Real Life Story: “The answer is still No”
This is my true story and I’m sorry, it’s not very encouraging. In spite of everything I have just said about preparing a great Business Plan, you still may not get the financing you want.
In the early 2000’s during the infamous Dotcom bubble, my partner and I decided to launch an e-commerce venture that was essentially a virtual distribution business for computer products. We consolidated product information from various sources in a database and then developed an online catalogue application for computer retailers with all the products showing comparative pricing available from alternative sources. We also offered the retailers a customized storefront where they could present the same products to their customers at marked-up prices.
It may sound pretty boring now, but this was in the early days of e-commerce and online shopping. We got rave reviews from the computer distributors and retailers, “Wow! How did you do that?” Lots of users and sponsors signed up. But it was going to be costly to develop and support and we were not generating much revenue – so it was time to prepare a Business Plan and get the million dollar financing we needed to conquer the world.
We did the research and prepared the documents and financial projections to support a multi-million dollar valuation and started knocking on doors. Again we got rave reviews. “Great product, great Business Plan, etc., etc.”
Everything looked good for us: two experienced entrepreneurs with prior business success in the same industry; a proven business model with early customers in place; a realistic plan to build and grow the business; and reasonable projections to deliver a very high return on investment.
But the answer was still – “NO!”
Everyone had a different reason not to invest in us, but they all concluded with “Good luck and goodbye”. So we finally concluded ourselves that it was time to let it go and cut our losses. Like many other Dotcoms we went back to pursuing other career and business options.
It may happen to you. Don’t be discouraged.
It’s just time to listen to the lessons learned and come up with a new plan. You may not have to change your goals, just the route for getting there.
(Note: In all these Real life Stories, the names and business details have been changed to protect the actual subjects of each story.)
Your Uncle Ralph, Del Chatterson
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