Tips Guides

Advantages and Disadvantages in Business Structure of forming an s-corp and Limited Liability Corporation or LLC are discussed. Small and Home Businesses need to address structure at the onset and during growth…

Here we are going to go over an S-Corporation & An LLC.

Let’s face it, not everyone is into paperwork…and formation and maintenance of a corporate entity requires a fair amount of it. On the other hand, it’s a relatively small matter to form an LLC. According to Nolo’s Guide to Starting and Running a Small Business,
the relative simplicity and flexibility of the LLC make it the better choice. This is specially true if your business will hold property, such as real estate, that is likely to increase in value.

That statement about property is something to think about if your Internet business is an informational website that generates income on its own, such as CraigsList or a pay-per-use site. Digital property has the same potential to rise and fall in value as real property (just ask AltaVista).

Even if your website doesn’t generate income directly, if you’re getting a fair number of its per month - say, 100,000 or more - simply the domain name (if you have one) can be valuable.

Beyond the fact that forming an LLC is a one-step process requiring little in the way of red tape, you won’t have to worry about annual meetings and keeping minutes of those meetings in the way corporations must do.

Dividends of S-Corporations must be distributed among shareholders based on the number of shares they hold, regardless of whether or not they contributed to the business in any tangible way (in other words, You could put in the hours of actual labor while THEY sit around the pool waiting for the dividend check - which in theory, could mean your shareholders may wind up with the lion’s share of profits!).

With an LLC, profits and losses are divided up among the members in any way they see it. Finally, an LLC can be owned and operated by anyone, whether they are a citizen, a resident alien, or another person or corporate/business entity inside or outside of the U.S. An S-Corporation, on the other hand must be owned by a “natural person” who is a U.S. citizen or a legal resident - it cannot be owned by another corporation or person outside of the country.

Members of an S-Corporation pay Medicare and Social Security taxes only on money they actually receive as compensation in the form of wages or a salary - profits received as a dividend are exempt. In contrast, members of an LLC may be liable for these taxes on all profits made.

This is especially true if yours is an online business that provides professional services in the fields of health care, the law or engineering and design. If this is the case for you, it is a good idea to consult with your account or tax advisor on what is best for your small business.

Another caveat for licensed professionals residing in the State of California: an LLC may not even be an option for you, since California law prohibits LLCs from rendering professional services as an individual. Other than that, California charges LLCs a yearly tax of $800 just for doing business in that state, plus an additional annual LLC fee based on a percentage of total yearly income from all sources.

You now know the difference between each of these corporation types. Take your time in choosing the one that’s right for your business.

Get detailed information free online from the author, Leon Edward, on government funding, Federal, State, Local Grants , where to find start up grants, sources, how best to fill out grant applications, grant management step by step tips, setting up a business steps at his website
starting a business grants

The Walt Disney Company which was founded on October 16, 1923 has a long and distinguished history. But it is a history that might never have existed if not for the perseverance of one man. That man of course was Walt Disney who together with his brother Roy O. Disney were the founders of The Walt Disney Company. Of course The Walt Disney Company has a long and colorful history that has had many books already written about it. So we’ll just cover one particular area of the story. Walt Disney’s perseverance.

You see Walt Disney was a man that would not give up no matter what. No matter how many setbacks he had he did not know when to call it quits. So how did he get started? Well early on in Walt Disney’s life he got into drawing cartoons first for his school newspaper and after World War I he began working for newspapers and magazines. He would draw cartoons and do advertising work for them to pay his bills.

It was through this work that he met a fellow artist by the name of Ubbe Iwerks. Together they would form Walt Disney’s first attempt at building a business. This was in 1920 and the company was known as Iwerks-Disney Commercial Artists. Unfortunately the business got off to a rough start and soon had to be closed. But Walt Disney wasn’t finished there.

His next job led him into the field of animation. This of course is where he would really leave his mark on the world. Soon Walt Disney was ready for his next attempt at building his own studio. The one would be known as the Laugh O Gram Studio. The name came from a series of cartoons that Walt Disney was producing for a local Kansas City theatre operator. And it was nearly a success too. Walt Disney’s inability to handle money would be his downfall this time around. And so after the company went bankrupt. Walt Disney packed up his bags and moved to Hollywood, California.

This time around Walt would team up with his brother Roy O. Disney. Roy was a former banker so he knew how to handle the money side of the house while Roy would handle the creative side. And so the Disney Brother’s Studio was born. And it started off with a hit. Known as the Alice Comedies the studio began to turn out a number of short films based around the story Alice in Wonderland. They would turn out to be very successful and would lead to another character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.

Walt Disney though had one final bump in the road before becoming ultimately successful. You see Walt had made the mistake of selling the rights to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit to its distributor. And now the distributor wanted to cut the fees they were paying. Further pressuring the Disney brothers they threatened to hire the people that were actually doing the work on Oswald the Lucky Rabbit away from Disney and they would form their own studio to do the work. Walt Disney wouldn’t give in and so he lost both Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and most of his staff.

After what had happened to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit Walt Disney found his studio in need of a replacement character. And so Mickey Mouse was born. The rest of the story you probably already know as Mickey would become extremely popular. But Mickey wouldn’t be here today if Walt Disney had given up. It was through his perseverance that The Walt Disney Company would become a reality. And millions of children can get a hug each year from a big furry mouse.

Cash Miller is an experienced entrepreneur and speaker who has spent over a decade as a small business owner. His years of experience in small business cover a variety of topics. If you are looking for more small business help please check out http://www.smallbusinessdelivered.com

Starting a vending business can be one of the best experiences in the world when you have a clear vision about how to go about it and build your business properly.

Sure anyone can buy a vending machine but how do you find locations? Where do you buy products, Where do you get parts for your machines, Who is going to move them for you? What if it breaks how are you going to fix it?

These are all questions that you should have answered before you even start or personally in my opinion even before you buy your first machine. Homework is critical before starting any business and especially the vending business.

If you do not do your homework you could wind up over paying for your machines and this could cost you hundreds or even thousands in start up costs alone. Never mind you’re on going expenses in the business.

Before buying your first machine research on the internet some of the websites that sell machines. You should be buying a very specific make and model of machine. Think of it like a car. If you like ford cars and you found them to be very reliable and if you ever needed parts for it you could get them for a fair price.

Well vending machines are the same. Stick with what you know and what is prominent in the market and your local area. Once you find a reliable vending machine then stick with buying the same kind.

Also it is important to have some things in place like having a vending mover that you can call to move your machines for you. This is important because if you find a location to place your machines then you will need to give the location an idea of when you can move your machines in.

In my business I am always in close contact with my vending machine mover always knowing what his schedule is. I do this because a big part of my business is expansion and closing deals on locations.

I always like to keep my new locations informed as to how things are progressing and when they can expect their machine. This way you will close more deals and start your relationship with your new locations on the right foot.

Expanding your vending machine business is by far one of the most important aspects of your business. This is a critical component to the success and difference between just running a part time small operation and running a serious money making business where you could be saying goodbye to your day job!

This is the reason why I love the vending machine business so much. There is so much potential to make a serious change in your finances and make some serious money in vending.

Do you want to make more money? Do you want to be able to have control of your financial future and not be at the whim and mercy of your employer? Then the vending business is for you.

The reason for this is because it is very easy to get into without having to have a large sum of money to start with. Plus if you take the time to learn how to market your business properly you will get more locations that you could dream of. After all isn’t that what people struggle with the most in the vending business?

Locations are the life blood of your vending business and this is what people struggle with the most. Why?

Because they don’t take the time to learn marketing! Marketing is crucial to your expansion of your business. There are only so many hours in the day that you can run around town banging on doors to try and build your business.

What you have to do is learn marketing and advertising to build this thing. When you put together a system that works then you will stand the best chance for success in vending.

Chris Robertson has been a vending operator for over 9 years. He can be found at Toronto Vending Services. Also learn about Starting A Vending Business. and be sure to take a look at Chris’s vending information website Your Vending Resource to get all the latest information about vending and Chris’s Free Vending Report!

Starting a small or home based business involves making a lot of decisions before starting up, weighing options and informing yourself. Some of this is obvious, like digging around for market demographics, the strength of the local economy and similar. Some of this is less obvious when applying for grants - there is a lot of digging to be done before you can get a business started.

First, do the research on what sort of business you want to start, and make sure it is appropriate to your region. There is not much call for downhill ski trainers in Miami Beach, for instance. If you are entering a crowded field, you will want to make sure your offering stands out from the crowd.

Yo will also want to look at regional and nationwide trends for this sort of business. Are sales up or down? Is there a clearly identifiable reason why they’re up or down, and reasons to predict a continuation of the current trend, or its reversal? (One of the best ways to make money is to start a business at the end of a downturn in a given market segment, come out with a well received product, and sell it to an acquisitions hungry company looking to make it into that segment.)

If you are doing manufacturing, you will want to look at how raw materials get in, what environmental regulations you need to look out for, labor restrictions, warehousing and packaging and similar - this will become a fixed item on your expenses, one that recurs monthly, so take the time to comparison shop now. Moving is never fun or easy.

When it comes to production, and providing services, you are going to need an accurate assessment of how much time it takes to do things. One of the big places where new businesses fail is that they undervalue the time of their founders; when you are short on capital, sweat equity looks very tempting. There is a time, however, where it is worth it to pay someone else to do things, and an absolute limit on the growth of your business if you choose not to have employees.

The next piece of research is market assessment. What is the market like for your goods or services? How strong is it? Who will buy it, and why, and for what secondary or primary purposes? Are there services you can add to the sale of a good to improve the value, or a good you can acquire cheaply to sell with a service or bundle with a service as a promotional item? Are there any untapped needs, or needs that you can combine multiple segments together to meet in a new way? What is your competition like and what are they doing?

Assessing needs and what the audience and customer base wants is a critical step in analyzing any business case.

Answers to these questions and more can be gotten through SCORE, which is a program put out by the Small Business Administration. SCORE is the Service Corps of Retired Executives, and is made up of entrepreneurs who have retired, but volunteer their time to give consults to new businesses starting out. Listen to them - particularly their stories about mistakes. Mistakes are costly, and are lessons learned. Learn from the mistakes of others, as you lack the time to make them all yourself.

Another place to look into answers to these questions are mentorship programs, particularly in technical fields, like printing. Talk to the people who have been in the business - a lot of them will be quite happy to help you set up and take over the jobs they do not want to be bothered with anymore, the smaller accounts that require more work than their payoff justifies with their higher overhead.

Once you have got answers, it is time to tally up expenses and the balance sheet. Look at the money you will need, generate a very pricey estimate of three months of operating expenses, including your own salary, and see what funding sources are available.

Do not forget to advertise; its how customers find you!

Get detailed information free online from the author, Leon Edward, on government funding, Federal, State, Local Grants , where to find start up grants, sources, how best to fill out grant applications, grant management step by step tips, setting up a business steps at his website
small business grants

Starting a business takes a realistic assessment of expenses, planning assets, and most importantly, funding requirements. The second leading cause of small business failure is from under capitalization. (The leading cause is mismanaged growth). Capitalizing your new business means overcoming the high up front startup costs, and making sure that you have enough money in reserve to handle operating expenses for a few months while building your client base or bringing your service or product to the market. Nothing is as disheartening as seeing that your business has failed when it could have succeeded with a bit more money at the right time.

To figure out your capitalization requirements, you are going to need to itemize your start-up costs, like paying for office and work space, warehouse space if you need it, and initial capital investments in equipment, tools and furnishings, plus service fees (attorney time, licensing fees and state permits). You will also need to start the basic utilities - internet, telephone, trash pickup, electricity and water. When you start adding it all up, it can become more than a little daunting.

However, you do not need to do it all at once. Make a priority list. Can you work out of a spare room in your home, or use your garage as your small warehouse? If the type of business lets you do this, then you can postpone a large chunk of continuing overhead expenses by doing exactly that. If you are providing an online service business (marketing assistance, freelance writing, and the like), you may never need to get -real- office space, though there are some serious benefits to doing so. (Not being interrupted by your family during business hours is the least of them!)

Another way to overcome a shortage of capital is sweat equity. When you are starting a business, the most plentiful commodity you have is your back and sweat, and doing things for yourself. It is easy to get into a rut with this, so be sure that you are valuing your time appropriately - remember that the leading cause of business failure is mismanaged growth: Getting into the habit of doing everything yourself, when hiring an employee to free you up to do business management is one of the classic failure patterns. Doing things yourself will give you a gut appreciation of where the money goes, and what jobs you will want to delegate in the future. It will also give you a leg up, when you have employees, to know what all the jobs are, and how to train people to do them to your satisfaction.

Keep an open mind during the business planning phase. Network and talk to other small business owners, and make a habit of going to your local SBDC luncheons every month. Learn from the people who are going through what you went through, or have gone through it before. There will be lots of suggestions on how to manage your business growth.

Finally, be aware of the differences between capital expenditures, sunk costs and recurrent expenses. Or, when it is time to spend money, do not be afraid to do it when the opportunity strikes!

Get detailed information free online from the author, Leon Edward, on government funding, Federal, State, Local Grants , where to find start up grants, sources, how best to fill out grant applications, grant management step by step tips, steps to starting a small business at his website
money for starting a business

When it comes to industrial design, this is the one thing that has led the world in advancements in all fields, from medicine to mechanics from food processing to farming. It has opened up possibilities that for thousands of years would never be dreamed of. The industrial revolution surely has to be the most monumental point in history when it comes to world changes. Soon after this, machinery was developed to make so many aspects of life easier and this has simply progressed over the years to the point where machinery does pretty much everything.

Of course, this has had its drawbacks but then as a human race we are very adept at looking on the bright side and the fact that machinery is taking over the day to day tasks simply gives us more time to play. The invention of grown up toys is something of a recent phenomena and this is not only because of the fact that industrial design has bought us the machine to do everything but also because, in recent years, more people have had more disposable income than ever before.

The more grown up toys we have, the more design is required to not only better them in everybody’s call for better technology and fancier gadgets but also for ways to produce the energy to run these toys. To that end, inventors have been working on batteries to run many things. Long before the grown up toys of today, inventors have been working on a form of battery since the mid 1700’s until it has been developed to what we know and take for granted today as the disposable power source of an electric battery.

The Energizer battery enjoyed its most popularity after the ‘Energizer bunny’ was introduced. This television advert showed a collection of toy bunnies representing the never ending collection of children’s toys that now require batteries. One of their most recent adverts showed a collection of these battery powered bunnies scaling a mountain side and the one with the Energizer battery made it when all the others failed.

However, as is usual with industrial design, there will always be competition and the Energizer bunny has just been beaten by a robot that contained batteries from Panasonic. The robot containing Panasonic batteries beat the Energizer and Duracell containing robots to climb the Grand Canyon in seven hours. This is quite some feat and gives all parents hope that they might be able to get through a weekend without a tantrum from their child that a toy is ‘dead’ because the batteries have run out of power.

Worse still for women is the man tantrum that his toys don’t work. This is when they bash them in the vain hope that this will make them work. You will see this when the TV remote control gives up its batteries. The remote control is one of the slightly more pointless inventions of industrial design because you are never that far away from a TV that you couldn’t get up and simply change the channels. But, no. Men just press the button harder and aim the remote closer to the TV until they get to within arm’s reach of it and still are insisting on trying to force the remote to work. However, I digress.

Children’s toys more often than not these days are equipped with battery departments so that the toy can either work on its own or produce entertaining lights and noises. Is it any wonder we are producing a nation of obese children and adults when we all expect to sit back and have things done for us?

Expert inventor expert Catherine Harvey looks at the way technology calls for evermore inventive industrial design to stay one step ahead.