Entrepreneur Problem #143: Companies Without Customers

Alright, I have a full fledged website: http://www.iqco-op.org, I have a VP. We have business cards. We are hosting 2 events coming up. But... There's only one problem with IQ Co-Op. We don't really have any customers to speak of.

Odd predicament, I know it mus seem: to be a business with everything but the customer base. But believe me, there is a reason for this madness. I am trying to boostrap my company. So unfortunately, that means getting it off the ground with my own out of pocket expenses. I need to have some sort of infrastructure set up before I can even get customers. If the majority of my income is going to come from having my own place, then that means something very simple: I need seed funds before I can go and start a space. And it's not like I can go and get a loan as I am a mere 18 years old. But, that is not to say that I can't find other ways of earning money to save up until I have enough interested members to be able to get this going on a quicker projection.

So I am teaching classes, holding seminars, and hosting networking parties as well as conferences in the near future and start up competitions shortly after that. Once I have enough prospective members meeting and willing to throw down dues to get this started, and I have maybe a sponsor or two, hopefully a Thiel Fellowship, and  enough saved up to open up a space that I can host my own classes out of, then GREAT. I'll be all that much closer to being in the black.

I am not too terrified about not having any real customers, yet. There is a difference between understanding that you are working on creating infrastructure and deluding yourself to think that you never actually need customers. That is your income base. You actually want to make money, not just spend it.

So, no, not too terribly concerned. Although if another month passes and there hasn't been much of a change in... anything... then there will be reason for concern. It is all about being reasonable given the circumstances.

Use good judgment. That is some advice that I think I could impart to all of you would-be entrepreneurs: Use common sense! Have a plan. And revise it. Often.

I am pretty sure my description and aims of IQCO have changed slightly a multitude of times in the past months. I had to. You adapt or you die.

So now, I am waiting to be able to start actually making money. Yes, that will come about in about a week or two, but I want to start working on that now. Not later.

High Tech Trade School.

So I think now is an opportune time to delve a bit into the nuts and bolts of IQCO. This, in essence is our elevator pitch.

You have heard of makerspaces. You know of skill shares. Heck, half of you may even know about the Exploratorium.

This is none of those. This is all of those. And more. This is the high tech trade school of da Vinci, Tesla, and Tony Stark. To prove a point, I will be teaching a class about how to forge rings as well as attempting to create a Farnsworth Fusor. I am helping create traditional makerspaces and am self publishing. I am working on a network and humanitarian engineering. 

So my dream for IQCO is to let people of any niche work doing whatever they love. People need to start working jobs that they actually like. Science, math, history, astro, computers, art, literature, metal smithing, anything. Learn what is actually interesting to you. 

Apply for a science fair. Look for an angel investor. Produce an LP. Publish a book. 3-D print. Mentor. Apprentice. Start a business. I know I've harped on this before, but it's because it's true. 

Imagine a place where you can learn all the cool things school never taught you. Build all the fun stuff you could jot down on the side of your notes. Create the job you wished you could have. And without paying the thousands of dollars to get there! 

Explore the world around you. 

Learn. Create. Innovate. 

And remember, 

Keep calm and hack on. 

-IQCO Mgmt

TinkerMill

Today I did the most simple thing: I showed up. I listened to what the universe was telling me when I found out about the new HackerSpace, and I felt that this would be a great opportunity for myself, and for IQCO, so I went.

And now I am on the board of directors for a HackerSpace opening up in two weeks. This is an awesome opportunity for me to learn the ins and puts of running a HackerSpace. Additionally the city wants to work with us to create a huge space, an incubator, and a general ethos of innovation within the city. It is exactly what I wanted to do with IQCO, but I get to have a running start on this. 

I'm also going to have TinkerMill become a member of The Switchboard. I am thinking I can have a networking party, have them present at the event with others and that will be a source of income for IQCO along with the classes until we get our own place up. Apparently, directors of NPOs also get incomes, which I was unaware of. I will try to get that going in about 6 months so I can work on TM full time. Along with IQCO. And playing for Boulder County Bombers in Longmont as well. This is just one of those things that you have to seize the opportunity as you see it. I get to be a DJ, run networking parties, build a makerspace, found accelerators, and connect thousands of like minded people. 

I may be able to do what I love full time soon. How great would that be? What hacker doesn't want to do that? 

So I must admit that today was a great start to the month. I am already counting my blessings and I am getting things rolling. I don't know how things worked out so perfectly, but I am so thankful that they are. I am thankful for everyone that has believed in what I'm doing, everyone that offered to work with me,and everyone that let me go on my crazy tangents about wanting to start a company. 

Cheers everyone, and have a lovely day. 

IQCO MGMT

Planning Kinda-Sorta.

So now that we are an official business I feel far less sketched out by the idea that we have to generate an income. 

I figured I'd make all of the short term goals for IQCO and keep a running tally of what we are up to. And how to stay on track. The month of July, for example: 

Contact business owners for networking or hosting

Doers Interview 

Find 3 more local places to teach classes

Get a financial tracking system

Give info to Longmont instructors

Give out contractual agreements 

Attend Meetups

Contact the media/network

Get Switchboard operational

Rent office space

As you can see, we are going to be busy.  Haha and yes, I'm writing this at my day job. I work over 40/week. And again, this is why entrepreneurship errs nearly to the side of insanity and the seventh ring of HTML hell. 

I have 70 tasks until August 2014. Of then include incorporating, publishing a book, being in NY, TX, CA, FL, and CO. 

And none of this counts my engineering projects as well.... I think I'm going to just lie down for a second......

 

Have a great day everyone. And remember: "Keep Calm and Hack On".

Cheers,

IQCO mgmt

Forward Progression

Sorry for the lackluster title of this post. 

Actually. No, I'm not. I'm unapologetically OWNING that boring title. And I'm going to make it perfectly awesome. 

Things are moving forward. I think. Could be wrong. Sometimes the wooosh of life swarming past you is really you missing reality. But I'm going to be optimistic and say we've got some forward progression.

Today I'm getting the LLC registered. The web domain will be purchased soon and the first seminar will be slated for August 10. I'm getting contacts in CA, CO, NY, and FL hacker spaces. I'm collecting people to interview for HackerSpace Rising. I'm contacting the media to spread the word. And I found an awesome band I want to help support and have play at our networking gigs. 

I'm going to be getting back with my contractors and consultants about contractual agreements. Late July I can see about starting the process to get IQCO classes started in local areas. 

And then we can grow. 

My contractors can get more work eventually once we start to expand. With few exceptions, I have more interested people than I have jobs for right now. Which is a blessing and a curse. I'm a sole proprietorship right now. An LLC. I don't have 9 co-founders. I am a single founder drudging through legal jargon to make it so my company can function. 

And I have a lot of home-chefs in the kitchen. Many hands can make light work but they can also cause huge amounts of confusion. I need to be better at delegating tasks, sure. Every boss needs to. They are the leaders of their organization. This is why I want to keep IQCO as a sole prop for a while. I only want my own neck on the line. I will pay my workers, but if things don't pan out I don't want ten people to have debt and a shot credit score. 

But, thinking positively. Things are trucking along. I have a niche market and an interested audience. This can work. 

Cheers, everybody. 

-IQCO MGMT

Conference Calls (There and Back Again)

And here we find ourselves again: looking at a blank page with about thirty things on the to-do list.

For any of you that are unsure of what IQ Co-Op will *do*. Well now, my curious friends: we will do a couple of things. In a nutshell, though, we will create global cultures of innovation and entrepreneurship. How? By creating hackerspaces, hackerhouses, and networks to connect them along with innovative companies to hackers and other similarly interested businesses.

So we will first create a network and generate revenue. There are a few ways to do that. We will start by hosting networking events through IQ Co-Op, giving classes and seminars on IQCO skill shares, and start creating "The Switchboard" as a way to network people, businesses, and hackerspaces.

The attraction of IQCO lies in the network. We are network people. We connect companies with other companies that have a mutual interest. Or we connect hackers with hackerhouses. Or Members of a house to other in a different hackerspace. Or perhaps we are connecting a company with freelance hackers that want to develop their own freelancig chops.

You don't have to be in a house, or a space, or anything else. Now, it is true that is is far easier to work with these collaborative groups if you are working with IQCO. You can have the brainpower of all the hundreds of hackers across the globe. Or you could tinker in your basement or toil away in your parents' garage. Your choice.

We are also in an interesting state where we are going to be hosting parties in some of the best locations imaginable. We will be hosting parties in Boulder, Atlanta, San Francisco, Palo Alto, and Manhattan. SCORE.

The classes will be rolling out soon. So will seminars. Look for some of those in about..... a month.

Happy hacking, everyone! Keep it 1337. ;)

HackerSpace Incomes

Alright, everyone.

This is one of the potential properties that we here at IQ CO are looking at to become the IQ Co-Labs in Colorado.

Check it out.

There are about 3,000 sf of usable space. And if you were wondering, the cost to run it would be about $4,500 per month.

Now, how would we get that much in a month? Well, we could max out credit cards, sell our souls, or partake in morally questionable business practices... But we'd rather not. Instead, we plan to start offering classes at local rec centers, have Starving Hacker Rent Parties, and a couple of other services.

-but more on that later-

The actual income for the makerspace is going to be generated from skillShare classes. We will host 6 "classrooms" in this space. Each will have 2 hour long classes hosted by local doers, makers, and breakers to teach at a reasonable $30/session (2 hours of personal welding classes by a professional is a steal...). We need all of 21 people to go to 12 sessions of classes in a month (not per classroom, but in total). This is also considering that we will split the income 50/50 with the instructor, to help them begin their freelancing careers too.

Consider this. If each class was filled for 8hrs/day, at the end of the year we would make $1,314,00 pre-tax. Granted, this is highly inflated, and not likely, it is our earning potential in classes alone. We are expecting a modest $9,050 in the first month. We will also have memberships and co-working spaces as well.

Pretty cool, eh?

I'll lay out the costs of a space along with the full income potentials later.


And remember,

"Keep calm

and

Hack On"

Peace,

IQCO MGMT

Hackerspaces For All Ages

So we are looking at starting our first hackerspace: IQ CO-Labs. It is looking like it will be a bit out of the way, possibly in Ft. Collins, CO, but that is for purposes of economical buildings and flexibility to grow our space.

There was something that caught my attention, and that is the fact that so much of the "hacker" culture is geared to 18-30 somethings. That is a tiny portion of the world. What if these hackerspaces were used to teach 11 year olds ras pi? Or how to wire Arduino sensors? We could sponsor a robotics team, we could get apprentices to pair with mentors that also worked in the shops. Fathers could come with their kids to teach them about woodworking, welding, or soldering.

And what about the 40-50 year olds that spent their lives as engineers, and just want to pass on a bit of wisdom to the next gen or to tinker? Perhaps this is a moment where author Richard Martin was right, "Here's to the next generation". Why not start innovation at a young age and cultivate it as they grow. Let them learn the skills that schools do not teach. Let's create lifelong hackers.

We can start with wunderkin hackerspaces, then they can be part of a teen hackerspace agreement, go to a hackerhouse as young adults and as professionals use a traditional hackerspace to create their projects. Then when they have families, they can take their kids to hackerspaces, and so on and so forth.

We can teach life skills, hacks, and tricks, projects, tech advice, life help, and anything else. Hmmm.

Get 'R Done (godMode)

Howdy, everyone. Alright I am just going to brain-spill on the page, and sift through all of it later. After a day of frenzied scrounging and identifying the best places to get this up and running, 300 evernote pins, and figuring out the best plan of attack, and getting the fearless commanders together (Godschmanders, for anyone who gets the joke), I figured now would be an opportune time to just get some thoughts organized in a somewhat coherent string of words. No promises though.

SO. IQ Co-Op is looking to bootstrap their way to awesomeness, not that it is a small task, but it is the prerogative nonetheless.  So on the first order of business.

The Game Plan:

We are going to start out with the most doable thing first, we are creating a switchboard to connect hosts with hackers. This can be for coworking space, coliving space, or looking to up hackerspace membership.

-Simultaneously-

We are going to also going to be starting the first of hopefully many hackerspaces across the globe. We will also have meeting rooms to connect hackerspaces with one another (thank you Skype and *even better* Google+ hangouts)


-Then-

We will start the true IQCO HackerHouses, with working, living, and maker spaces.*

* This will also be the time that we start marketing freelance hackers as a "think tank" service to other large companies.


Next Steps

So this week, we will be speaking with StartupDigest Colorado, looking at an office with Scrib in Boulder, CO, and incorporating.


Coming Soon: 

We will be discussing the nitty-gritty of our hacker space, getting it up and running, and throwing a wicked sweet rent party for entrepreneurs and hackers in the Boulder area.


I will keep you all updated.

Cheers,

IQ CO Mgmt