Close your eyes for a minute and imagine me as a 13 year old growing up in Barbados…
Hang on! Open your eyes for a min.
Not the glamorous beaches and touristy part of Barbados, but rather the “if you’re not from this neighborhood, get out before dark!” part of Barbados.
Okay, so back to the story…
Me, 13 years old, times are tough. But I’m still having a sweet childhood. Getting older is fun, I have awesome friends, I enjoy my school, and I’m loving life.
However, I’ve been given some lambs as a gift, and I need to tend to them every morning before heading to school.
And after school every evening as well.
I had to rise early to clean their sheds, gather water, cut grass for storage, and lead them to the pasture where they would spend the day grazing.
And while my friends were out playing sports in the afternoons, I had to make time to bring these sheep home and get them settled in for the night.
Here’s the point I’m getting to: I raised those bad boys myself. Then I sold them after about a year.
The lambs weren’t expensive to take care of. They just required water and free grass (for the most part), but what I really had to put in was time.
Time.
Lots and lots of time.
But in exchange for that time, I had a nice little bankroll for my efforts. And I was barely into my teenage years.
So what do these black belly sheep have to do with anything?
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In my opinion, there are two different types of businesses you can create.
1.) Raising Black Belly Sheep:
This is a business designed to expand rapidly without requiring you to invest your own money each month. This business will grow with time (just like my sheep). It requires you to put in more time than money, but it will expand steadily for your efforts. Small initial investment required and then you work on it like a crazy person for a year! Local service businesses fit this bill.
2.) Building Rocket Ships:
Now this type of business requires a financial investment for growth. Water and free grass isn’t enough. Money is the growth engine. And the more customers you acquire, the more financing you need. Have you ever watched Shark Tank and you hear people say, “we have a big purchase order but we need cash to fund inventory?” That’s what this is. So you need to invest money BOTH on getting customers AND on the products you have to deliver to those customers. In this type of business, success can be painful (unless you already have a lot of cash laying around). Subscription boxes often fit this bill.
The Big Takeaways:
If I was creating a business for the first time, I would build a “black belly sheep” business first. Your risk of losing money is much lower and you’ll learn to prepare yourself for taking on bigger challenges later that require funding and more expertise. And there’s actually a lot of money to be made.
Want to learn from our process in real time? I’ve started a group where folks can follow along and watch everything we do as we build a black belly sheep type business.
Join us.
By the way, black belly sheep are seriously beautiful animals. They’re just incredibly stubborn.
Check us out on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1970700969819916/?source=create_flow
