My carefully worked out budget has been completely thrashed.
Every quarter or so, there is a fifth shipping Wednesday. Theoretically, I should be able to take the three months worth of orders and divide them by 13 weeks to get a weekly average.
But the orders have come in at least 20% higher than that supposed average. I had left out the unfortunate fact that the publishers tend to hold back on product until just before summer.
My bad.
Sales are down this month, as well. The street closures have had even more negative impact than usual, for some reason. So this will be a third month in a row with sales below last year, which by my reckoning is a trend.
It's not a question of losing money -- it's a question of not making as MUCH money as I'd hoped.
Back to the drawing board.
It's a valuable lesson -- once again, I need to factor in the 'worst' case scenario. That I won't get an "average" level of product, that I can't count on beating last year each and every month.
It doesn't really change a thing. Well, I am changing my estimate for the next quarter to take into account the lower sales and the higher weekly estimates. But basically, the strategy stays the same. Ironically, the strategy for making a profit and not losing money are exactly the same.
So I just need to pick myself up, dust myself off, and start all over again.
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2 comments:
'The Distinction' ... well as HBM and HOMER and et-al have said many a time, Bend is about turning 'great fortunes' into 'small fortunes'. The 'distinction' seems to be that an endless supply of kept-women keep arriving with daddy-warbucks in tow to dump their life-savings into Bend.
"But where are the old established biz the child asks??" Shsssh move along, .. High turnover fresh faces and the 2-3 year old biz quietly files chapter 9,11, 13, ... and great fortunes become small. Someday somebody will write a book about this phenomenon of Bend. All you ever hear of the BULL or SORE is the new & fresh, ... maybe somebody ought to talk about the death of biz and the hardship that having a biz in Bend and the downtown triple-net-lease, ... how its an anchor around so many folks neck who have actually survived here for more than 5 years.
No doubt that Bend continues with COVA, CORA, COBA to lure new sheep to be sheered by those that OWN this town.
But where are the small proprietor's yachts?? Where do all these dead folk go when they lose all in Bend? USA is about winning, and losers are never mentioned or cared about, ... only winners, trouble is there are no winners in Bend, just new fresh faces headed for the gallows, and the BULL&SORE continues to paint them as winners.
Some of the downtown businesses probably are hobby businesses run by rich men's wives looking for something to do, but I don't think this is as common as it was back in the old days when you really COULDN'T make any money with a shop downtown.
The other reason for having a small business that doesn't make money, of course, is to be able to run your personal expenses through it to make them deductible. This is the practical aspect of many hobby businesses.
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