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Your experience means a lot to others who want to venture into their own business. WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU.

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Find out the secrets of how Leslie raised RM90,000 in just one month and generates profit from day one for more than 7 years

Introduction

Leslie is the owner of Hair Channel, located at Level 2, AmCorp Mall, PJ, Malaysia, which has been in operation for more than 7 years.

With more than 10 years of hair styling experience, Leslie is not only reputable for his hair styling skill, he is also well known amongst his customers for his eye brow shaping and trimming skill as well.

One of the many secrets of his success is to maintain a great relationship and network with his clients. Find out more from our interview with him on the 20th of December 2005.

If you wish to talk to him about his experience, or even just want to go for a great hair cut, pay him a visit at his shop in AmCorp Mall or call him for an appointment at 603-7954 9819 or 603-7955 0615.

Q. Before venturing out on your own, what did you do for a living?

I have always been working in the hair styling industry and occasionally, I do eye brown shaping and trimming for more than 10 years in Malaysia, New Zealand and Canada. Upon coming back from Canada, I continued to work for a local hair saloon house for another 3 years until 1998 when I started Hair Channel with a partner.

Q. Why do you want to be your own boss?

I believe I can make more money by venturing out on my own. Next is freedom, I can do whatever I want at my own pace. I was 30 years old when I first decided to be my own boss – I am not young anymore and I wanted to give it a shot.

Q. How long did it take to plan for your business venture?

All in all, it took about 2 months.

During the planning stage, I spoke to some of my colleagues and customers about my intention of starting a hair saloon myself while I was still working for a local saloon house. Somehow, word just got back to my boss and he was not too happy about it. I was asked to leave almost immediately.

Since I was jobless then, and was really reluctant to continue to work for others again, I have to speed up my planning process and make it a reality.

In total, it took me about two months from planning to start up. I found myself a partner to start Hair Channel.

Q. How much was required for initial start up?

About RM90,000.

Q. How did you raise the capital?

My partner borrowed from his family members, however, it was still not enough. I am kind of a spendthrift and do not have enough savings to make up the balance required. Without a choice, I went to Hong Kong and took some free lance jobs (eye brow shaping and trimming in particular, and a little bit of hair styling) for a month.

My friends in Hong Kong were really helpful by introducing me to many clients within that month.

Hong Kong is an amazing place. They really pay handsomely as long as you do a quality job. I managed to generate about RM40,000 within just one month alone. With that, together with my partner’s money, we finally raised enough capital to start.

Q. What was the biggest challenge during the start up period?

The biggest challenge was to overcome the fear of failure! I still remember while I first started out, it was in 1998. As you know, Malaysia was suffering from a recession during that time! Business prospect was very gloomy. My friends kept on telling me that starting a business during that time was not a good idea. I, too, was kind of worried as well. But then I thought to myself, the heck with it! Let’s give it a shot and if all things fail, I can always go back to Canada to work again.

Fortunately for me, things went on very well from day one of operation. I still remember we made only about RM10,000 on the first month of business, and even that, we didn’t lose money. We never lost money on any single month since then and our customer base continue to grow.

Q. What was the biggest challenge to maintain your business?

For business maintenance, of course is getting enough customers to sustain.

The secret is to keep up your reputation within your existing customers and keep a good relationship with them, they will eventually bring you new customers through word of mouth. This is even more effective than advertising.

Hair saloon is a very competitive market. Hair styling service can be quite generic, thus, networking and PR with clients are absolutely critical to grow your customers base.

I maintained a good network with my clients during my days as an employee with a saloon house near Jaya Supermarket, Section 14. Since my customers mainly resided around this neighborhood, I chose AmCorp Mall to start Hair Channel. On the first month of incorporation, most of my customers basically followed along, and that is one of the key reasons how I managed to generate profit since day one.

Q. How did you choose your partner?

I knew my partner while I was working in Canada and we have been friends since then. He is a Malaysian too. I chose him because I trusted him. For partnership, trust is very important. I am very bad at business planning and figures, thus, I let him do all the planning and he basically manages the accounts for the company till now. I trust him fully on this. On top of that, he is good at hair styling too.

Q. What do you think are the success factors?

Being humble to everyone is the key to every success. As long as you stay humble, you will eventually be successful. Secondly, you have to be a person with good ethic and moral, be a good person.

Q. What is your biggest sacrifice in starting your own business?

As long as you do it with your heart, nothing can be considered a sacrifice. I do not consider working on Saturday and Sunday a sacrifice either, especially I am in the service industry. This is required for my kind of field. Moreover, I prefer to rest on a week day.

Q. What would be your advice to those who wish to set up their own hair studio?

Do it from your heart, be passionate and hardworking. Start from the basic and build a strong foundation.

Q. How about those who do not have hair styling skill but wish to start up a hair styling business, what do you think is their success rate?

Unless you are very rich, it will be very risky. I would say 50:50. You have to start a business on what you are good at. If you hire some hair stylists to do the job for you, you will face problems if the person leaves. What are you going to do when that happen and you can’t cut hair.

Q. Finally, what do you usually do while you're not working?

Traveling and going out. I was born in the year of the Monkey and so, I cannot sit still and have to move around.

Listen to his full interivew by clicking the "podcast"button above. The interview was conducted in cantonese.

On 19th December 2005, we interviewed Steven Yee, owner of Centegy Solutions http://www.centegy.com.my/, to share with us his journey of being a business owner.

Get a preview of his story below or click on the podcast button to down load the entire interview (20 minutes).

Introduction Of Steven Yee – Owner of Centegy Solutions

Steven Yee is the Director and owner of his own consulting firm, Centegy Solutions , that specializes in corporate governance and risk management. His consultancy services include helping public listed companies undertake risk management initiative for the board of directors and the internal audit team.

Centegy Solutions is in its second year of operation by Dec 2005. Steven worked as a Senior Manager, Audit Department, with a one of the world leading auditing and consulting firm in Malaysia (one of the big four) for 12 years before venturing out on his own.

He has a lovely wife with two fabulous daughters, one aged 3 years and another less than 6 months old.

Question: Why did you venture out on your own, leaving a promising and high paying job?

I hit a cross road at the age of 30 and started to wonder what I should do next – continue to work as an employee or to work for myself? After working for 12 years, the job doesn’t give me the drive anymore. I did some soul searching and found that challenges is what motivates me. I have more to gain and less to lose by venturing out on my own. Nothing beats the experience of being your own boss. I would rather try it early than wait till I am 45 years old, do it while my heart can still take it!

Question: How did you raise money to start your business and manage the financial risk?

My line of business does not require a lot of capital. My initial capital was solely to buy “gadgets” such as laptop, printer and to pay for rental of the office.

Initial seed capital was RM20,000. I allocated about RM10,000 for office equipments and RM10,000 for working capital as I have anticipated zero revenue for the first few months.

I raised the money from my own savings. The first three months in business was very crucial for me. Fortunately, I managed to secure a few projects to subsidise some of the expenses of my initial set up.

Question: Where did you get your clients – from previous contacts or new clients?

Mainly from my previous network that I had built up in the past 12 years. Networking is very important for my line of work.

Question: How did your family take this?

Family is a very important component for my business venture. I have to make sure that at least one person have a stable income. My wife basically takes care some of the household expenses while working for another company.

Question: Did you come up with a business plan and forecast?

Yes. Business plan is very important for a business venture. I did a simple and easy to understand business plan for short and middle term, taking into consideration some of the expenses and returns. I even went to the extent of evaluating the opportunity lost as an employee as well. I calculated what I will lose out as an employee (such as salary, EPF and SOCSO) and compared it against what I will potentially gain once I ventured out on my own.

Question: During the 2 years of being your own boss, have you faced any challenges and do you have doubts about your decision?

Yes, there are a lot of ups and downs, especially the uncertainty of getting enough projects to sustain the business. This is why having a business plan is crucial to prepare yourself for the worst case scenario. Fortunately for me, things are on track now.

Question: How long did it take you to plan for your new venture while you were still working as an employee?

In total, not more than 6 months. The thinking process started when I was no longer motivated to work. I spent most of my time planning and think what’s the next course of action. I started networking and prospecting. I have to evaluate my financial standing, and of course, discuss with friends and family.

Question: How many hours did you spend a week to plan for your business during the initial 6 months?

Took a lot of time. At least 6-8 hours a day – planning, thinking and networking.

Question: Have you ever thought about what if things don’t work out your way?

Yes, this is what I specialize on, risk management. You have to plan for an exit route and backdoor plan. You need to have a worst case scenario and revisit the plan to ensure it is on track.

My exit plan for me is to go back to employment. I believe I am able to get a job if I chose to go back into employment. Fortunately enough for me, so far so good.

Question: What do you think is the success factors for being your own boss?

I still consider my company young and dynamic thus, hard work and perseverance are the two most important success factors. Next is getting yourself a good set of business plan – lay down the objectives and detail tasks you need to perform in a specifed period. Networking play an important role too.

Question: What would be your advice to others who want to start their own business?

I always believe my own motto: Do what you are best at. You need to evaluate what kind of skill set and competency you have. Do a SWOT analysis on yourself.

Get good support from family and start networking. Do a business plan. Work extra hours and have perseverance.

To hear more about our interviews, down load the podcast now http://www.ourmedia.org/node/122719

We are almost done with the design of our second round of surveys. Scheduled to released by end of Dec 05.

This time, we are including some interesting gifts to be given away by participating in our survey.

Stay tune for more detail.