A local furniture store hosts two temporary businesses for a special shopping event, combining business-in-a-business and pop-ups to benefit everyone. Photo by Becky McCray.

By Deb Brown

The old way of doing business is one building, one business. What if you could test an idea and have a business inside a business?

Anyone of us either knows or can find someone who is making things from their home and selling it.

What if you encouraged already existing home-based businesses to host a trial popup in your store?

These small popups can be short term, over a season or if it works out a permanent addition. Perhaps you’ll let them try their idea out for free for a short time. If it works, you can determine together if they pay rent to you or a commission.

Who do you know that is a:

• Quilt maker
• Artist
• Artisan
• Painter
• Sculptor
• Widget maker
• Baker
• Crafter

Look for those that are doing business from their homes. Maybe they are just beginning to think about making some money with their products.

How can you help them, and your business at the same time?

Invite them to set up in a corner of your shop, as a pop up.

Then try these ideas:

• Meet the artist event
• Have a party announcing your new acquisition
• Create a Facebook event and do something special to announce their arrival

Why does all of this matter?

1. You will be bringing in new people to your store to meet these crafters. Cross promotion is good for business.
2. You’re giving a hand up and not a hand out to a new business person.
3. You’re enlivening your community using local resources.
4. You’re making your store a place where people come for an experience.
5. You’re building community and that strengthens the town for everyone.

More rural economic development tricks

Find out more rural economic development tricks in our latest SaveYour.Town video.

Before you write that plan, why not try a pop-up of your business idea? Even in your own front yard you can learn more than you will staring at a computer screen. Photo courtesy of Shawn’s Kettle Corn, Webster City, Iowa. 

by Deb Brown

At least, the old way of doing them

Writing a business plan is an intense project that takes up a lot of your time. You spend weeks and weeks on it, and you’re not even sure everything in it is correct. Your financial projections are just wild guesses. You’re not even open and they want you to guess how much money you’ll make! You can find out the amount of traffic that goes by your proposed location. But just because 10,000 people travel down that road doesn’t mean any certain percentage of them will be guaranteed to stop. 

What if you waited and wrote your business plan after you’ve run a few tests? 

How do you test out your products and market without having a brick and mortar business? 

Participate in a pop up event or two

Small towns have these kind of events. Car shows, town fairs, three day events for fun, goat eating contests, celebrations and many other kinds of parties. You can set up a table and a covering and sell your product. 

Do track your sales! It’s as easy as counting inventory at the beginning and at the end. Write down if you had to drop the price. Write down suggestions people give you for similar products they’d like. You’ll begin to get an idea of what products people like.

Try a longer pop up.

Does your town do seasonal popups in empty buildings? It’s worth asking the building owner to do that! You could partner with other entrepreneurs and give it a try.  

Again, track sales, price drops and suggestions. If possible, track the  number of people who came in the building. 

Let’s not forget online selling

Etsy, Amazon, eBay, Poshmark, Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, eBid, and Ruby Lane are a few places. Be sure to choose the right site(s) for your type of product.

Many of these sites will do the tracking for you! If not, track them yourself.

Shared spaces

Is there a place in your area that has more than one vendor in the location? See if you could join them. This is a shared space, and they are operated in different ways. Some have one cash register, some have each vendor with a cash register. Both have been known to work. Get the details and see if they work for you. 

As you track results, don’t forget to write down your market

Who is buying your product? 

As you are trying these ideas (and making money) pay attention to the people who shop with you. Do they fall into a certain age category? Are they male or female? Of a certain social strata? This is all research for the kind of people who make up your market. 

Where do these people live? What do they look like? How old are they? What gender are they? Are they different nationalities? Where are they shopping for similar products? Are you satisfying a need in the marketplace? 

After this time of tracking sales, places, and people you’re really ready to begin writing a plan.

The difference is you’ll have actual figures and not made up ones. You’ll also want to write about your products, competition and staffing. You’ve already got the answers for these topics too.

You have everything you need for a simple business plan. You can show the banker, if you need one, exactly what you’ve been doing as you build your business. You’re not putting your dreams and wishes on paper. You’re putting facts and figures and proof that your business is working. 

Our next video is Before You Write Your Next Plan and you’ll hear about real people in real towns who are not writing business plans the old way anymore.