How I Started My Small Business With No Money

by Stacey Carroll, Contributing Writer

There are numerous ways to start and run a business. Some ways cost more than others. For my own business, I had no budget and no money. This meant that I had to be very creative when it came to start up costs.

No Outside Office

While I would love my own office in an office building, typical rates for a small office in my area are $18 a square foot. That's $5400 dollars a month for office space not including furniture or equipment. Instead of renting an office, I looked at my living room, rearranged the furniture, took the dining room table out to the storage closet, and made due with the space I had in my home.

No Employees

I am my only employee at the moment. That doesn't mean I won't need an employee in the future, but until I have more income than I need and more work than I can handle, I don't need an employee. The lack of an employee saves me $290 dollars a month at minimum wage, not counting the employment taxes I would spend if I hired an employee.

Office Furniture

When I decided to start my business, I had one computer desk and my computer took up the entire desk. I went out and bought another small computer desk for $40 dollars so that I would have a place to spread out and organize my papers.

Backup Computer

Six months into my business, I realized that I need a new computer, but instead of buying a new computer at a retail store, I enlisted the help of my father who can build computers. Instead of spending $600 on a new computer, he built me one for $200 which is a savings of $400.

Existing Website

Prior to starting my business, I had a website, domain name, and hosting account that wasn't doing anything productive. In fact, I had barely set the pages up. Upon starting my business, I took the existing website and changed it to meet my business needs.

In the first six months of my new business, I spent exactly $240 dollars. Since I earned more than that, my business was profitable already. It's entirely due to the fact that I decided on a home office with my existing furniture and no employees other than myself. By doing those things, I have saved myself thousands of dollars in start up costs.

Author Bio:

Stacey Carroll is the author of the thriller series - Avia.  She also authors the paranormal erotica series - The Blooddoll Factory. Stacey grew up in Indianapolis, Indiana. she went to college at Indiana State University (ISU) and graduated with a Bachelor's degree in aerospace in the professional pilot program. She has flown Cessna 152s, Cessna 172s, the Pipe Seneca and the King Air. She also graduated with a minor in computer science that specialized in web design.

She has always been interested in reading and writing, and the first book she was ever read was the Grimms Brother's Fairy tales. From the ages of 6 to 11, she read the Nancy Drew series. By the age of 11, she had graduated to Stephen King novels. A few of her favorites include Carrie, Tommyknockers, The Dark Tower Series up to book 3 (That's where it stopped in the late 80s/ early 90s), Pet Semetary, The Shining, Night Shift, The Stand, It, Cujo, Christine, The Eyes of the Dragon and Thinner (Richard Bachman). In her teen years, she moved on to Anne Rice and got through about four of those books before they degraded. If you've ever read Anne Rice, you know book 5 isn't readable. Stacey has read a couple Harry Potter books as she was introduced to them in the early 2000s, and she's never read or watched anything Twilight or 50 Shades. Sorry. I'm a vampire purist, and nothing needs to be said about the latter. You already know.

She is currently an author and freelance writer. She received an honorable mention in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine in 2008 for a short story entitled The Field. In 2014, she was published in 13 Stories by Us by MacKenzie Publishing.

Other books by Stacey

• AVIA II
• AVIA Memories

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