This is not a negative blog at all....far from it, but 2016 for me was a year of fails. I'm an entrepreneur at heart and absolutely love setting up business's. I get an idea that excites me and then have a goal of where I see it takes us as a family in say, for instance 5 years then 10 years. I then plan and set out a way of how to get there. Over the years I must have had about 10 business plans, 7 of which I followed through and 9 of which failed. 2016 was no exception.My first small business was homemade bath bombs. I watched YouTube videos on how to make then and practiced a lot until I was happy with the way they turned out. I mainly ended up giving them as gifts to friends and family. It lasted a few months but I just did not have a clue on how to get it off the ground. The children were very young still at this point and I could not spend my time promoting the business.
Somewhere between making fudge and buying a sweet cart for display, I then found a bargain and bought a screen printing machine off ebay. I watched youtube videos again on how to do this and set up our shed in the garden as a studio. This was more exciting and would produce a lot more profit. I love learning new skills and always think I have all the time in the world to master these things, but yet again I was wrong. It took me forever to learn how to use the equipment, It's time sensitive because of light exposure and with the demands of small children I would always get it wrong and mess up. This was a frustrating business but the idea was still very much on my heart. 
The plan behind the business was to create a children's clothing range designed to inspire. I was concerned that all I could find in the shops to buy my boys was T-shirts with negative slogans on "20 minutes on the naughty step" , "Here comes trouble ", " I do what I want", plus all the sexualised children's slogans out there which are awful and I refuse to buy them for my children. So I wanted to come up with my own ideas, that inspired, uplifted, encouraged children to be more. Something they could read on their mates T-Shirt or hoody and feel good, that actually spoke into the child's life and not some sarcastic sentence that spoke negativity over that child.
After struggling with this idea I put it on the back burner and decided to hire out my sweet cart instead of T-shirts and making fudge. We made a good profit doing this. We hired out the sweet cart to weddings, bar mitzvahs, birthday parties and funerals. We were able to combine this business with my father-in-laws dove release business. My husband and myself focussed on the weddings and my father-in-law focussed on funerals. This lasted a few years and was a nice little income earner.
In the meantime I sold the screen printing equipment and bought a sublimation set up instead as this looked much easier to do and it was. Thankfully. It was much less time consuming.
where we were busy and quiet so I decided to take up a part time job working weekends, I also just needed to do something outside the house. This was when I became a chef at a private Health and fitness club, I spent a years here. Qualified as a Fitness instructor and learnt a lot about nutrition. I was introduced to USANA and decided to run an MLM business during the week and then the club at weekends. I was very impressed with USANA's nutrition and supplements. Being a busy mum on the run the protein shakes were a great solution to grabbing food on the go, knowing my body was not missing out on good nutrients.
So, the sweet cart took a break. Until I met a mum at my children's school who also had a sweet cart and we decided to work together and build the business's back up. This sounded like a good idea to me as it was still a dream of mine to be self employed. We worked hard and secured a 4 year contract with a wedding venue. This was when my business partner decided to do it alone. Another lesson learned when it comes to business. Just before this happened I also left my part time job at the Health & Fitness club to focus on the Events business. So within a week I was unemployed, the only financial stability I had was USANA.....back up plans do work!
Throughout these business's I learnt a lot about self development, what I was capable of doing and learning from new. I got to experience some great places and met some wonderful people. I also know there was no failure involved. I had fun with my family, taught my children about working, starting business's, how to focus and engage on something and the importance of enjoying what you do. We spent time together making bath bombs and fudge round the kitchen table. We got them up early to attend the farmers market, they would come along to set up the sweet cart to earn some pocket money. They still talk about those times today, so I know they had a positive impact and I'm excited to see what they do in the future with the knowledge they learned.
I find it incredibly difficult to work for someone...I think it's because being a stay at home mum for so long I have been my own boss. I do not have a problem with authority at all. When you are a parent you are the time manager, scheduler, worker, delegator, organiser etc. so I found in my places of employment (especially as a chef at the Health club and gourmet pub chef before that) all this is done for you, you are just expected to show up, use your skill and go home. This is something I am just not use to anymore, maybe when I was 16 but not now.
The amount of times we read about very successful business owners who had failed multiple times before getting something to work is encouraging. If you have a dream that you can't just shift then plan plan plan....you can do it! These things take time but it does not make it impossible. Make a plan of how you are going to get there and work towards it. You might take steps back but use these as learning opportunities.
My Entrepreneur days are not over. I am going back to my original idea which I have sat on for years and going to set up a plan. Watch this space........................
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