Face it, money helps just about anything or any situation be better. Lack of money
makes just about everything worse and less tolerable. I’ve been
rich and I’ve been poor. Trust me, rich is a whole lot better!
So, I put my brain power to figuring out how I could make the most amount of
money doing something that I loved. I’m not ashamed of that, and
you shouldn’t be either. When someone starts spouting that
propaganda about being in it “for the love of the dogs”, just
picture a flashing sign on their forehead saying “I don’t know how
to run a business, so I make ridiculous excuses”.
And another
thing, I’m not just talking about being wealthy financially, I’m
talking about having a rich life all around. I’m talking about
having more time to spend with your family and loved ones, or on
your hobbies and passions. About taking back your life and owning
your business, not your business owning you anymore.
Most business owners just own their own job- and they are a slave to it. When
they are not physically there, they’re thinking about it, worrying
about it, dreaming about it when they sleep, tossing and turning and
having nightmares over it seven days a week. If this sounds
familiar, you’ve come to the right place.
I know that scenario all too well because I lived it myself once upon a long
time ago. I was young and all I knew about business I learned from
my parents. I tried to make it out on my own,
away from the family business. You know- prove to my
parents that I could do it.
My new business
consumed me. It controlled my life. The grooming business that I
loved, had turned into a nightmare that I struggled with and worried
about non-stop. Have you heard the saying “Do
what you love and the money will follow”? That is SO not true if
you don’t have the knowledge and skills it takes to make it
profitable. I didn’t have the knowledge or the skills I needed. It
got to the point where I was getting physically ill stressing over
how to make my grooming business succeed.
I struggled
some more. I tried everything I knew. I refused to tell my parents
how bad it really was. I was ashamed and embarrassed. But I was
determined and had the tenacity of a bulldog. I knew I needed to increase my money making skills no matter
what it took.
I listened to
all the so called “experts” in the grooming industry. I hung on
their every word as if it was the gospel. What I didn’t know at the
time was that they didn’t know what they were doing any more than I
did! They just knew some of the popular buzz words to say like
“Guerilla Marketing” and “U.S.P” (Unique Selling Proposition), so
they sounded like they knew what they were talking about. (Yes, I
know I’m dating myself. For you youngsters, that was back in the
early 70’s.)
What I’ve seen
in this industry is that
almost
And here’s why:
In this industry we have a genuine case of the blind leading the
blind. People think that being a good groomer makes you a good
business person, so they listen to the people who are good
groomers! Think about that. It isn’t logical, or smart.
Mark Victor
Hansen, the co-author of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, said
to me recently that the difference between wealthy people and
non-wealthy people is the way they think. You can’t think like a
groomer and make it in business. Yet, that is exactly what most
groomers do and that’s why most of them struggle just to get by.
What do I mean
by “thinking like a groomer”? Most groomers think the way to be a
successful groomer is to first become the best groomer they can be,
buy the fanciest scissors and equipment they can afford, find out
what the competition is doing and undercut their prices, bond with
all the customers to create loyalty and they will tell all their
friends about you. And then everyone lives happily ever after,
right?
DEAD WRONG!
This is the fast track to become the worn out, stressed out, barely
scraping by, slave to their “job” (the business owns them), groomer
that is touting how “they’re in it for the love of the dogs”.
How do I know
all this? Because that was me! I was that burnt out, stressed out,
barely scraping by, person who was beginning to hate what I was
doing. I kept looking for a way to make the business work like a
business, not a hobby.
Fortunately, I
finally met an older gentleman who became my mentor, but he was NOT
in the pet business. He just knew solid business principles that
you can apply to ANY business. Since I was tired of struggling and he made
so much more sense than anyone I’d ever heard, I decided I had
nothing to lose by doing what he told me. The next thing I knew, my
business took off like a rocket!
With my
mentor’s encouragement, I ended up becoming a student of all types
of business and industries. It fascinated me to realize that
basic business success principals can be applied to any industry
once you know what they are. I began applying these secrets to
the pet industry and the business exploded.
Next, I met the
"love of my life". We got married and ended up moving all over
the world because we both had a bit of
wanderlust in us. Once I learned the secrets to pet grooming
success, I loved it because I was able to purchase many
failing grooming businesses just to turn them around in six short
months. Later, we'd move to the other side of the country or a
different country altogether, and I'd start all over again.
Some of them
I started from scratch, but most of them were a sorry lot when I
bought them. Once they were thriving, I would sell them and move on
to my next “project”. I loved the adventure and challenge of
it all. On each new business, I would experiment with new ways
to get new customers faster and faster.
I got it down
to a science so that I could pick up a grooming business with a
horrible reputation for pennies and turn it into a self propelled
cash machine within six months. I even created my
own “operating manual” detailing exactly what to do to turn a
business around quickly. It became sort of a hobby for me along
with several other business ventures until I retired a few years
ago. So, enough about me.
Let's see what we can do to help YOU become the success you were
born to be!
To your success,
Mr. E
