A ""HOME BUSINESS"" BUSINESS

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IT PAYS TO ADVERTISE!)

by Don Vandeventer

Promoting other people's bootstrap efforts can be profitable for both them and you!

A few years back, my friend Paula Vineyard and I decided to venture to our own home busi ness. When we looked into advertising the product we hoped to sell, though, my partner and I were amazed at the high costs involved. Expensive radio or television commercials were out of the question for us. So we checked into the possibility of a Yellow Pages listing . . . and discovered that (in our area, at least) the cost for the smallest entry was about $45 per month. One last bastion of hope was the community's daily newspaper. We investigated that avenue and sadly found that a 1 "X 2" display ad cost $14 for each insertion.

At that price it wouldn't take very long to deplete our entire advertising budget! In desperation, Paula and I did the only thing we could. We printed business cards, and left them posted on bulletin boards throughout the area. Then we resigned ourselves to sitting back and crossing our fingers . . . hoping our customers would manage to find us.

SOLVING THE HOME BUSINESS DILEMMA

Sadly, during the winter of 1981-1982 our sales reached a dangerously low level, and we had to fold. My partner and I closed our endeavor on Friday, February 19, 1982 with exactly $14.60 in the company checking account. We had no jobs or business prospects. The future looked bleak.

Paula and I began brainstorming for new ideas almost immediately. Yet every enterprise we thought of seemed doomed to failure because of high start-up and promotional costs. It was then that we began to visualize a home business directory. After all, we had learned (the hard way) that most self-run enterprises simply cannot afford conventional advertising. So, we asked ourselves, why not come up with an effective solution to that problem . . . and capitalize on it?

We phoned our self-employed friends and acquaintances and asked whether they'd be interested in participating in a directory of home-based businesses. Almost everyone we talked with was enthusiastic about the project, so Paula and I sunk our last $14.60 in a small classified advertisement for the local newspaper to seek out other potential advertisers ... and raced forward from there.

Well, it's been more than a year now since we printed and distributed our first Home Business Directory. In that time we've produced several such guides-covering four counties in northern Illinois -and are both making full-time incomes from our endeavor!

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