Owner Of A Business That Sells Surfing Products
Career review from a person working in the job
How I Got The Job
My Education: BA in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley.
My Prior Experience: I worked as a construction project manager.
My Job Profile
My Company: I work at a retail store that sells surfing products in San Diego.
Job/Career Overview: Since I am the business owner, my main responsibilities are paying all the bills and making sure we are paid in full on all accounts. I also am in charge of all inventory and of ordering more product when we run low. Lastly, I make sure the shop floor runs smoothly by scheduling employees and supervising them.
I usually start the day by paying any bills that are due. Then I go over the receipts from the day before to see if we are running low on any products. Then from there I usually just stay behind the counter and help ring up sales.
The less obvious stuff I need to watch for are all the small business forms and taxes that need to be paid. There is sales tax, payroll tax, and personal taxes that all need to be taken care of. Plus the business has licenses that need to be renewed to remain current.
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Love It? Hate It?
I rate this career 8 out of 10.
What I Love or Hate
As a small business owner, the worse part of my career is having to worry about every little thing, especially sales. There is a lot of stress involved with sales because if you don't make enough for the month, then you can't pay your bills. So I often live month to month without knowing if I will be able to pay my staff or myself. This stress can really take a toll after a while if there is a string of bad months.
My Career Tips
1) Make sure you have enough cash resources to pay all your bills for at least 6 months in case there is a bad sales trend.
2) Make sure to do enough research on the business you are opening and the market for your products to be able to better sell your products to customers.
3) Make sure you have good advertising and sales personnel to make sales more consistent since a bad string of sales can almost shut down your business.
