Hello everyone, thank you for taking a look at this new thread.
The reasons for writing this thread are because I think it is the best way for me to be able to look back and spot the mistakes I made and to look back at how I was thinking at a different time. I would also love to get insights and help with potential problems from the members of this forum, from whom I already learned a lot in the other threads.
A bit about me: I am 21 years old and just finished my business degree a month ago. In the upcoming years, I will dedicate myself to this business I started in January earlier this year.
About the business: I am from the Netherlands where sustainability is an increasingly important issue. So, my e-commerce brand is focused on day-to-day items for the kitchen and living but in a sustainable way. The sustainability elements so far include:
- Recyclable packages
- No extra boxes and plastics used for shipment
- We use a completely CO2-neutral delivery company
- We pick the most sustainable items possible for each product we buy
- For every order, we donate a percentage of the money to sustainable projects like reforesting or solar panel parks.
Any suggestions on how we can add to this are very welcome!
Now I will write a quick summary of the progress so far. Keep in mind that from January to July, I was still very much focused on getting my bachelor's degree, writing my thesis, and had some other work to do.
January:
- Officially registered the company, the website, and brand name.
- Worked on product research, brainstorming ideas, and building the website.
- Completed some other legal documents and set up a payment system.
February-April:
- Conducted a lot of product research and ordered 7 different products using about 12k that I had left over from a different company I had owned previously.
May:
- 3 products arrived at the end of May.
- First few sales this month.
- Faced a legal issue with a different company wanting to sue me for the brand name. I hired a lawyer, and this was resolved with 3 hours of work.
- Revenue: €400
- Operational profits: ~€100
- Net profit: ~€-800 (mostly legal fees)
June:
Had to do a lot of work on my thesis.
- 4 more products arrived.
- Mainly focused on improving product pages.
- Had to package and deliver the packages to the post office myself.
- First real sales month but faced some problems such as the lack of my own car for package delivery and issues with the delivery company.
- My printer and PC broke down, resulting in extra costs.
- Revenue: €7958
- Operational profits: €3200 (keep in mind that this is quite high because I do not have to pay taxes on the first 20k in revenue)
- Net profit: €~1200 (bought a new PC and printer, also spent about €700 on advertising)
July:
- A terrible month overall.
- The website was down for over 20 days due to delivery problems.
- One of the products had a lot of returns, but plans were made to improve it because sales were good. (currently received the improved sample and not yet satisfied, however next sample should be good)
- Positive developments included setting up an email campaign, ordering a new product, and changing the delivery company.
- However, my computer fell and was damaged.
- Revenue: €5132
- Operational profit: €1600
- Net profit: €450 (new PC)
August:
- After the bad month of July, I hoped for a great month in August with delivery issues resolved.
- August started well with over 1k in sales on the 1st of August.
- Mid-August, I ran out of some products, and sales were generally lower due to vacation time.
- I secured an investment agreement with an investor who will provide funding of about 5k every 2 weeks, however he requires a lot of updates, almost weekly on sales, ROI, new product ideas etc. Every month he also expects about 8 excel pages with profit margins and a lot of other metrics. (still very happy with the funding)
- I really worked hard this month because there was no more college to worry about. Nearly evey morning from 4-12 AM i focused on product research and finding suitable suppliers. Starting at 4 AM works best because it is about 10 AM in china at the time, this is were most of my suppliers are based. This resulted in 5 new products and 2 new samples ordered.
- Made a great deal with someone in the same type of business who switched to a different niece.
- I rented an 18m3 garage for storage.
- I also made a deal with the investor to use his old car.
- Revenue: €14.980
- Operational profits: €2800 (lost my tax advantage)
- Net profit: €1500 (had to buy wood for the racks and advertising costs)
September so far:
- This month, I rented another unit, this time 30m3 for storage, and have been busy with building racks, doing product research, and improving product pages.
I probably forgot to mention a lot of things, so if you have any questions, please ask.
Goals: When I started this year, my
goal was to make 100k in revenue in the first year, but I challenged myself and changed it to 200k, despite having only about 4.5 months left in this year and achieving 30k thus far. The big plan is to aim for 1M in revenue in 2024, and I fully believe this is possible.
For the next 4.5 months, these are the revenue goals:
- September: 20k
- October: 35k
- November: 50k
- December: 65k
It may seem a bit impossible given the cash required and the delivery times, but I will try my best and find solutions to these problems.
Thank you for reading my maybe not-so-glorious but realistic e-commerce plan.
