.

Before or after costs?

After.

So average wage = £26,000. Twice that = £52,000.

Lets assume hes managing 42 hours a week billable time, being 7 billable hours a day six days a week. And lets assume he works 47 weeks a year.

42 * 47 = 1974 billable hours a year = £26.34 per hour in your £52,000 pa.

Lets assume £9 an hour to cover fuel, insurance, advertising, maintenance & depreciation on the car.

So £35 an hour for a driving instructor?

If thats how it is then great - i'll be the first to admit though that i never saw being a driving instructor as a £50K pa role after costs.

Edited by daemon on Sunday 9th April 21:43

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

[singlecoil]

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

[Countdown]

daemon said:

So average wage = £26,000. Twice that = £52,000.

Lets assume hes managing 42 hours a week billable time, being 7 billable hours a day six days a week. And lets assume he works 47 weeks a year.

42 * 47 = 1974 billable hours a year = £26.34 per hour in your £52,000 pa.

Lets assume £9 an hour to cover fuel, insurance, advertising, maintenance & depreciation on the car.

So £35 an hour for a driving instructor?

If thats how it is then great - i'll be the first to admit though that i never saw being a driving instructor as a £50K pa role after costs.

Edited by daemon on Sunday 9th April 21:43

What about "dead time" travelling between students? I suppose they could always drive to where the instructor is....oh wait

[98elise]

VitzzViperzz said:

Si1295 said:

Let me introduce you to the world of IT contracting

Smashing! £500 a day is not a bad salary.

Read up on IR35, and make sure you have some marketable skills. IT contracting can be great, it can also be bleak if you are on the bench at the wrong time. Now is a pretty bad time to be starting in contracting (I've been doing it 5 years).

[technodup]

singlecoil said:

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

I suspect there is money in it, but the learner always gets more than the instructor.

http://fakeinstructor.com/

nsfw

[Gemaeden]

singlecoil said:

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

Increase the hourly rate, reduce the hours and costs.

[Saladin1971]

After spending many years making and restoring furniture I decided that it was time to change...

Still working with wood... But making and restoring wood frames of vintage and veteran cars.

Much more fun I have to say!

[daemon]

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

You told us even a trainee could acheive over £1,000 a week after costs?

And how are they calculated then?

[daemon]

Gemaeden said:

singlecoil said:

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

Increase the hourly rate, reduce the hours and costs.

And a trainee will be able to achieve that will they?

OR will this just be the 1% you've now dropped in?

[Gemaeden]

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

singlecoil said:

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

Increase the hourly rate, reduce the hours and costs.

And a trainee will be able to achieve that will they?

OR will this just be the 1% you've now dropped in?

If the trainee is open minded it's really easy to become a top instructor very quickly. Minimum of 40 hours training is a legal requirement.

[daemon]

Gemaeden said:

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

singlecoil said:

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

Increase the hourly rate, reduce the hours and costs.

And a trainee will be able to achieve that will they?

OR will this just be the 1% you've now dropped in?

If the trainee is open minded it's really easy to become a top instructor very quickly. Minimum of 40 hours training is a legal requirement.

So a trainee would need to move right through to being in the top 1% to achieve the sorts of figures you were bandying about as commonplace?

Suddenly this doesnt sound as easy as you were promoting a page or so back....

[Tuna]

My company will be twenty years old this year. I moved on from a software consultancy to contract out and write the occasional piece for my own business. On the whole I get involved in leading edge technology - so I was tech lead on the team that wrote one of the first online banking sites in the UK, I've worked with biotech and telecoms companies and developed software from 8 bit microcontrollers up to petabyte scale private clusters.

Right now, I'm working on my own product - building a 'full stack' tool for UAVs (drones) that deals with everything pre- and post-flight to get useful results out of flying robots. It's a great technical environment - from Android apps up to cloud computing - but also has the benefit of spending the occasional day on the top of a mountain flying.

How did I get into it? I enjoy technology, love a challenge and thrive on building new things. The rest is 'just' a case of looking for opportunities to flex those muscles.

[Gemaeden]

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

daemon said:

Gemaeden said:

singlecoil said:

Gemaeden said:

Not 'a' driving instructor, but a top one per cent driving instructor. Most people don't appreciate that there's a difference but those that do are more than happy to pay.

The figures are achieved differently from the way that you calculated.

Feel free to explain how the figures are achieved.

Remember, this is a trainee.

Unless 'driving instructor' is a euphemism in this case

Increase the hourly rate, reduce the hours and costs.

And a trainee will be able to achieve that will they?

OR will this just be the 1% you've now dropped in?

If the trainee is open minded it's really easy to become a top instructor very quickly. Minimum of 40 hours training is a legal requirement.

So a trainee would need to move right through to being in the top 1% to achieve the sorts of figures you were bandying about as commonplace?

Suddenly this doesnt sound as easy as you were promoting a page or so back....

I don't remember saying it was commonplace, just that it's easily achieveable in London and the South East. Getting into the top 1% is relatively straight forward for a trainee, if they have the right training.