I really think that business has been embedded in me and my siblings brain at a very young age. As long as I could remember, we always have a store. The earliest memory that I have was stacking one peso coins in our store while my mom clean fishes. Back then we sell fishes, meats, vegetables, fruits and groceries. Basically it was a small market or as we Filipinos call, 'talipapa'. What really stuck to me was the adrenaline you get from rush hours as one customer from another give orders nonstop. It was a total chaos but my mom handles it with ease and a smile on her face while having casual talks with her customers. I really admire her because of that! And at the age of three my favorite play was putting up a story and selling goods to my stuff toys.
Image source: https://www.pinterest.ph/pin/266697609171946051/
My very first business was when I was in second grade. Though I was more of an employee in here. My older brother who was in fifth grade talked me into selling stickers with my classmates. One day we bought this metallic sticker sheets that were famous that time. We cut it into pieces and my brother came up with the prices for each depending on the sticker's size. I sold every sticker I had the next day even before our first period started. I think I tripled our capital that time and my brother was on the roof that he made me sell stickers everyday. I didn't get any salary from selling the stickers. I was happy that I could sell the stickers at all. And by then, I didn't care about money. When I came into senses, years after I realized my brother was swindling me. It ended because I got tired of selling and wanted to play more.
The second business came the summer of third grade. As I've mentioned above we have a store. And that summer I came to discover animes. There's this anime I watched were the character loves grilled sweet potato (I dont remember exactly but I think it was Ranma 1/2 but it was long ago so I might be wrong.) So I would steal sweet potatoes from my mom's store and grill them on a vacant lot next to our house. My friends wanted to try them but I told they need to buy it from me. Though it wasn't money that they use, mostly I ask them to dance, sing or barter something in return. And soon it wasn't only sweet potatoes I was grilling, I also stole some other things in our store. It ended when my mom found the smoke from the vacant lot one time she went home during lunch. My mom was fuming red but my dad laughed it off saying I inherited my mom's brain.
I'd say I really dont have a monetary view back then because my siblings and I were raised not to ask money unless it was an emergency. And all the things I needed were always provided. And so my third business was a lesson for me on how to earn money and manage it. It was the summer of fifth grade and I was totally bored. My cousin who was the same age as I got into a fight and she wouldn't let me borrow her nintendo. I was furious so I asked my mom to buy me one. But my mom is a frugal woman, we hardly have toys because she says we have the streets to entertain us. And instead of giving me money, she gave me a small store on our new apartment. On the first day, she provided me with vegetables, fruits and groceries then taught me about the prices of the goods. I was up to the challenge and was happy about it. I was ecstatic to sell all the vegetables and fruits in one day.
By night time, I came running to my mom and told her I have so much money. But she told me that it wasn't enough to buy me a nintendo. She told me that I needed to sell more vegetables and fruits. I told her okay and to provide me more in the morning. And the woman was playing tricks on me, she said she wouldn't do that anymore. She told me that I needed to buy the goods from her and that I also need to pay back the amount of goods she lend to me.
I was crying in bed that night because I only earned about fifty pesos. And I did the math and I would probably spend the whole summer selling vegetables and fruits before I could get the nintendo. I was frustrated and hopeless yet in the morning, I still opened my store.
As expected, I spent the whole summer with my store. I couldn't remember how much I earned but when I gave it to my mom she said it was still not enough. She told me she would hide it for safe keeping since I now have my school and wouldn't be able to tend to my store. I forgot about the money when I came back to school and when I rembered about it, she said why would I be asking for it since the money was spent on my needs. (My eyes are rolling now since I remembered it.)
Later I found out from my cousin that I have enough money for the nintendo and my mom just swindled me like my brother. When summer came and my mom asked me if I wanted to open a store, I refused. (Not going to be fooled twice, right?)
Image Source: https://pixabay.com/photos/typewriter-vintage-old-1248088/
The concept of money only came to me when I was in high school. When I started wanting to dress up. I acquired a sudden taste for shoes and bags. And in order to keep up with my wants, I came with the easiest way to earn money. I get paid by doing assignments and projects of my schoolmates. In order not to get caught by my teachers, I only accept clients from other sections and lower years. And also, I only accept works that can be done during free periods because I couldn't take it home unless it was a weekend.
It was a good business actually. I could whip a three hundred words essay in ten minutes and do maths in between classes. I was earning five-hundred to one-thousand pesos in a week. The drawing plates and power point presentations were not even included in that.
I was proud of myself back then. I was thinking it was too easy. The business goes on until I graduated high school.
When I was in college, I was not thinking of continuing my underground business. But when one of my friend failed trigonometry the second time, I offered him a help. I told him if he could text me during his midterm, I would help him. So during exam we used chika text to communicate. It was a free text messaging site/app back then. Data usage wasn't really popular that time. And so my friend would text the math problem to me and I would text him back the answer and solution.
He was able to ace the exam and pass trigonometry. The incident traveled to our circle of friends and one schoolmate asked me if I could help him too. I refused him because I could be expelled when someone leak it out. But the guy was persistent and wouldn't leave me alone and he would even follow me home.
He cried to me saying it was his third time taking differential calculus and if he won't pass it he need to shift in another course. He told me he would pay me if I do it. I was blinded with money and so I accepted the offer. (Don't judge. I don't really get allowance from my mom aside from fare money.)
The heist was followed by many more after that. But it was discreet and i would accept one client per exam only. And I would only accept them as clients if and only they would promise not to share the answers to other. Because we have this one professor back then that could tell if you copy your answer from someone even if your solutions are slightly different.
And so it ended after I graduated college. I'm someone who loves solving math problems so it was really an easy feat to me. But the stress it put was quite enormous. If someone from the school found out about I would have been doomed. Thankfully, I survived.
In between high school and college I also sell some of my hand made crafts like drawings, bracelets, necklaces. At one point I also sold cookies and pancakes. There were also boys who asked me to write love letters and make explosion boxes.
Above are sample works that I found in my gallery.
The most recent business I had ended months ago due to conflicts with my partners. And it was the most stressful business I had for it was a real company with real employees.
It was an engineering company. We go to body builders for automotives and offer our services. We provide manpower for their production. We also offer consultation for maximization of production. And we also offer designs for new bodies and jigs.
I had learned a lot from this business and until now I was still pondering if I should continue in this line of business.
If you want to know more about this business I tackled how I started it with my friend how it also crumbled into pieces in this article: @creepymeow/how-my-friends-and-i-built-a-company-and-how-it-turned-into-shambles
And so, inspite of my introvert characteristic. I really enjoyed interacting with my clients. I love the exchange of knowledge and the high it gives me whenever I sell a product or closes a deal. More than money it was the joy, I was craving from doing business.
Are you also a business minded person? What businesses have you put up?
