The plan for this week was to take it easy, but after driving to the airport on Tuesday and seeing how quiet the roads were I thought I would get a jump start seeing customers who were back at work. Normally during the day I would only accomplish two or three customer appointments due to the traffic. Being organised is not something I am used to as plans tend to go out the window with problems cropping up that need fixing right away.
This week I have already seen 11 prospective new clients and the good thing about this is they had time and were available for a proper chat. Next week things would be different as most businesses would have opened up and the rat race starts all over again. Some of the businesses I visited this week are manufacturing businesses and it was great to see them open and running earlier than expected.
I am a firm believer in personal interaction in the flesh and not emails as you need to get to know these people and they need to get to know you. Now we have met we can continue via email or phone calls, but at least we can put a face to the voice and that is for me what makes selling your products more special. Nothing can beat the physical meeting and for selling you need to read the body language because this can reveal so much. Also visiting the business gives you an indication of how financially stable they are which is important for when payments are due.
Over the last 2 and a bit days I have accomplished a weeks work and we will see how next week pans out. I am under the time pressure gun knowing that my time will be scarce once we have the packaging line up and running. The packaging business I am involved with now will be put on the back burner probably from around April so I have 3 months to turn this into a business my son can run or we can do it together.
The packaging plant will take up so much time initially setting things up like finding premises and ordering the correct machinery. What is great about this new business is there is no need for staffing and my business partner and close friend does not realise that the containers that need off loading we will do on our own to start with. I believe you need to do the work yourself first to fully understand the job and to know how long each task takes.
This way you would know if you need to employ staff or not especially when the containers arrive. A 20Ft container should take no longer than 30 minutes and a 40Ft 45 minutes for 3 people so the two of us should cope depending how the products are packed. From my understanding the powder items are coming in 10Kg packs and this is what needs to be repackaged using the machine into smaller consumer end product packages.
When you do everything the business requires on your own when starting up then there is no room for not understanding and there are no weaknesses. Decisions can be made quickly as you know what is required. This is also the fun part as you are learning new skills by being hands on and why initially you may not have too much spare time for other projects. I know myself and I become laser focused on new projects because you want them to succeed and run as efficiently as possible. This project requires you to know and understand every step as this is the first of what will be 3 branches that we will be opening.
I would hate to arrive in London or Spain/Portugal having to set up a new branch and have no clue what needs to happen. One would know how long this process would take due to having already done it and why we must do all of this ourselves without any help for the first month or two.