So, I'm starting my own business

[lbhsbz]

And....we've got a website.



Ebay fees are over 20% and I'm getting tired of that. I'm writing the catalog line by line..up to 1200 lines so far....it's not fun, but it will be better than any catalog out there, it already is (it's just not complete). I started on this Monday morning at about 4AM...and with a bit of help, here we are.

Lots or work ahead cleaning up imported files, re-shooting pictures, etc....but it's a good next step.

Looks like we'll finish out the year with a grand total just shy of $320K in sales. I've added about 50 part numbers in the last 2 days, and will probably add another 1000 or so over the next couple months.

Full line brake pads for automotive and SxS are in the pipe, as well as a whole lot more caliper pistons, rebuild kits, and SS brake line kits.

Still haven't paid myself. lol. This just might work, we'll see what the new year brings.

 

[lbhsbz]

Well....not quite sure what's gonna happen next. The outfit that bought the company I used to work for and fucked everything up just bought out another company...both a customer and a supplier of mine. They're the ones who bought all the bolts last year, about $100K worth. I bought quite a bit from them too, probably in the $10K range. Friday and monday they started sending out letters to customers informing everyone of price increases, effective immediately. Lowest I've heard is 20%, highest I've seen (on my letter) is 200%.

After about 10 seconds of careful thought, I copied their letter and pasted it on my letterhead, changed the names, added a MOQ figure of 100K pieces (previously it was 10K pieces) and sent it right back to them.

Lots of customers are getting pissed off....many just changed over to these guys so they didn't have to deal with the assholes that bought my old company.

...should be fun.

 

[HNL2LHC]

Interesting turn of events in your business segment. Kind of like what is going on in a lot of other business areas. Maybe you can acquire more market share with these guys screwing things up and pushing people over to you. Then you can be bought out for MILLIONS!!!!!

 

[timstoy]

Seems to be the new norm in the automotive aftermarket.

 

[Ace in the Hole]

Gave your info to one of my friends. needing a 83 944 rear caliper.

 

[lbhsbz]

Gave your info to one of my friends. needing a 83 944 rear caliper.

Great...I have about 10 sets of those on the shelf.

Been a while since the last update.

Some time in mid December I made a deal to rent some warehouse space...up to 14 pallet locations and they would handle whatever freight shipping/receiving I needed....cost me $1000/month, which while on the high side, wasn't too bad I guess. The plan was to stick pallets of bolts there so I could keep everything in stock for that customer that ended up getting acquired in early January....lol. For the last 3 months, there's been one lonely pallet sitting up there, so I killed that deal and built more shelves in my storage container around the corner to put that on....have enough shelf space now to empty another couple pallets, and one of my other suppliers close by has offered to handle whatever pallet freight shipping and receiving I need. I gave them about $50K worth of business last year, so that's nice of them.

Kit business has been growing, getting some activity on the website, eBay is doing pretty well. $23K so far on eBay this year, up 70% from the first 3 months of last year, so that looks promising.

Having problems sourcing caliper components....since the acquisition of the primary supplier to the rebuilding industry, all the big players have cancelled their orders and sent them over to the 2 little suppliers that I used to use as primary...cleaned 'em out of damn near everything. I've been working with a couple factories in China the last week here and found better sources...better quality actually than I was getting from my US suppliers, shorter lead time and better pricing shipped DDP...so I don't have to deal with any import/customs BS. Also hooked up with a US supplier who manufactures for the outfits I was buying through....I hate going over their heads/behind their back but when they tell me they can't get me parts for 2 months and their factory can ship in a week....I don't really have much of choice.

It's going well I guess

 

[Roosky01]

Just curious…

What are the highest margin calipers you can provide? What is the highest volume caliper with good margin?

 

[lbhsbz]

Just curious…

What are the highest margin calipers you can provide? What is the highest volume caliper with good margin?

Most of my calipers are fairly low volume....If I sell 1/month of each part number that's a good month. I've had stuff sitting on the shelf for over a year. It comes in waves....there were a few months where I couldn't keep Porsche 944 rear calipers on the shelf. I was selling 3 sets a week, then nothing, then a month later its 84-89 911 calipers, then something else. I've had a month go by where I didn't sell any calipers at all....that was a bit disturbing, then the next month I'm shipping 2 sets a day.

Margins are pretty good on about everything. Average calipers sells for $150. Say I've got $15 into plating, maybe $1 into rubber parts, $10 into new pistons and $8 for shipping (I offer free shipping on everything I sell), a bit of labor....Call it $100 profit on each caliper. Sound like a lot, but....

In order to be able to do this, I've got $50-60K tied up in cores. There's about a 10% core scrap rate, then I've got to store all this shit too.

British calipers are a bit lower margin....mainly because British car people are not inclined to piss away money like Porsche people, and there are new Chinese calipers available for most of the british stuff for less than I'm selling my remans for, plus I tack on a core charge. Porsche guys don't want chinese reproduction stuff on their cars....british car people don't care.

I hate rebuilding calipers but I have to keep at it. It's what enables me to develop parts that I need (and everyone else needs) and figure out how to piece together kits that don't exist anywhere else. I have some Dodge Viper ACR (carbon brakes) calipers here right now with chrome chipping off of all the pistons. Nobody, even Dodge, sells pistons....supposedly they don't have the calipers either. I'm modifying some other pistons to replace the originals....hard anodized surface rather than chrome, with stainless nosepieces to limit heat transfer, and we're adding some titanium shims between the pad and the pistons for good measure. I'll put the pistons into production after this set is done....this guy gets the mickey mouse version because he doesn't have the time to wait 4 months for everything to get sorted out correctly.

I couldn't develop this stuff without a rebuilding program, it's a necessary evil.


Caliper rebuild kits is where the money is. I sell a 6 piston brembo rebuild kit for $30+, it costs me less than $3

I do a bunch of stuff at 30-50%, but it better be effortless or high volume. I have one customer that I deal with at around 40% on average, but he orders a pallet a week of new rotors and new calipers. All I have to do is pick up the calipers at my storage, pick up the rotors at my supplier warehouse on the way, and drive about 50 miles to his place and back.

 

[Roosky01]

Most of my calipers are fairly low volume....If I sell 1/month of each part number that's a good month. I've had stuff sitting on the shelf for over a year. It comes in waves....there were a few months where I couldn't keep Porsche 944 rear calipers on the shelf. I was selling 3 sets a week, then nothing, then a month later its 84-89 911 calipers, then something else. I've had a month go by where I didn't sell any calipers at all....that was a bit disturbing, then the next month I'm shipping 2 sets a day.

Margins are pretty good on about everything. Average calipers sells for $150. Say I've got $15 into plating, maybe $1 into rubber parts, $10 into new pistons and $8 for shipping (I offer free shipping on everything I sell), a bit of labor....Call it $100 profit on each caliper. Sound like a lot, but....

In order to be able to do this, I've got $50-60K tied up in cores. There's about a 10% core scrap rate, then I've got to store all this shit too.

British calipers are a bit lower margin....mainly because British car people are not inclined to piss away money like Porsche people, and there are new Chinese calipers available for most of the british stuff for less than I'm selling my remans for, plus I tack on a core charge. Porsche guys don't want chinese reproduction stuff on their cars....british car people don't care.

I hate rebuilding calipers but I have to keep at it. It's what enables me to develop parts that I need (and everyone else needs) and figure out how to piece together kits that don't exist anywhere else. I have some Dodge Viper ACR (carbon brakes) calipers here right now with chrome chipping off of all the pistons. Nobody, even Dodge, sells pistons....supposedly they don't have the calipers either. I'm modifying some other pistons to replace the originals....hard anodized surface rather than chrome, with stainless nosepieces to limit heat transfer, and we're adding some titanium shims between the pad and the pistons for good measure. I'll put the pistons into production after this set is done....this guy gets the mickey mouse version because he doesn't have the time to wait 4 months for everything to get sorted out correctly.

I couldn't develop this stuff without a rebuilding program, it's a necessary evil.


Caliper rebuild kits is where the money is. I sell a 6 piston brembo rebuild kit for $30+, it costs me less than $3

I do a bunch of stuff at 30-50%, but it better be effortless or high volume. I have one customer that I deal with at around 40% on average, but he orders a pallet a week of new rotors and new calipers. All I have to do is pick up the calipers at my storage, pick up the rotors at my supplier warehouse on the way, and drive about 50 miles to his place and back.

Wow. Thanks for the info and I find it fascinating. Always enjoy your updates.

Is there an additional avenue in the business that you think you could exploit that you haven’t? You obviously have the knowledge in this to accomplish a lot!

 

[lbhsbz]

Wow. Thanks for the info and I find it fascinating. Always enjoy your updates.

Is there an additional avenue in the business that you think you could exploit that you haven’t? You obviously have the knowledge in this to accomplish a lot!

Lot's of 'em! Sky's the limit

I expand as I find the time....lol. Remember, I'm a one man show. I have no fucking idea how I'm doing as well as I am....maybe it's because I'm good at operating with all the data in my head.

I'm the:

Catalog guy
Purchasing guy
Caliper rebuilder guy
Kit assembly guy
Research guy
Shipping guy
Customer Service guy
Website guy
Driver
A/R
A/P
Photographer
Marketing guy

....and I still find time to sleep here and there.

With the new website, I found an add on app called MRPEasy....inventory management, billing, purchasing....does EVERYTHING way better than the version of quickbooks I had to do this. I can build actual BOMs, and work orders, and....run it like a real business. Now I have to get eBay, MRPEasy, Shopify, and Quickbooks to all talk to each other....the only thing left is MRPEasy and Quickbooks...need some help from my accountant on that, lots of things to map to other things that I'm not smart enough to deal with. That should happen here next month. Then everything will be tracked.

Lots of populating special fields so there is unison between all the platforms, lots of making new part numbers because I sell things on eBay in various stages of different kits...each one of which needs it's own part number and BOM so as to suck things out of inventory appropriately. lots of work.

 

[lbhsbz]

Been down with Covid the last couple weeks....this is the first day I've felt like doing much of shit. Most of the symptoms went away after about a week, but just sorta didn't have any energy....wake up in the morning and start counting the hours until it's time to go to bed again....that sucked. Luckily, it was pretty slow.

Today is making it up for it. Got a $1400 PO this morning for pistons/kits from a great customer....second order this month from them, orders for 9 pairs of calipers and somewhere in the neighborhood of $1300 worth of rebuild kits all came in before noon. I wish I could take the rest of the week off. lol. This is a rare day.

 

[monkeyswrench]

Sucks to be down and sick, but at least you were slow. Good thing is, timing was good. If the orders came when sick, your normal turnaround may be effected. This way, the customer knows no different.

 

[lbhsbz]

It's been a while since my last update...

Things are going well I guess...and some changes are happening.

My buddy who I worked with for years who started the caliper rebuilding business down the street from me....who said he was never going to stock finished parts, just rebuild and return what customers sent in...has started buying cores and stocking calipers to sell on an exchange basis...just like what I do. He has also taken out ads in some of the Porsche magazines...which steps squarely on my dick. He said he wouldn't do that, which is one of the reasons that I DID do that...so we wouldn't be in competition. Oh well...I'll beat 'em because I'm better.

eBay and website sales have been pretty stagnant for most of the year....no real growth. I realized I hadn't added any new product listings to eBay or the website except for a few here and there...So I sat down for a couple days and figured out what other kits I could put together out of all the component inventory I had, or what other configurations of already listed kits I could put together, took a bunch of pictures and added about 100 items to the eBay store...now I'm at 250, up from 150. I've been stuck at about $30K in sales for the last 90 days on eBay for about the whole year so far...as of yesterday, that's up to $35K. I need to add more. Goal is to get to 300 listings by the end of the month, then 400 by the end of the year. Can't sell it if it ain't for sale.

I have some suppliers that don't know what they have....they've made stuff for someone once and have stock but no nothing about it....I've requested details on some of this stuff and found some pretty good stuff. I've got caliper rebuild kits and pistons in stock for the C8 corvette, which will come in handy when people start cooking them on the track...I've sold a few, but it's a new kit so it'll take a while to gain traction.

Wholesale business is up...I've been screwing around on my customer's websites seeing what they have (that I can get) and looking at their pricing...I know where they get most all of their brake parts. Where I can match or beat their current pricing on stuff I can get through my current suppliers, I'm sending quotes and picking up some of that business.

I just hooked up with a direct importer and now have access to a NEW aftermarket caliper program....mostly dime a dozen common applications but there are a few gems in there.

A while back I had a deal to buy about 200 core calipers from a junkyard in San Diego to rebuild for a customer of mine who goes through about 200-300 of this particular part number/year....so I ordered in all the components to rebuild those, then the dickhead at the junkyard decided he didn't want to sell anymore after the initial 25 sets....so I put kits together with basically everything but the casting and sold a complete "master caliper rebuild kit"....for more than you can pick up a rebuilt caliper at autozone...and I've sold 70 of them this year so far...at very good margins. I think folks are realizing that the commercially available rebuilds are just garbage and they can do it better themselves if they can find the parts....which I put all in one kit to make it easy. I'm expanding this into fleet applications (250/2500-550/5500 class trucks) and a few enthusiast market applications....we'll see if it sticks.

The all inclusive kits is where the money is at, so concentrating on those for the forseeable future....all the profit of 3 or 4 separate sales with only the effort of one.
Numbers are looking good...even without that 6 figure customer from last year...it's looking like I'll beat last years sales total...even if I matched it, that would be a huge win. Doesn't look like I'll hit the 1/2 mil mark this year, but it's definately in the sights for next year.

Got another storage can a few months ago at the boat storage yard for another $225/month (10% off when you rent 2 units...lol) so I've doubled my warehouse space lol. Plenty of room for expansion now. I might get a couple more just because. It's cheaper than getting a proper shop and it's 1/4 miles from the house.

 

[lbhsbz]

I love this game. If you're in a rut, find a niche you have a passion for, and get started.....you'll kick ass.


After almost 3 years working for myself....I can finally see what folks mean when they say "the world is what you make it". You have to give a shit though....and be on call whenever. Can't skip opportunities because "there are more important things to do"....unless you want to fail at it.

I've actually told 3 "customers" to fuck off this week because I don't have the time for the shenanigans they bring to the table. There are few things more pleasurable than firing customers....and realizing those customers were only holding you back.

 

[LuauLounge]

I had one that started out by telling us how we were going to do our job. I was very diplomatic in telling her that we were not the firm for her business.
A day later she called requesting a meeting. Her opening statement is you aren’t going to get rid of me that easily. Long story short, this was 15 years ago and has been a stellar client. Listens to us, pays timely and has been a pleasure to deal with.

 

[Maw]

When I started my company 25 years ago my ex-boss gave me this small sign - which had been given to him 25 or so years prior. Next time I'm in Long Beach I know who I'm passing it down to.

 

[lbhsbz]

When I started my company 25 years ago my ex-boss gave me this small sign - which had been given to him 25 or so years prior. Next time I'm in Long Beach I know who I'm passing it down to.

View attachment 1364213

I’m actually down to about an 8 hour day….I’m learning about efficiency.

Only because I’m spent by the end and just don’t feel like doing anything at that point.

I have meetings tomorrow and Friday to bring in some catagaloging horsepower which should double or triple things by the end of the year….I’m willing to start at $60/hr and go up from there….gotta pay to play. The $100/hr guy I wanted is having some medical issues, so I’ve gotta settle.

 

[lakemadness]

I'm rather surprised you've made it this far, based on how negative you are on this forum.

 

[lbhsbz]

I'm rather surprised you've made it this far, based on how negative you are on this forum.

Part of my business plan was to surprise idiots….seems I’ve succeeded in that as well.

 

[LuauLounge]

I’ve been following your business since you started. One thing I really appreciated is you choosing a niche business. Brake parts, but not the Autozone market,. By going after the hard to find items, price is far down the list for your customers, wholesale or retail.
Have you looked into Amazon and their distribution options? I am seeing more companies that have an Amazon storefront.
Congratulations on your success, I’m anxious to see what directions you choose for building your business.

 

[lbhsbz]

I’ve been following your business since you started. One thing I really appreciated is you choosing a niche business. Brake parts, but not the Autozone market,. By going after the hard to find items, price is far down the list for your customers, wholesale or retail.
Have you looked into Amazon and their distribution options? I am seeing more companies that have an Amazon storefront.
Congratulations on your success, I’m anxious to see what directions you choose for building your business.

I've spoken with a few guys from Amazon, and I really have no desire to deal with them...The return policy rules they beat into their suppliers are just dumb. Otherwise, it's just like eBay but with a shit ton more rules, that I don't really care to comply with. eBay does pretty well....even though it gets a bad rep from some, I'm pretty happy with it despite the fees. I just tack on another 20% or so to the eBay prices. Talked to a guy from Walmart Marketplace last year at AAPEX, and had a few follow up meetings, but I decided that their cataloging is crap and I'm not real happy with their platform, so I chose to stick with what I've got....eBay and my website.

As of this writing, total sales (gross) on eBay for the year are about $67K, with net coming in around $49K. Website and other sales are a little less than double that, and margins are pretty stupid...lol. eBay takes a big chunk, but I can't imagine what I'd pay for the same level of SEO. If you search what I sell, the eBay listings are at the top of the first page of google. It's worth it.

Thank you for your support. I'm not sure where the business will go. I'm about done rebuilding calipers...went from 10-15 sets a week in sales down to 2-3 sets a month for the last 8 months....decided to kill it for the time being, crated up all my cores (about $100K worth) and stack 'em in storage....of course the next week I'm getting nothing but calls for calipers. Don't care, they're a pain in my ass....I may get back into it when I have more horsepower, but I don't like letting others do the work because regardless of what I pay them, they always seem to not care and fuck up. As I mentioned to @lakemadness ..employess are a pain in the ass. I'd rather simply not do it than put out subpar product schlocked together by someone who doesn't really give a shit, so that's what I'll do....drop the product line. If I don't have the time to do it myself, it just ain't gonna get done, and that's fine.

I'm not sure what'll happen next....I've decided to start throwing a bunch of shit against the wall and see what sticks. I've found lots of stuff that sticks and lots that doesn't.....so I order a lot more of whatever sticks. One important lesson I've learned is to not get stuck in one spot...I started off 3 years ago rebuilding calipers and that was about it....my parts supply cut me off, so I went to their suppliers, then realized a bit later that with access to all these parts at the wholesale level, I should seek out other customers that were cut off just like me, but might not know where else to get the stuff....that has proven to be lucrative. I'm supplying components to quite a few big guys in the business....

I search the forums and see what people are looking for and try to figure out where the voids are, and then fill them. I join and provide advise as I can and participate when I can provide useful information. I try not to just be the guy hawking parts.

Odd customers too....defense contractor in the middle east, fleets in south america, all kinds of fun stuff. I have a customer in Curacao who I took care of and he's invited me and my family there to stay at his villa, observe his Porsche collection, and play with a few of his race cars on the local track.....we'll see if I can find the time.

A lot of aspects of the business are way harder than they should be, because I refuse to put on pants and give up my 9 step commute from the house to the garage.....but I've dumped my 2 little rental storage sheds and moved up to a 14x30 storage garage with about 12 foot ceilings intead of 7 foot ceilings....increasing "warehouse space" considerably. I'm gradually getting things sorted out, every day is better than the last, but with additional challenges.

I could go rent a shop, and that might happen by the end of year, but I don't really want to until I really need to.

None of this is me bragging....maybe a little bit, but that's not the intention. The intention of this thread and the posts in it is to sort of document the road I took a chance in going down, the levels of success I'm seeing...along with the struggles, and what I feel to be the key points of what helped and hurt along the way....I'm in a better financial spot than I've ever been in my life, due to mostly luck and also a bit of savvy. I've never professed to be good at business....but if I can do it, anyone can....

 

[Roosky01]

I think you should partner with one of our gummie friends from the site and increase your reach exponentially.

 

[lbhsbz]

I think you should partner with one of our gummie friends from the site and increase your reach exponentially.

Assembly lube and a gummy free with every purchase of 2 or more caliper rebuild kits....I like it.

 

[hallett21]

Part of my business plan was to surprise idiots….seems I’ve succeeded in that as well.

You’re a coarse person. But you’re one of the most helpful, honest and intelligent people I’ve met. Not to mention you offer a drink and conversation when the works done.

 

[lbhsbz]

You’re a coarse person. But you’re one of the most helpful, honest and intelligent people I’ve met. Not to mention you offer a drink and conversation when the works done.

The wife saw this and said "he misspelled asshole" lol

 

[LuauLounge]

One of the great aspects of being self employed is you are never out of work.
We started in 1999 and I learn every day. Best advice is hire the best. No one can be 100% all the time. We recently hired the son of one of our employees who started with us. One of our clients called me to solely to compliment on how efficiently he took care of her issues and what a pleasure it was working with him. I passed the information along to everyone and saw an immediate improvement on everyone’s efforts.

 

[Romans9]

Great thread. Only made t about 1/3 through it. Will finish tonight after I go put in my 14-16 hours of self employment bliss……

 

[ChumpChange]

The wife saw this and said "he misspelled asshole" lol

I'm rather surprised you're married, based on how negative you are on this forum.

 

[RaceTec]

I am glad you are kicking ass! Thanks for your help, like everyone said you deserve your success! Now I need to find out what my next chapter is! LOL!

 

[Your ad here]

Good to hear you're doing well. I really enjoy reading up on your progress and what you face and how to handle it. I have a small side business and am learning along the way. I do face similar situations as you so it's nice to know it's just not me.
I to have a list of people I just wont work for. Another thing I learned is to always speak with a client on the phone rather than text message back and forth... On a phone call and can tell if it's a job worth doing by their voice. I can't tell with text messages.

 

[EmpirE231]

Sounds like biz is going good! were you the one that had a heart attack recently, or was that a different member on here? I always get members / threads mixed up.

 

[lbhsbz]

Sounds like biz is going good! were you the one that had a heart attack recently, or was that a different member on here? I always get members / threads mixed up.

Yeah...that's me. Was pretty weaksauce as far as heart attacks go....I was in the hospital for 2 days, got a stent installed, then back after it the next day.

 

[EmpirE231]

Yeah...that's me. Was pretty weaksauce as far as heart attacks go....I was in the hospital for 2 days, got a stent installed, then back after it the next day.

You think it was due to the stress from business or something else?!

 

[lbhsbz]

You think it was due to the stress from business or something else?!

It was due to eating like shit and smoking for the last 25 years. What stress? I have no stress in my life lol.

yes.

 

[WTMFA]

Interesting observation….

Getting ready to leave for the river…first real break I’ve taken since I started this mess. My clock no longer stops when I leave the office at 5:00. For the last month, every time I start to work on the boat and get things ready, within 5 minutes I get a phone call/email/etc and I’m back doing business stuff.

We’ll be on the road in an hour…boat is still not ready. I’m bringing what I need and I’ll finish things up when we get there I guess….should have some downtime today while I’m waiting for my new jack plate pump motor that should be arriving at the RV park via fedex overnight from FL. Lol.

I struggle with flipping the “off” switch….I always leave it on, because there’s money to be made. Gotta work on that.

I’m leaving my laptop at home this weekend. It’s a start…lol

I have a friend I camp with in glamis who owns a construction equipment rental company and I'd say he does pretty well but, everyday he is in glamis he is working. Everytime I step in his trailer he's on the phone. We've had extended stops out in the middle of the dunes because he is dealing with his business while the rest of us are drinking and having fun not even thinking about work yet I envy him. There's a certain freedom that comes with being your own boss and controlling your own destiny.
It's not all about the money...

 

[lbhsbz]

I sort of hired a guy today....he's semi-retired, been in the business 40 years and is mostly just bored after selling off the assets of his caliper business a few years ago. He knows every aspect of the business pretty well, and can do this part time whenever he wants. Sort of a catalog / administrative / clean up the electronic mess I leave behind kinda job for him. We've been colleagues for 20 years. Had a 2 hour meeting today, having my attorney draw up a contract and a NDA, even though I probably don't need any of that with this guy. He ain't cheap, but should be worth every penny. Goal is to double the amount of catalog listings in the next 6 months, which should at least triple sales.

 

[LuauLounge]

Congratulations
You may have come across an excellent compliment to your operation. Today’s market is challenging on all fronts, finding people you can work with and people that your customers can work with. Oh, they actually need to be driven enough to work, too.
Our clients are having a horrible time with new hires. Start by not showing up for the interview, a save, no time invested. To being hired and not showing up, second save. From the executives to the staff. Interview, hired and don’t make it through the first week . Several of these groups I’ve worked with for over a decade and it doesn’t make sense to me. Clean, professional office environments who have had zero turnover in years.

 

[lbhsbz]

Congratulations
You may have come across an excellent compliment to your operation. Today’s market is challenging on all fronts, finding people you can work with and people that your customers can work with. Oh, they actually need to be driven enough to work, too.
Our clients are having a horrible time with new hires. Start by not showing up for the interview, a save, no time invested. To being hired and not showing up, second save. From the executives to the staff. Interview, hired and don’t make it through the first week . Several of these groups I’ve worked with for over a decade and it doesn’t make sense to me. Clean, professional office environments who have had zero turnover in years.

I had another guy I called first, about 1/2 the price or less....used to work for us at Centric but had a bit of an issue with calling in at least one day every 2 weeks with some sort of excuse....he's kinda doing side work and fucking off, works for his Dad doing repairs and service work on british cars. I figured this could help him fill in some free time. He was supposed to be here at 11:00 on Thursday to discuss....he texted me at 3:00pm and told me something came up....I sort of expected it. Was amusing.

 

[TimeBandit]

Did California ever enforce NDA's? I just read they are now not allowed on a national level.

Oops, that was "non competes".

FTC Announces Rule Banning Noncompetes

www.ftc.gov

Congrats on the growth!

I was thinking of you yesterday when I found some brake fluid where the two halves meet.

 

[LuauLounge]

Good to hear you're doing well. I really enjoy reading up on your progress and what you face and how to handle it. I have a small side business and am learning along the way. I do face similar situations as you so it's nice to know it's just not me.
I to have a list of people I just wont work for. Another thing I learned is to always speak with a client on the phone rather than text message back and forth... On a phone call and can tell if it's a job worth doing by their voice. I can't tell with text messages.

I agree regarding email/phone calls. I send emails for yes/no discussions and phone calls for everything else.

 

[lbhsbz]

Bit of an update, if anyone cares...

It's been an interesting year so far...not sure what to make of it. Sales are up and down...which is to be expected, but it's strange. Some days there is absolutely nothing...other days I'm spending 12 hours packing orders.

I've finally sold out of most of my "in stock" calipers and I haven't built any for stock in some time...it's nice not dealing with those. I still have a couple customers that send me stuff that I deal with because I don't want them taking all our other business somewhere else....but I'm concentrating on rebuild kits and pistons now primarily. I'm learning my "system" better and have been looking at each wholesale customer, the margins, the totals, and the costs involved on an individual basis and realized that there are a couple that look real good on the surface but at the end of the day don't really make me much at all, so we'll either dump them or make some changes to how we deal with them.....trying to streamline stuff. Cashflow is not income.

I haven't had time to add any new part numbers in a while, and for the last 2 or 3 months my days are a lot shorter since the wife is down....but we're managing.

One of my biggest problems is organization. I'm running this out of my garage. I have a double car garage and a single car garage, and the single car garage houses all of my parts for daily consumption. It also houses a bunch of garage shit, a shot blaster, and 2 blast cabinets that need to stay accessible, so there's no good way to lay everything out to make it work nicely. Last weekend I bought an enclosed trailer....24ft V-nose, and backed it in behind the garage. Plan is to put the whole "warehouse" in there, along with a small desk/packaging area up front. I spend about 1/3 of the time walking back and forth between the back garage and the front garage and moving around my rolling shelves to be able to get to what I need. The new setup has room for about 1000 different part numbers in bin boxes, so having everything within 20 feet with nothing I don't need cluttering up the area should make things more efficient, and I get some of my garage back. Trailer was cheaper than adding onto the garage and dealing with the building dept....which I don't have the patience for.

Never brought in that guy I was talking to....for a few different reasons.

eBay is up 84% over last year so far, which is pretty nice to see. Website is picking up speed but still nowhere near it's potential....I see 2-3 sales a day on average through the website, which is pretty good considering I haven't done any marketing or even updated the catalog in over a year lol. Total numbers today are up over last years total, and there are 3 months left....so we'll do OK.

Supply chain is doing well but I'm still struggling to manage inventory correctly....the numbers are way off all the time and I don't know why, so figuring that out is high on the priority list...and the move into the the trailer is a perfect opportunity to do a 100% physical inventory of everything.

 

[Done-it-again]

Bit of an update, if anyone cares...

It's been an interesting year so far...not sure what to make of it. Sales are up and down...which is to be expected, but it's strange. Some days there is absolutely nothing...other days I'm spending 12 hours packing orders.

I've finally sold out of most of my "in stock" calipers and I haven't built any for stock in some time...it's nice not dealing with those. I still have a couple customers that send me stuff that I deal with because I don't want them taking all our other business somewhere else....but I'm concentrating on rebuild kits and pistons now primarily. I'm learning my "system" better and have been looking at each wholesale customer, the margins, the totals, and the costs involved on an individual basis and realized that there are a couple that look real good on the surface but at the end of the day don't really make me much at all, so we'll either dump them or make some changes to how we deal with them.....trying to streamline stuff. Cashflow is not income.

I haven't had time to add any new part numbers in a while, and for the last 2 or 3 months my days are a lot shorter since the wife is down....but we're managing.

One of my biggest problems is organization. I'm running this out of my garage. I have a double car garage and a single car garage, and the single car garage houses all of my parts for daily consumption. It also houses a bunch of garage shit, a shot blaster, and 2 blast cabinets that need to stay accessible, so there's no good way to lay everything out to make it work nicely. Last weekend I bought an enclosed trailer....24ft V-nose, and backed it in behind the garage. Plan is to put the whole "warehouse" in there, along with a small desk/packaging area up front. I spend about 1/3 of the time walking back and forth between the back garage and the front garage and moving around my rolling shelves to be able to get to what I need. The new setup has room for about 1000 different part numbers in bin boxes, so having everything within 20 feet with nothing I don't need cluttering up the area should make things more efficient, and I get some of my garage back. Trailer was cheaper than adding onto the garage and dealing with the building dept....which I don't have the patience for.

Never brought in that guy I was talking to....for a few different reasons.

eBay is up 84% over last year so far, which is pretty nice to see. Website is picking up speed but still nowhere near it's potential....I see 2-3 sales a day on average through the website, which is pretty good considering I haven't done any marketing or even updated the catalog in over a year lol. Total numbers today are up over last years total, and there are 3 months left....so we'll do OK.

Supply chain is doing well but I'm still struggling to manage inventory correctly....the numbers are way off all the time and I don't know why, so figuring that out is high on the priority list...and the move into the the trailer is a perfect opportunity to do a 100% physical inventory of everything.

Dealing with inventory sucks and its never right in the computer ... We do inventory every 3 months to make corrections if needed.

Don't want a large inventory at the end of the year either, who wants to pay taxes on that!

 

[lbhsbz]

Dealing with inventory sucks and its never right in the computer ... We do inventory every 3 months to make corrections if needed.

Don't want a large inventory at the end of the year either, who wants to pay taxes on that!

My acquisition cost is fairly low…I’d rather pay taxes on it than be out of it and lose sales.

Biggest problem is that I’ve had most of my little rubber components (boots, seals, etc) in little 2” wide bin boxes on rolling shelves to save space. That’s what I pick from for my daily orders. Say I can fit 50 of something in those bins. Then I have 4 big plastic crates full of ziploc bags containing 100-200 of each thing, that I dig through to replenish the bins when they run dry, and then I have big boxes of the stuff in my storage that I replenish the crates with when my ziplock bag is empty. It’s a mess, but it’s what I can do given my limited space.

The setup in the trailer will be better. Bin boxes on the shelf are 5 times the size of the current ones, and I have room for “overstock” that should allow me to keep everything in the trailer….and organized. At least that’s the goal. I’m also going to implement my version of the can-ban system to some extent to verify actual daily usage against what the computer is seeing, so I can hopefully get to the bottom of why those 2 figures never match.

Someday it’ll seem like I know what I’m doing….but not today lol.

 

[lbhsbz]

Dealing with inventory sucks and its never right in the computer ... We do inventory every 3 months to make corrections if needed.

Don't want a large inventory at the end of the year either, who wants to pay taxes on that!

My other issue with inventory is....I stock EVERYTHING in component form, physically. Takes up a lot less space, and requires a lot less physical inventory. Let's say I have 300 different rebuild kit part numbers, many of which share parts with other kits. If I "built" 30 of each kit, it would "consume" thousands of pieces of certain components....but I only carry maybe 1000 of that particular component. The website requires I have inventory "built"....so I try and keep that number around 5 or 6 per kit, which is all bullshit because I don't actually assemble the kits, I just tell the system that I did. I haven't done it in a while, but I'm going through my website this morning and found about 5 pages of zeros lol, so I'm creating manufacturing orders for all that stuff. It's tough to keep up with. On the eBay stuff, I manually create an order once a week or so with all the eBay sales, and the system lets me build to order....after it sucks down all the existing "inventory", which zeros stuff on the website.

 

[RVR SWPR]

lbhsbz,noticed thru out thread you mention people you worked with years ago. Gotta ask if you came across a guy name Presley @Franklin Brake? A real character Presley and his parrot.
Really enjoyed this thread,thanks.

 

[lbhsbz]

lbhsbz,noticed thru out thread you mention people you worked with years ago. Gotta ask if you came across a guy name Presley @Franklin Brake? A real character Presley and his parrot.
Really enjoyed this thread,thanks.

I don’t recall him, and the only Franklin I can think of is Franklin Truck parts.

 

[Done-it-again]

My other issue with inventory is....I stock EVERYTHING in component form, physically. Takes up a lot less space, and requires a lot less physical inventory. Let's say I have 300 different rebuild kit part numbers, many of which share parts with other kits. If I "built" 30 of each kit, it would "consume" thousands of pieces of certain components....but I only carry maybe 1000 of that particular component. The website requires I have inventory "built"....so I try and keep that number around 5 or 6 per kit, which is all bullshit because I don't actually assemble the kits, I just tell the system that I did. I haven't done it in a while, but I'm going through my website this morning and found about 5 pages of zeros lol, so I'm creating manufacturing orders for all that stuff. It's tough to keep up with. On the eBay stuff, I manually create an order once a week or so with all the eBay sales, and the system lets me build to order....after it sucks down all the existing "inventory", which zeros stuff on the website.

I get it and we have the same issue. You would need a system that has “sub assemblies”. So when you assemble a kit and add a build qty to the system on how many you made it pulls all the individual pieces out of inventory. It’s just more part numbers. Ha ha ha.

 

[RVR SWPR]

I don’t recall him, and the only Franklin I can think of is Franklin Truck parts.

Correct,Franklin Truck Parts.

 

[lbhsbz]

I get it and we have the same issue. You would need a system that has “sub assemblies”. So when you assemble a kit and add a build qty to the system on how many you made it pulls all the individual pieces out of inventory. It’s just more part numbers. Ha ha ha.

My inventory software (MRPEasy) is awesome…it has sub assemblies, BOMs, and also virtual inventory (how many kits can I build with the inventory on hand) . Problem is the way the website integrates with this program…it will only integrate live inventory, not virtual inventory…and eBay doesn’t integrate with it at all, so all my eBay sales have to be keyed in manually once a week or so.

I’ve opened a support ticket to try and get them to make virtual inventory integrate, but they want an open ended commitment at $100/hr for coding time with no guess as to how much it will cost in the end…so not gonna hapoen

 

[lbhsbz]

Correct,Franklin Truck Parts.

We never got into HD stuff, which is their bread and butter....only the Medium Duty stuff, which was sort of short line for them. I've probably spoken with guys from Franklin 20 times over the last 20 years and can't remember anyone's name. Other people I'd speak with 5 times a day....was gonna say "good customers called in more often"....but maybe they were just dumber ones lol.