- feel I may be losing battle with a cold #
- stomach flu or food poisoning – what’s the diff? it all evens out in the bottom line. #
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Day: March 4, 2008
In Part 1 we discussed Stephanie’s background, and what led her to start her new company. In this final part we discuss the money and what Stephanie’s measure of success is, relating to finances.
Howard: Did you have to raise capital to run the event?
Stephanie: The company isn’t incorporated, so from a legal perspective I’m doing this event under my own name. In Switzerland that’s how it works. I’m looking into the incorporation, but I want to make sure the first event is successful before I do the administrative work to set up the company. There was no initial capital. The event should be self-financing, with attendee payments and sponsorship paying for it. That’s why I have some aggressive early bird pricing.
Howard: Are you paying yourself?
Stephanie: My objective is to pay myself, but the first ambition is that the event doesn’t lose any money. Hopefully I’ll make enough profit to pay myself.
Howard: Did you take time to budget the event?
Stephanie: Yes, I have spreadsheets but I was a bit naive about cash flow when I started. You can do a what’s coming in, what’s coming out, and hope the total of revenue is greater than expense. Or you can add a time component to the budget and you have a week-by-week vision of what’s coming in and what’s going out, to ensure that by, say, week 5, you’ll have enough money in the bank or incoming to be able to pay out at the end of week 5. This was something I hadn’t though about previously.
This Entrepreneur Starts Her Business…With an Event About Starting a Business…
Stephanie Booth is a blogger, freelance Internet consultant and a new entrepreneur who is starting a conference business. Her first conference is for other freelance workers in the web and technology space and it focuses on the essentials of running a business. And Stephanie herself is learning these essentials in real-time as she prepares for the event.
(We also recorded this discussion. It will be published shortly at A Chat and A Song (Episode 18). I’ll change the link when it’s ready UPDATED: Direct link to episode 18 as an mp3 or click on that icon and listen to it in this page).
Howard: I know you have quite an interesting and varied background. Tell me more about how you got here.
Stephanie: I’ve been online for quite sometime, and blogging since 2000, and I primarily describe myself as a blogger and someone who understands the Internet. I studied Chemistry, Philosophy, French, Indian Religions, then worked as a project manager, a schoolteacher, and then up until recently I was a freelance consultant. My new business is called “Going Far” and it’s a media company. I organize events. I’ve been to many conferences, and I complain too often – the WiFi is bad, there’s no bottled water, the sessions aren’t interesting. A friend suggested that I could put on better events.
Howard: You complain at events. What will you do when people complain at yours?
Stephanie: I will probably crawl under the table embarrassed. I’ve realized it is a lot of work, and things are more complicated than they seem.
Howard: What things are more complex than expected?