3 skills entrepreneurs need

~ premsagark ~ 3 Comments

I realize the increasing need to have 3 very very important skills while running Tapprs.

Those are:

  1. what does the customer need?
  2. how much will he pay for it?
  3. how does he decide

If point 1 above sounds too simple and obvious to you, it helps to read the story of Iridium, the satellite phone company that never was. And I think they realized it after plonking down a good 5 billion $ down the drain. And I think 7-8 years of ignoring market signals.

As for the 2nd, you may do well if you were reborn as Steve Jobs.

As for the 3rd, I would get insanely rich if I could crack the code.

Am sorry if you came here to know how to get those skills. There’s no short cut. So, go figure them out yourself.

And come back to leave a comment when you attain nirvana!

Small steps

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“Think big”, an oft used phrase.

Think big, one should definitely do provided the thinking isn’t beyond means and methods.

And for small ventures, “think big, act small” is more ideal. This part, you and I know already. Many books and articles have been written.

“Think big, act small!”.

We read. We listen. We nod in consent.

Yet, when it comes to doing, we forget!

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Value chain

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Many of us first time entrepreneurs get it wrong.

When we conceive an idea and execute it… most often we get excited and blinded by the greatness of the idea that we fail to study something vital. (Or like in my case, after wanting to start something exciting and not getting any great idea, start something without actually studying vital information.)

That vital thing is value chain. (I don’t know if there’s a better phrase for it.)

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Good entrepreneur

~ premsagark ~ 4 Comments

A good entrepreneur isn’t one with a great idea or isn’t one who hasn’t ever failed.

Heck, he needn’t even be good at execution… at least to begin with!

He is one who has a good sense of smell.. towards the customers needs and towards where eventual profits are (or whatever else the reward). And pursues it relentlessly.  Whatever shit happens in the meanwhile is a lesson… if one has the composure to call it that and the caution to not let it hit the ceiling.

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Rebranding Tapprs

~ premsagark ~ 6 Comments

I have to confess.

Inspite of all the cribbing in my earlier posts about how rentals is not exactly a great market and how the market signals aren’t great, I have been hooked onto the idea of Tapprs (mind you, not to the idea of rentals).

The reason is, I feel Tapprs could be woven into a nice brand if done well. Not necessarily rentals, could be anything else too. I have stuck my neck out on Tapprs. I can’t explain why. Perhaps, its because it’s your baby, even if its ill-conceived. Or perhaps, I feel that it needs to be given more time and patience.

I have put all my tech ideas on hold to give Tapprs some concentrated effort in the coming 1-2 months.

Whatever, I am here now. Looking at re-branding Tapprs. I don’t want Tapprs to be identified as a rental place and would love to create a brand out of it.

I want Tapprs to be attributed with a few characteristics. And that means change from the ground up.

I’ve tried to work things out towards that effect. So here goes.

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Run fast to reach late

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I have started running recently.

It’s been 3 weeks now and makes me feel good.

In the last 2 weeks, I used to do 10 laps in the ground near my home in about 28 minutes usually, a distance of around 4.6Kms.

Yesterday, since I entered the 3rd week, I thought I will push myself a bit more. So I tried to run just a wee bit faster.

To my surprise, it took me longer than my usual sub-28 minutes.

It took 30 minutes.  I had slowed down during the latter part a bit.

That made me think.

  • Slow and steady may be boring. But is still a good strategy.
  • Fast growth is not the answer to building a good business / financial portfolio / lifestyle.
  • Focus on quality. Maintain priorities. Focus on goals, not on reaching fast.
  • Don’t sweep things under the carpet in your race to pace it out.
  • Think long term though few of them may be counter productive in the short term.

It is especially important that I keep these things in mind given my current situation. Gave up my job, too many experiments, lot of ideas, lack of execution knowledge, what-next situation, etc.

 

Market size

~ premsagark ~ 6 Comments

I was looking at the performance of Tapprs in the last one month.

Tapprs did reasonably well in June for a 2 month old venture (actually a respectable 5 figure). July hasn’t been bad either. And I have a few advance bookings for August too.

So, I should rejoice. Right? Well, not exactly! (Read this post first).

Before I get into details, let us keep in mind the fact that Tapprs handles two different things. Travel rental & photography rental. So what I say needs to be taken in context with what category it is in.. travel or photography.

Photography rental is my core service. Travel rental (sleeping bags, tents, bicycle, etc) is just an add-on. (Also, I am finding it hard to handle them given that people take it on treks, wet & dirty the items, return it without bothering to clean them, etc. It’s a pain! I may remove it off.)

I was checking the statistics for Photography today.

  • SEO traffic is bad. Conversion is decent.
  • Facebook, readers of this blog and friends are my best referrers! Thank you guys :-).
  • 10% business is repeat.
  • User feedback is extremely good.

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How do you allocate ownership?

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If you are thinking of starting on your own, partnering is probably one of the most important things that can make or break your venture.

And am pretty sure you have concerns and doubts about ownership and how do you allocate it fairly between the founders? And who exactly is a founder?

Tough question to answer. Joel Sposky has done a fabulous job of answering it in detail here. I tend to agree on most things including on that of not treating a non-full time partner as a founder.

 

The economics of running a rental business (updated)

~ premsagark ~ 16 Comments

You might know already that I run Tapprs, an online photography & travel equipment rental place.

Thought I will share my view of the economics of running such a business, at least at a small scale such as it is now.  Tapprs is still in the validation phase, but the numbers shown here should be relevant even if scaled up. All numbers are actuals, except for revenue.

Disclaimer: I have no accounting background and there could be mistakes on my part. Please do point it out if you find any.

Initial funding:

Assume that the operations began on June 1.

As the sole owner, I put in Rs 1 lakh as equity capital. This is free money (don’t have to pay interest on it). And then I lend Rs 2lakh to the business from my pocket which I charge an interest of 12% annually (realistically, no one would lend to such a business without collateral and interest rates will be much higher).  That means Tapprs would have an interest payout of Rs 24000 every year on it until paid back.

Source of Funds

 Amount
Equity capital 100,000
Loan capital @ 12% 200,000
Total 300,000

Use of funds:

Tapprs needs to start. For which, I do these transactions on June 1.

Item Expense
Purchase of equipment 200,000
Domain 450
Total Initial Expense 200,450

 

So, at the end of the day, my balance sheet looks like

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