The Real-Time Small Business Experiment: Introduction

This is the Introduction to a series which will follow in real time my attempts to make money in the world of 'small business'. Because this is a real time series I suspect the posts will be less frequent than my other series (such as my real estate investment series) as I will be updating my progress as I go through the experiences.

I am probably trying to start a business for different reasons to most. Some people are trying to replace their job with a business or are trying to earn significantly more money than they could from their job. I think I am one of the lucky people that (currently anyway) truly loves their job. I am not looking to replace it - I am looking to see if I can create another income stream (in addition to paid work, passive income from my stock / real estate / cash investments).

I was particularly motivated by the book The Adventure Capitalist by Connor Woodman (I have linked to it below) when he sells all his possessions and goes on an around the world trip seeing if he can double his money in a year by buying and selling goods around the world. It is a simple concept and one I want to see if I can replicate for myself.

The broad goals from this exercise are:

• Generate $1,000 per month, pre-tax additional income from a business


• Work no more than 5 - 10 hours per week on the business


• Achieve the above within 1 - 2 years