After the first two months working for Delirio (our IBG’s t-shirt company) I learned many new business-related concepts. I realized that it is incredibly fulfilling and satisfying to start your own company and being your own boss… but there are many things that you should consider before exposing your brand.
Idea: First of all, in Delirio, we had to accept the fact that for every good idea that we had, there were thousands of persons out there who have the exact same idea. In that regard, we researched the idea from top to bottom, and then simply asked to ourselves: Can we find a unique angle to it?
Plan: Then, comes the plan. The thrill to expose our product to the market made us skip right pass this step, but we always ended up backtracking. After realizing this, we created a business plan, which helped us by guiding our vision and direction as we gained momentum in our entrepreneurial journey.
Who’s on your bus? Jim Collins said it very eloquently, “You are a bus driver. The bus, your company, is at a standstill, and it’s your job to get it going. You have to decide where you’re going, how you’re going to get there, and who’s going with you.” In Delirio there is no defined CEO (it’s probably time to settle one), but we all know that we can’t sell the 100 t-shirts in our own. Can we drive the bus alone or do we need employees?
Appreciating our costumers: We have several problems when defining our target market/ audience since the identity of the brand isn’t really clear. We have to select between two types of designs, and can’t figure out which one will sale faster and suit better to our mission.
Contacts: Having contacts is essential in the business world. Indeed, the most important asset of every company is its people… but not only those from the inside. For instance, after the first two IBG meetings, Sebastian, Ciro and I, thought that we ahd all figured out. We had the company’s name (yahúa), and a lot of enthusiasm. When we met with Fernando García, president of Ink A Poster, to buy some of his company’s designs, we were introduced to reality. Fernando made us see the raw, brutal facts, and changed our childish mindset of what a company means. Moreover, thanks to the friendship he has with my brother, he promised to help us by promoting our brand in Ink A Poster’s website (which is followed by more than 15,000 persons), by giving us their designs for free, and with anything we needed. Nevertheless, he told us that the relationship must be mutually beneficial, and not because he needs the help, but because the purpose of the project is to understand the business world, and we can’t drift from that idea.
Being able to actually payback Fernando by promoting Ink A Poster in Breakthrough is really satisfying. This creates trust and reliability in the relationship, and therefore, we are able to work consistently and with more equity. Nonetheless, in Delirio, we understand that the essence of networking is not whom you know, but who knows you.
Idea: First of all, in Delirio, we had to accept the fact that for every good idea that we had, there were thousands of persons out there who have the exact same idea. In that regard, we researched the idea from top to bottom, and then simply asked to ourselves: Can we find a unique angle to it?
Plan: Then, comes the plan. The thrill to expose our product to the market made us skip right pass this step, but we always ended up backtracking. After realizing this, we created a business plan, which helped us by guiding our vision and direction as we gained momentum in our entrepreneurial journey.
Who’s on your bus? Jim Collins said it very eloquently, “You are a bus driver. The bus, your company, is at a standstill, and it’s your job to get it going. You have to decide where you’re going, how you’re going to get there, and who’s going with you.” In Delirio there is no defined CEO (it’s probably time to settle one), but we all know that we can’t sell the 100 t-shirts in our own. Can we drive the bus alone or do we need employees?
Appreciating our costumers: We have several problems when defining our target market/ audience since the identity of the brand isn’t really clear. We have to select between two types of designs, and can’t figure out which one will sale faster and suit better to our mission.
Contacts: Having contacts is essential in the business world. Indeed, the most important asset of every company is its people… but not only those from the inside. For instance, after the first two IBG meetings, Sebastian, Ciro and I, thought that we ahd all figured out. We had the company’s name (yahúa), and a lot of enthusiasm. When we met with Fernando García, president of Ink A Poster, to buy some of his company’s designs, we were introduced to reality. Fernando made us see the raw, brutal facts, and changed our childish mindset of what a company means. Moreover, thanks to the friendship he has with my brother, he promised to help us by promoting our brand in Ink A Poster’s website (which is followed by more than 15,000 persons), by giving us their designs for free, and with anything we needed. Nevertheless, he told us that the relationship must be mutually beneficial, and not because he needs the help, but because the purpose of the project is to understand the business world, and we can’t drift from that idea.
Being able to actually payback Fernando by promoting Ink A Poster in Breakthrough is really satisfying. This creates trust and reliability in the relationship, and therefore, we are able to work consistently and with more equity. Nonetheless, in Delirio, we understand that the essence of networking is not whom you know, but who knows you.