My Business Lifecycle

Have you ever wondered what it's really like to run a cake business? In today's episode, I'm answering a beautiful and fascinating question from one of the podcast listeners. She wanted to know what kept me in my business for ten years, why I continued with it, and why I decided that it was time to end it. She also asked me about what the process of ending the business entailed. This was really interesting for me because I've never talked about what it was like to run my business before, nor about the life-cycle of the business and how it all went down. So listen in! I really hope that you will be inspired by this topic!

My business was called Three Sweeties and I really loved it! People kept telling me that the things I made were really amazing and I would make a fortune selling them. So I started my business from home, part-time and completely illegally, because even though I had a bit knowledge about food safety and things like having to register my kitchen, from being a chef, I was still totally clueless about how to actually run a business. So although I was unbelievably excited to start the business, I was unsure about its future and where it was going. And I did some really silly things in the beginning, but I learned a lot as I went on. Tune in today, to get my personal account of what life was like for me throughout the life cycle of my business. 

Show Highlights:

• Coming to realize that I didn't want to work from home and renting a commercial kitchen, not too far from where I lived. 
• Getting things legal.
• I was figuring things out as I went along.
• Anytime anybody asked me for anything I just blurted stuff out and hoped for the best.
• Moving to the next stage of the business where I was cheffing a lot less.
• I started to get clear about wanting to grow the business and what I needed, for that to happen.
• I became clear about what the business was, and also that I would want to sell it one day.
• I became really clear about the products I wanted to make.
• The point at which I grew out of the commercial kitchen.
• The final stage, before selling the business, was moving to a storefront, or a cake studio, where people could walk in.
• I gave up cheffing completely when I moved to the storefront.
• Moving to the storefront allowed me to start teaching, and explore a whole lot of other business opportunities.
• How the move to the storefront really skyrocketed my business.
• About my $100, three-hour How To Run A Cake Business class.
• Why I wanted to sell the business by the time I turned forty.
• I decided to become a salaried blogger for six months, to see if it would work out. 
• I left the business when things were going well but not brilliantly.
• Some interesting things that happened in the life-cycle of that business.
• Why I stuck with the business for ten years.
• It was very hard to fight the intellectual excitement that I got from the blog.
• The industry started to get really crowded.
• I started having intrusive thoughts about the business.
• It was really hard to leave Three Sweeties.

Links:

Podcast mentioned: Invisibilia (The Secret History of Thoughts) https://www.npr.org/programs/invisibilia/375927143/the-secret-history-of-thoughts

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