My Journey, 21, Moved Country & Trying To Succeed! PT2

HELLO AGAIN! - Hope we are all well

On the previous part of our story I quickly explained a little bit of my business history. As you may tell business is something I've been hugely into from a younger age, 'you'll never get rich working for someone else' was a phrase regularly told to me. So during PT2 of our adventure I intend to get through my past to bring you up to date with what I'm doing at the moment, my methods of trying to get a business off the ground with not a lot of spare capital!

We left the story last episode was just after I got my first 'proper job' ... ERH! With rent to pay and for my car insurance etc it was necessary at the time to get a payed job that I could rely on the income, not like my detailing business that had gone super quiet through the winter months :(. I started work thanks to a good friend that managed to get me a job with him working in a hotel! As my first job I was pretty excited because the place was stunning, mainly serving weddings in its historic surroundings.

Not going to lie, at first I really enjoyed this new experience! I shortly got moved up to a full time member of staff and was earning good money. I tried to slowly bring back the detailing but with working all weekends it was near on impossible to book times where customers and I were both free! -nightmare! In the process I decided perhaps it wasn't going to work out, especially for the time being and I really needed a regular income.

SO, next step was to look into something I could do at the same time as working, so something that didn't depend on me being necessarily 'free' Me and my pal got together and had a bit of a plan talked about for a while, Simple as it gets buying and selling! We took a little from our months paychecks and started from this, scouring gumtree, eBay and other selling sites we had found. To begin we were buying really undervalued electronic items such as Iphones and tablets etc. The issue was we could only buy a few items at a time because of the sheer cost! We didn't have the money to be buying tonnes of stuff until we started making profits to re-invest. Slowly but surely we were getting somewhere, just by carefully working out our costs for shipping, collection etc we could work out exactly our profits each week. I must say for something that was this easy the money was not bad at all!

Soon as we had a fair bit in our 'pot' we looked at other things we could be buying and selling to make more of a mark-up. My partner and I were going to get all sorts, one of the best moments I remember was trying to fit a pit bike (small scrabbler motorbike) into a Vaxhaull Corsa... We did it and this was the nature of the business, just trying to make it work the best we could! I started looking into buying bulk items, such as a lot of phones or from where business malfunction and sell off all their items for cheap! However it became clear that we couldn't do this forever, especially not registered and it began to take toll when we became stuck with a few items (like we were literally trying anything... Even a lizard and cage the once) which got a bit silly.

Work was getting busier and busier with weddings in the evening and early starts and was soon doing near 100hr weeks (which I have no problem with when your getting payed for your time) but as I was now on a salary a monthly amount was set no matter how much I worked. There also began other problems and after about a year I wanted out. However it wasn't all bad as I met my gorgeous girlfriend here as she was working as part of her training in France. Yes she's French, and was working in the UK for her baccalaureate. Long story short we got together here and we both ended up leaving, she moved in with me and my parents for the time being and both got other jobs.

I decided a more structured company would be best for me, at least this way I would be getting payed properly!
HOW WRONG WAS I!? After moving out of my parents I really couldn't rely on if something sold meant I could pay the rent so I soon got a second job... wooo..

I was working splits at a restaurant and working at the local supermarket doing admin. I had no time what so ever to even try anything but I was earning a great amount. This only took me 6 months before I got fed up with this life... I hated it, The supermarket really wasn't my place, my colleagues were strange to say the least, all a little 'too' involved with their jobs and would ruin their lives making sure they were loyal to the company! infact one guy on his day off used to sometimes come in, For FREE, to help out the others... But then I guess if its what you enjoy crack on, but to me this was a little to much and I was expected to be the same?

After the 6 months of being a zombie I had really done enough. I wanted a new start but if I'm honest the business side of me had totally gone away, I hadn't thought about doing anything or even trying! But this was all to change. As my girlfriend hadn't been back to see her family for nearly a year and us definitely needing a break we booked to go for week ( as that's all the time we could get off, my GOD isn't work like a prison) to go stay with them in Annecy, France. It was while I was there, having a little relax and thinking time I randomly stumbled across a French selling site. Due to my fascination with cars I searched for some bits for my current BMW E28

With looking on the site and having a rummage about It was shocking to notice something, my eureka moment! With good knowledge on old car parts and aftermarket upgrades back in the 90's (my brains a little weird) I could clearly see the price difference. For example my car in the picture in the UK would be worth £5-6K but on the site you could get better examples for half the price... OSHHHH For a car head its pretty mind blowing! I quickly had a huge flash and imagined what I could do with this potential, hopefully my long term dream....

This see us nearly to where I am today but before I blur your eyes with too much text It will be in the next update! The large scale ideas and trying to make them work from a 20yr olds pockets...

Wish me luck!

Samuel Cole