New Year Resolution

I know a lot of people aren’t fans of New Year resolutions, but I am. It’s a good time to reflect and set yourself up for success. Now at risk of sounding like a self-help guru, I want to lay out my resolution for 2016. It’s pretty simple:

Sell coffee to someone.

This is how I plan to do it.

Stage 1: Company set up. I have already submitted my request to the state to have my LLC created. Once that is finalized, I am going to get my food handlers card, roughly $30 and an afternoon taking a test. Lastly I will register as a home baker. In Arizona, you have to register to sell direct to consumers. I won’t be able to sell to re-sellers, but I can get out into my first event.

Stage 2: Hopefully setting up my business won’t take forever. I would like to have all this done by March, but it really depends on the state. In the mean time I am going to start purchasing supplies. I found a website that sells cups and lids in batches of 50 rather than 1000. Sure they cost a bit more per cup, but the upfront cost to me will be less. Also, where am I supposed to store a case of cups, lids, and sleeves in my house? I plan to purchase a few sleeves of each over the next few months. That will keep the impact on my family’s wallet low.

Stage 3: buying the coffee. This is the kicker. I will need to either buy some coffee from eBay or try to get my wife to agree with buying a giant bag from Olam. The problem with eBay is that it ends up being quite a bit more expensive and you can’t guarantee the quality. Olam sends samples and I can make sure the coffee is good before purchasing 150lbs. The down side is that will cost me about $550 with shipping.

Final Stage: Attend First Friday in October. I’ve mentioned First Friday in some of my previous posts. It’s an interesting scene. My goal with the first event will be to see if I can even make this work. If I get close to breaking even, then I will attend through the winter season. Coffee is a tough business in the summer and I don’t have iced coffee figured out yet. If I am successful enough, I will figure out iced coffee and keep chugging along.

Wish me luck.