The Spiritual Path is Relaxing in the Midst of Chaos
I’m in the middle of renovating the store whilst my bank account flirts with $0.
It sometimes feels as though each day there’s a new fire to put out. This time the fire is financial. I finally passed all the inspections but getting the store open to the public is going to require $12–$15k. I was down to the last $2k and had to ask my brother for yet another check.
Now I have $7k and the first set of renovations is going to cost $5k. I’ll be back down to $2k in a couple of weeks. The worst part is sales have plateaued and are slightly down.
The hole I’m digging is big. I still have to pay rent, and I still have to have money in the bank to hire an employee. And without an employee, I really can’t ramp up sales. It’s a catch-22. One that could be solved with some cash.
Improving sales before the store is open is asking for trouble. I’m already stretched too thin. I’ve spent a ton of time at the store, waiting for inspectors, or contractors, or utility companies, which in turn causes me to have to juggle delivery times. Not good for the company’s reputation with customers. There are times I have no choice, and I don’t want those times to increase to the point where every delivery is at risk of being late.
The path forward is obvious. Open the store as soon as possible and hire someone to work there while I run deliveries. Even then I’m not sure what that would look like. My deliveries are scattered throughout the day right now. I would have to change the delivery times so that I could be there to man the store at certain times.
I have to figure this out. When does the store open and close? Who’s there at what times? The goal is to eventually have the store be open from 7 am to 7 pm, but that goal is a long way away. At the beginning I can only afford one employee for about 20 hours a week.
I have to focus on the task at hand, which is raising enough capital to be able to open the store in the first place. That is the most immediate concern. I’m going to fill out a couple of loan applications and also approach some friends and family for loans.
No matter what this train is not stopping.
This story is part of a series documenting the journey of a Dallas startup called Feather Laundry. For your reference here is the Table of Contents for the series.
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