Considering going independent in the midwest. Any advice on startup would be greatly appreciated.

Start small and don't go financing a bunch of stuff...it will be tight for awhile until you get your name out there.

and NEVER (and I do mean NEVER) underestimate the power of cold calling and door-to-door sales calls to local shops, businesses ETC ETC.

Call me 1st!!! 877-922-7488 x231 what state you ask agn he knows i know :)

What state and part?Maybe I can help.

What kind of area are you in? Alot of glass shops? Got a suitable vehicle and tools?

Going solo is a good thing.

Once you get over the hump of not having a paycheck the next week you start to relax and then it becomes alot of fun

I work near St. Loius, MO. Don't really want to say who for, because I still need a job.

Well do you work for me?

STL market = Garbage.. the only reason i am here is because I live here. STL is a junk market, especially when it comes to insurance.

nope not you

I totally support your decsion to go out on your on, but let me give you a free piece of advice. Quit working for someone else long before you do anything to build your own bussiness, if you don't you may be opening yourself to several promblems down the road

RGT :) then quit! :)

Crystal Clear
What kind of problems are you referring to?

Larry Quit 4 what?

How do you plan of marketing your business, I hope you're not going to join a lot of the other one man shops by looking for referals from the networks?

LAWSUITS
LAWSUITS
LAWSUITS
If you do the first bit of side work out of your boss' s van, and get caught either by your boss or your customer you will probably find yourself unemployed and getting sued. We live in society where you can sue anybody for anything, and that is the last reputation you want to start with.

I was not planning on using the networks, just alot of loyal customers.

Loyal customers to the shop you are currently working for? Nice!

I never said that

We just let one of our techs go, he worked for the company for over 10 years . I found he had been ordering glass off our account and putting it on will call and picking it up while on his hour lunch brake . I would have never caught this because he had been doing this for the last year but putting them on a cash ticket with the distributor. He just got greedy and forgot to pay for a $825 back glass.

I found this out when my sales rep. came by to go to lunch and he informed me that my account was over 120 days past due and they placed me on credit hold.


I handed him a check for $825 and told him to close my account I would be doing business else where. Any body that is going to knowingly sale glass to someone that is employed by me (and the rep did know this)and fail to call me and let me know is just as shady as the guy that committed the crime.
So RGT don't do this to you current employer it is punishable by law and it makes you look like bad and gives you and you new business a bad image starting out.

The best advice I can give you is to save up one years worth of your salary, then make a bussiness plan figure out how much its going to cost you just to get the phones on and your marketing, once you have all that sitting in your bank, then start chasing your dream do quality work for people in a timely manner. If you work hard and are really committed you might just might be able to scratch out a living one day
Remeber if it was easy every tech out there would have there own business.

AHAG I tell you what that is a **** poor distributor and i would encourgage you and others to not use them, they knew your employee had you down on the ground and was pounding your accounts.

AHAG,

That sucks bad. I definitley wouldn't do business with them again. What a shaft job. Just out of curiosity which distributor was it? Tell me in e-mail...I'm sure it wouldn't be allowed on the forum.

lol only would be allowed if I did it AGN :)

Yeah. You'd just have to assume one of your alias' and go after 'em.

LMFAO!!! You kill me agn, and for the record lol i am not astute biz person...

LMFAO funny that agn asked me if i was hahaha