About a month ago, I was contacted regarding donating to the Lil' Sistas Project. A father and his two kids had caught wind of my outreach program and wanted to help out. They wanted to donate. So they pulled their money together and reached me. I was so touched.
This week their father arrived in the Philippines.
Today their father came to meet with me.
What was anticipated to be a thirty minute or so meeting turned into a few hours and I left that meeting definitely grateful to be what I'm doing and so refreshed with just how supported I am. It's pretty awesome.
Earlier today, right before this meeting actually, I had a really big meeting with a potential investor. It was the investor I had mentioned the other day, the one who spontaniously bought one of my sample hoodies off me and who had asked me to email him my investor breakdown. Today we met up at The Refined, to talk about some finer details. He had four questions he wanted answered and he had given them to me in advance by means of one of my business mentors.
His four questions:
1. What is your salary?
2. What % does his investment get him?
3. How will I protect my company? (because it's currently not able and isn't legally in my name)
4. What happens to my clients if I were to get sick?
1. My salary... I hadn't actually put a salary for myself because right now my focus is making sure I build my company and pay all the bills so that I can maintain it. Later, of course I'd bring it in but at the start, all I want to do is launch my company's training facility. Do you know that when I made Hulk's Boxing in Korea, I didn't give myself or my business partner a salary for the first year and a half. At first, we only allowed ourselves to take $40-50 a week, to pay for things beyond the necessities, like groceries and rent. Then when we got that bad winter and had to replace the ring and buy new heaters, we dropped it down to $20.
2. His %.... well, that's kind of private. I think I offered him a fair evaluation of my company and what his investment would get him. I asked for a bigger investment today because the inital investment was just to covered rent for the year plus the two month security deposit. Of course there's other expenses, like electricity, association dues on the space, water, and daily expenses, but the money I'm making now and the clients I have now could easily cover that. I just need a security blanket and that blanket is enough money to cover us for one year of rent plus the deposit. I do however need money to buy more equipment and to decorate the place and so today I added an additional investment option.
3. Protection... I'm getting a power of attorney. I have 5 Filipinos listed on my company's legal papers because I'm not legally able to hold the company because I'm a foreigner. However, if things go south, I need to be protected. Me being protected means not only my business but also my investors are well protected.
4. If I'm sick... first and foremost, I never get sick and there's no knocking on wood for that. Having said that though, clients pay for monthly packages so if push comes to shove and I get sick, I can postpone the training sessions and make up the missed sessions in the month, no problem.
I'm optimistic about this particular investor and am hoping he will be the only investor I need because he's a very well educated business man and I appreciate him picking my brain about the business, making sure that we know our stuff. I know I have a great idea and already I'm making good money doing what I'm doing but I really need to launch my own private studio. I can't tell you how mentally frustrating it is right now, having to train my clients at other people's spaces.
No comments:
Post a Comment