Major highs and lows…is it worth it?
Self-employment equals crazy! That’s basically how I can sum it up. You get major highs and major lows, I’m yet to have a steady period where I know what to expect and I can coast along merrily, secure in the knowledge that business is coming in regularly.
The truth is, when you are the only person in the business, you are everything to the business and everything you do is for the business. There isn’t someone who will tell you what your next task is…there’s no boss! There isn’t a person who can deal with admin tasks for you, unless you can afford to pay for that service (uMF can’t…yet). There isn’t a cleaner who will make sure the office or workshop is clean and fresh for you starting a day’s work. There isn’t a person who will package products that you’ve made and then take them out to be posted. There’s no accountant, no social media guru, no web guru, no photographer, no sales team, no pricing expert…you get the picture; you are the business.
I suppose I’m writing this as it has been a very busy few months and there has been a lot of contemplating over whether I’ve been a busy fool or not. In the first week of January I updated my accounts for my tax return, although it actually revealed that sales were up significantly, the spend was also up significantly year on year – this basically meant that uMF was breaking even. This was one of the lows I mentioned earlier…and wow was this a low.
I felt like I had reached a crossroads where I either decide to continue with uMF in blind faith or I pursue a career back in Teaching. The attraction of having a regular wage of the same amount each month has been a strong pull, that and the fact that I am actually still passionate about education, and leaving Teaching was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.
The timing was perfect however, of this low point, as I was just about to begin two weeks supply teaching that I had signed up for prior to Christmas knowing from last year that January can be a long, slow and quiet month. This would surely help me decide what to do. Well…it didn’t. After leaving teaching back in July 2017 it felt like an age since I’d been in the classroom. Not only did I feel like I had lost the ability to hold the attention of twenty something teenagers; but my immune system had forgotten how do deal with all the germs that fly around schools…so I was ill…again! But as you can’t really get a supply teacher to cover the supply teacher I decided to work through it and no doubt probably pass my germs onto everyone there. I also found it amazing that by simply being a supply teacher, and not a permanent fixture in the school, it meant that respect from pupils was severely diminished…something I’m not used to. So I found it tough.
After my first day back teaching I rushed home and proceeded to work out the uMF accounts for the current year in order to try to claw back some hope for the future of the business. Although the figures aren’t amazing, they’re a vast improvement on the previous year and I can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Less spend and more sales in the last nine months compared to the previous 12 means that I must be doing something right.
Also encouraging is that, for two months of the last nine, uMF did virtually nothing due to the relocation for both the business and personally. This also meant the virtual loss of the network I had built up in my previous local area meaning I have a job on my hands to build it up in my new location. I had also stopped selling in a retail space which was virtually passive income. So taking all of these obstacles into consideration I can definitely say the business is moving in the right direction.
It is also amazing how your mindset can change on the back of getting some good news and you start to see the positives. I soon realised that I’m not alone in this. First and foremost I have an amazing and supportive wife who is always there to step in, take some of the strain by undertaking some of the jobs I don’t have time for. She encourages me and believes in me and the business. She also ran her own extremely successful business so is in a position to give me excellent advice and gives me very honest and objective opinions on things I’m doing. To be honest I don’t think uMF would exist without her.
Then there are people I’ve met at business networking groups who have become friends. They each have skill sets in areas such as accounting, insurance, finance, marketing, IT, business coaching etc. that I can call on for free advice and some of them buy from uMF regularly too.
Then there are the friends and family who buy products from uMF without scoffing at prices. Other friends share uMF social media posts, comment on them and selflessly push me forward endorsing uMF whenever they get the opportunity.
Then there are the clients, uMF has some amazing clients! I genuinely get excited when messages or emails come through from people asking for weird and wonderful items that challenge me creatively as these always end up being the projects I am most proud of. Client feedback is also massively important and valued. Having a client get overwhelmed emotionally because of a product I have made is the biggest compliment I can ask for and when this happens anything negative or draining is forgotten about and everything seems worthwhile. Initially, and insanely, I was too afraid to activate the review function on the Facebook page for fear of any negative comments. I eventually decided that this was doing more harm than good so I turned them on, this turned out to be an excellent decision and I’m really proud of the results.
In reality it is very hard, I do feel like I’m in a very solitary situation sometimes, I feel pressure to make the business a success, and seem to subconsciously put pressure on myself to do it alone without help, I cannot see the wood for the trees at times and the lure of a full time teaching position is very strong. However, nothing worth doing is easy, the darkest hour is just before the dawn, insert another clichéd quote here etc. I suppose I’m saying that although it is tough I do believe it will be worth it in the end and I also believe that when you feel like giving up on something you’re probably just about to make a major breakthrough.
So…why do I do this?
Because I don’t give up and I haven’t seen this idea through yet. I know I can work harder, there are more businesses and creative individuals to collaborate with and there are so many avenues that uMF is yet to explore. The main reason I’m doing this are the people involved, as mentioned earlier; my wife, family, friends and my amazing customers. I’m doing this to have an impact and to make people happy through the products I make. So uMF isn’t done yet, it’s just getting started!
Normal posts will resume from now on, thanks for reading and thank you for your support.
