When making the decision to start your business, it can be difficult to know the correct steps. Where do I begin? Is it to get trained to weld jewelry? Find a location to operate? As a solutions based company, the PJS mission is to help you, business owners, in every season of your permanent jewelry business. We hope to make it clear and simple!
The steps to start are :
- Form your business as a Legal Entity within your state and federal jurisdictions.
- Locate high quality, trustworthy suppliers
- Create a Business Outline
Become a Legal Entity
The requirements for becoming a registered business entity vary depending on the state you will be operating in as well as the type of entity you become. The most common types of entities are a Sole Proprietorship, Limited Liability Company (LLC), or a Corporation. We recommend doing research and consulting with experienced business owners, attorneys or accountants to help you understand what your best options are.
Once you have formed the business and registered with your state, you will file for an EIN, Employer Identification Number with the IRS. Obtaining the EIN for your business then allows for you to apply for a Wholesale License. Having a wholesale license can benefit you when purchasing inventory. Those benefits can vary depending on the supplier, however, it will typically allow access to better pricing, bulk buying benefits, and you will not have to pay tax on items that are intended for resale.
Find the Right Suppliers for You
The importance of finding the suppliers that are going to be more than just suppliers, but also partners with your business cannot be overstated. We recommend looking at 5 criteria when making decisions about your suppliers. The first is experience. Do they understand permanent jewelry? What experience do they have in the industry you are entering? The second is service. Do they have team members that you have access to? Will they consult with you and your business needs as you grow? Third is products. Can they supply you with the quality product your customers want? Will they inform you what is on trend? The fourth criteria is training. Can they train you in new ways with new products and methods? Finally, we recommend evaluating the price. Taking the aforementioned criteria into consideration, are they offering a fair and good price?
Create a Business Outline
Now that you have formed your business into a legal entity and have found suppliers that you can partner with, now it is time to put pen to paper. Your business outline or plan is to create a framework or a foundation as you begin and grow. It helps you think through the fundamentals for your business. It includes your business overview. Where will you be located? How will your customers experience you in the marketplace?
Perhaps the first question to be answered is how will you present your business to the market? More specifically, where will you operate? Will you meet your customers inside of a brick and mortar location that is permanent? This is a great option to provide consistency to your customers. You as the business owner have full control of when and how you show up. The potential downfall is to take on a lease and a more expensive rent. There is an option to partner with an existing retailer and sublease a small section of their storefront. This can greatly reduce your overhead, however, you do lose some autonomy. It is important to create a partnership that you can trust! Finally, will you be a traveling permanent jewelry business? This can provide great flexibility for you, and gets your business in front of customers that you perhaps were not going to cross paths with.
A mission statement is an action-based statement that declares the purpose of your organization and how you serve your customers. Without a mission statement, it will be difficult to differentiate you from your competitors. It will also help you determine your message and marketing strategy. Knowing your mission statement will help you answer questions like, “who is your target market?” And, “what message do you want to communicate to them?”
The business outline will also be where you determine how you will enter into the market. You will have to think about how to build your social media presence and brand image. Once people find out about your business, how will you get their information? How will you transition someone interested into a customer? Your marketing strategy is vital to the success of your business.
Finally, your business plan will inform your product and pricing strategy. Your target market will help you determine which type of products you will make available to your customers. What are the benefits of your product or service? A strong pricing strategy is more than just looking at products and pricing them what you think it is worth. If done well, a pricing strategy can make you more competitive, increase sales, and increase profits. All good things!
Now that you have all of this information on paper, you can now decide where the business will go by forming goals. First year goals will take some guesswork since there is no historical data to help you. Our suggestion is to break it down into sales you are hoping to create per month. Then as you are able to gather more data you can adjust them in future years.
At PJS, we know that there is not a perfect path or formula to create a successful business. It takes a lot of hard work and, sometimes, seemingly even more luck. However, we also believe that creating a strong foundation will allow you to build a business that will better weather every season you endure! Happy business building!!