Bum to Bankroll: Building a small business starting with no money in 2018

Here's Gary Vaynerchuk, real life successful entrepreneur, online marketing legend, and the first guy to call you out on your bullshit excuses about not making money.  He's got a huge following online and social media, and yet he still goes garage sale shopping... for fun.  Why?  Because his family immigrated here when he was three, and he grew up buying and selling stuff to make money.  He came from the world where buying and selling stuff had to make money.  He came out with this challenge last year for his followers who were starting with little or no money. What's hot on Ebay has changed in a year, but the game of "flipping", as people call it today, has not changed.

So what does this have to do with me and you?

If you're in a career you're fairly stoked on, and life and money are good for you, then this post isn't for you.  But if you're struggling with 1, 2, or 3 low paying jobs, or you have no job and can't find one, or you just need extra income, this may be for you.

As for me...  I landed here in Richmond, Virginia, completely randomly, with $3 in my pocket, less than two months ago.  I'll get into that story in another post.  If you follow this blog, you know I've been working to build my Sharpie artwork into a business for a couple of years now.  And it's still not a legit business, but it is income.  I make money selling my drawings on a regular basis.  That's awesome.  But, I'm still homeless at the moment, and and as cool as "Street Life" sounds in hip hop videos, it largely sucks in reality.  I mean, I'm a dirtbag by nature, but I do like taking showers on a regular basis.  And that's not happening at the moment.  Besides the smell (peroxide helps with that), the sketchy sleep, lack of sleep, crappy fast food-based diet, and hauling 30 pounds of junk everywhere, really take a toll on the body.  On the plus side, I've lost 14 pounds since I got to Richmond.  But I'm still well over 300 pounds at the moment.

Since I use Facebook, this blog, and other platforms to promote my artwork, I listen to a ton of videos to educate myself on ideas, techniques, and nuances of social media promotion, marketing, and business.  In today's world, that's called "self-educating."  I stumbled across Seth Godin's videos and then books about 6 years ago, and he really understands how the internet has changed the business world.  Then I found Mitch Joel's book, CTRL ALT Delete, at the library, and learned a lot from him about business in the high tech, communication-rich age.  In an interview with Mitch online, I heard him mention Gary Vaynerchuk, a competitor of his in the digital marketing agency world.  Gary puts out an absurd amount of content about making money in today's world of smart phones, social media, the internet, and our hyper-connected world. 

His "day job," is trying to help huge corporations and brands sell shit in today's world.  But most of those companies are still run by old guys still thinking with a largely Industrial Age mentality.  Those huge companies spend $80 BILLION a year on TV ads, but don't stop to think that hardly anybody even sees, let alone watches, TV commercials in today's world.  So Gary's media company tries to shepherd them into getting their message out in relevant ways in today's fast changing, media soaked world.

The cool thing is that Gary, for his own reasons, gives you, me, and the world, pretty much the same advice for free.  The sales and marketing world is changing fast, and he's telling all of us who listen how to adapt and make use of it.  So I listen to Gary's stuff a lot.

Since I'm homeless since landing in Richmond, I have to literally carry everything I own around with me all the time.  I have a small, bookbag-sized backpack, a larger dufffle bag over my shoulder, and my big 18" X 24" sketchpad wrapped in trash bags to keep it dry from the rain.  I had this amazing backpack for ten years, that I bought in a California swap meet for $4.  But it finally died right before I came here from North Carolina.  So I had a cheap ass little backpack that was already wearing out last week.  I needed a new one.

I know that Goodwill is a great place to get backpacks cheap, especially Goodwill outlet stores.  Why?  Because at the outlet stores, you pay for stuff by the pound.  And little backpacks are really light.  So I Googled it, and found the Goodwill outlet here in Richmond.  It was a long bus ride, and a bit of a walk, but I got there, put my own bags next to the register so I could go shop, and I went treasure hunting.

Here's the thing about Goodwill outlet stores, everything is put into big bins, kind of separated by category (clothes, shoes, books, random stuff), and you have to dig through the bins to see if there's anything you want.  I had two goals that day, and less than $10 to spend.  I needed a hoodie (or sweatshirt, or maybe a sweater) that would fit my 320 pound self.  That's a tough one.  Big guy clothes don't last at thrift stores.  But it's starting to get chilly, and it was a necessity.  I also needed a new small backpack, preferably one that would last more than two months.

The outlet was smaller than I imagined for a big city, and it was crowded.  Personally, I hate shopping for clothes.  I'm a shorts and T-shirts guy, and rarely buy clothes.  But it's been getting cold, and I needed some kind of sweatshirt.  I dug for maybe fifteen minutes through bins of mostly women's clothes of all kinds.  I was getting a little bummed that I might not find anything my size.  Then BAM, under skirts and jeans and tops I found a 4XL, light blue sweater.  SCORE.

Now I've always been a bit of a flipper, a wheeler/dealer as we called it when I was a kid.  I went with my dad to gun shows and garage sales as a kid, learning the basics of bartering as he bought and sold things, and nearly always made a little money.  It was a hobby for him, a kind of treasure hunt, and I caught that bug.  Years later, I back in 2003 or so, I stumbled across storage unit auctions, before the TV shows about them came out.  I bought units and sold the stuff on the side while working as a taxi driver.

Wandering around the Goodwill Outlet Store, I got the itch to find stuff to flip again.  I love the treasure hunt part of it.  I did find a backpack, a really good quality, High Sierra one, and a good messenger bag, too.  But at this store, they weren't sold by the pound.  I paid $2.99 for my backpack, and left the messenger bag they wanted $3.99 for. I almost felt I was being ripped off, getting a $20 back pack for $3, rather than the $1.75 it would have cost by the pound.  So I found both things I needed, and a still wrapped Harley Quinn poster, for $5.77.  Not bad.

Since then, I've been watching flipping videos quite a bit on You Tube.  As I thought about it, and listened to GaryVee's hype on flipping as the best way to make money with a small dollar starting point, I started thinking about flipping stuff in addition to selling my art.

So that's where I'm at.  I might sell a drawing today, which would give me some money to go hit Goodwill again.  I also have a drawing to start tomorrow, and will be getting a deposit for that one to get started.  So even though I don't have a place to live, an activated phone, or have Ebay as a viable selling option, I'm going to try to make a few extra bucks flipping stuff, as I work on my art as well.

I have to start making a fair amount of money soon to get a roof over my head, and start rebuilding my life.  And I'm going to spend more time blogging about my journey from "Bum to Bankroll" (that's actually a blog title I started once, then decided against).  Whatever your situation is, you're probably a bit better off to start with than I am.  If you're willing to read these long posts, hopefully you'll learn from my dealings and that will help you not only get motivated, but make some side money as well.