Should You Kill Your Business?

Business Brain, the Show for entrepreneurs episode 510 for Wednesday, December 20, 2023. Greetings, folks and welcome to Business Brain, the show where we take a topic or three, we crunch it, we dissect it, we look at it in order to keep tuning our business brains together, which keeps us all living those charmed lives. Sponsors for this episode include gusto.com businessbrain that's where you're go to get three months of payroll, benefits, admin and more. Totally free. We'll talk more about that in a little bit. For now, here in Durham, New Hampshire, I'm Dave Hamilton.

And out here in Lafayette, California, I'm Shannon Jean. How goes it, man?

It goes. Yeah. Yeah. No complaints. It's. Yeah. Rocking and rolling, getting ready for the, for the, you know, the timing of the holidays. The holidays and all that stuff coming off.

I'm coming off of a long weekend, terrific weekend, but two big parties, one Friday night, one Saturday night. And I'm, I hate to say I'm still recovering. Oh, but good, good, Great events, great to get together with everybody and it.

Is nice to kind of hang.

I love it.

Yeah. Yeah, it's good, it's good. You and you, you're a very social person, aren't you?

Pretty social, yeah.

Yeah.

We have lots of, you know, for different friend groups and people that we hang out with and I really enjoy it. I think it's great and like I said, love connecting. One of the, I said it this weekend. One of the best parts of life is hanging out with people that you care about, laughing, joking around. You know, we had Santa at my house on Saturday night and everybody, you know, making people go sit on his lap and all that kind of stuff. Fun, laughter and good food, good friends.

I need to be better that I'm, I'm not. I, like, I am, I am, I have learned to be, I am a naturally shy person. I'm an introvert. I have learned how not to be shy. But it, I don't go out of my way to like, invite people to my house and, and I, I feel like I'm missing out on kind of some of that, especially as we're entering this empty nesting and all that stuff.

I, I would, that's what I was going to say. With now my kids gone and like, you know, Renee, my wife, really wanted to, you know, big Thanksgiving, but it gets harder because everybody's doing their thing and my kids are doing. So, you know, we, we, we have a group of people, we hang out, we take our dogs to the park every day at like 4:00'. Clock. And it was like 20 of those people. And we said, hey, come on over. And we had friends giving and dogs giving one big. Yeah, dogs giving one big long table with, you know, 18 people at it. And it was amazing. And it was a, just a wonderful way to start the holidays because. And you know, and then we went around and, you know, somebody said, hey, let's go around and say what we're thankful for. And it was pretty magical, man. There was a couple of older folks that had lost their spouses in the last year.

Yeah.

And, and being able to be there and have that sense of community, it was great. And it's actually something I miss from having a bunch of employees and running a business is that going into work and seeing everybody and how was your weekend?

And talking and it's, it's interesting that you say that because I, I've been thinking about this a lot lately and I've noticed that the people that I consider my friends, like I have, I have lots of people who are friends, but the people that I see regularly and, and hang out with regularly are people that are either in my family or that I do some kind of work with. And it could be like playing in bands is certainly, you know, part of that. Like, I very much enjoyed the, not only the playing of the music, but the hanging out with the people. Like set breaks are just as enjoyable for me as the playing right. You know, when it's. Especially with the right band. And in fact, we had, we had somebody in, we had Johnny D in our, in our pre show chat that. And he is somebody that I've done both with. He worked for us for a while and he's worked in the industry for a while. But I also play in a band with him. But it's like I was wondering, I'm like, should I have more, should I have people that I don't play in a band with that I don't work with, that I hang out with? And if so, when would I fit this into my schedule?

Well, I will tell you that, yeah, it is work. It takes work and time and you have to put yourself out there. But it's just like I liken it to people. When you go to the office, we would hang out, we did our Friday barbecues. You do those kinds of things. So that interaction is, I think it's critical, but you have to manage it obviously to your time.

Sure.

And, and you know, I've got a little more time on my hands than I have but it. When you have little kids, you're connected with lots of people.

It's sort of automatic because you've.

They've got kids and you're playing sports and you're doing this and theater and this kind of thing, but.

Correct.

I loved that social aspect. I think it's an un. It's not often discussed the social benefits of owning a business because you get to pick who you hang out with.

It's true. It's. Yeah. Because you're picking your employees is what you're saying. Okay, yeah, yeah, I agree. I agree.

And, you know, there was some people that, you know, turned out to be great friends that I'm still in connection today.

Absolutely.

People that we've hired from one of our businesses to work on another business.

Business.

You and I have owned some, so you do get to meet great people. And I would highly recommend putting yourself out there and connecting with more people. And I think it's really beneficial for your wellbeing. And we're in the communication business, customer service business. Like you always say, always. You get better at it if you interact with people more.

All right, look, I want to tell you about our sponsor, Gusto, but instead of reading a script about Gusto's payroll and benefits, I want to tell you what small business owners who use Gusto, what they say. These are people who use Gusto every day. Here's one now with Gusto, I think of payroll as a 32nd job. The website is so friendly and a joy to use. Friendly payroll. I mean, like, that's new. Amy from Utah says, I love Gusto so much. They do our medical, dental, vision, and life insurance. It's so painless. It's like going to the spa. And we have great options and rates, even though we're a super small team. Health insurance, like going to the spa. This is I. This is why we have Gusto on as a sponsor. Right. And here's what Amneet says about Gusto's customer support team. Whenever something comes up, I reach out and literally 24 hours later, they tell us what to do or assure us they've already handled it for us. Friendly humans, smart technology. This is great. And the list goes on. And right now, because you're a listener of business brain, you get three months free when you go to Gusto.com businessbrain Yep. Three months of payroll, benefits, admin and more. Totally free. I mean, like, we gotta go do this right now. Shannon. Again, that's Gusto.com businessbrain three months of payroll, benefits, admin and more. Totally free. Go check it out. Gusto.com businessbrain and our thanks to Gusto for sponsoring this episode. All right, Shannon. So that was a nice kind of heartfelt and heartwarming conversation we had at the beginning of the show there. I. I want to. We're going to destroy everybody here.

Darker, darker waters.

It's going to get to be a little darker. Yeah. So I was having a conversation with a friend recently, business owner. So it turns out I do have friends who I don't, but I make. We sort of work together. Ish. But he was lamenting how this year's been slow in general, you know, for his business specifically. But. But kind of the market in general, there may be. The last few weeks is looking better than the entire year has looked. But, you know, in terms of the markets. But. And also last year, you know, we pre. Before all the COVID lockdowns, like 2019, things were rocking, you know, and then we went into those lockdowns and things slowed down for a hot second. And then at least for those of us in the online business world, the money just poured. You know, I called it the silver lining of COVID I don't want to.

Go back to that similar experience.

Right. Yeah, but. But there was. At least the money was flown and it was, you know, there were a lot of reasons for it, but one of them was the government was pumping money into the economy.

We've given all that money back. Inflation now, but that's the problem at the time.

Correct? Yeah. But it kept people employed as. As opposed to paying it in unemployment. Right. So, like, that was fine. And then also for those of us in businesses online, unlike the people in, say, the service business, the money didn't have anywhere to go in the service and travel business and all of that. And so it flowed. All of the money that was there, plus the extra money flowed online, and it was great. And then, you know, the reality set in and the economy softened and et cetera, et cetera. And it's cyclical and it's normal. And we've seen this before, not the COVID thing before, but, you know, we've seen down cycles in the economy. And some businesses last, some businesses don't last. Sometimes there's consolidation, there's all the things. And he was saying to me, he's like, yeah, you know, we're down this year, and we were even down a little last year. And I'm like, yeah, man, same. Like, I have, I have no reserve. I mean, I'm not happy to share it.

But it's good to share it, though.

But it is good to share it. Like, we will write down a loss for Backbeat Media this year. Not a terrible loss, but it's a little bit, you know, and it's certainly not the first time. And it's not something that we're panicking about. We've seen it before. But I share it because I know that there's people out there in your businesses that are going to do the same thing. And it's. It, it's how it is. And my friend was saying this to me and he's like, you know, but, but I feel okay, because I have enough Runway, I can keep the business going for two more years. And I, I, you know, I, I have a. Yeah, this was a loaded comment because I, and I'm, I have a, A good relationship with this person. So I was able to say, okay. Hey, wait, though, like, if. What app. What happens after that? Like, you, it's good. You have the Runway. That's amazing. But what are you using it for? Are you using it to, to get you to the site of the crash.

Or, or, you know, that's a crazy framework to think about.

Yeah. I mean, there's my, my pilot friends always tell me about twin engine planes. You folks aren't going to want to hear this, but in pilot circles, this is universally known that people ask, what's the second engine for in a, in a, you know, in a twin engine plane? And they say, oh, it gets you to the side of the crash. Yeah, yeah. Because you need both engines to go. So if he's got one engine, is it like, what are you going to do with that? Two years of Runway to ensure that you're profitable and that thriving, not just surviving until the end, you're thriving past that. Because if you don't have that plan, end it now.

That's right.

End it now and take that money and do something else with it that is good for you and your employees and all of that. Two years from now and it might not be the same employees. Like, you know, I get all that. Yeah, yeah.

If you're. That's why the title of this episode is going to be should you kill your business? Because of course, you know, are you, are you putting off making, you know, brutal decisions? You don't want to lay people off. You've got leases that have a couple years to run. Well, you can go. Certainly you should think about negotiating those leases. Even if that's, even if you have to pay them out it's certainly cheaper if you're losing. Well, I don't know.

You get.

You gotta, you gotta look at the numbers. Is the business just skating by? But, but you and I know from personal experience, Dave, if you have that kind of framework and something happens and you take your eye off the business, thinking it's just going to continue to run. It's not going to happen. Oh, no, you're going to be really disappointed. And you're not going to be. I would say in two years, you're going to be way deeper in the hole than you are today.

I've been there. I did that. Yeah. I mean, I took my eye off the ball with the businesses when my kids were kind of in what I call that critical time that you never get back with them, that, you know, the, the just pre high school years when they're like humans but don't have huge interests outside of the house. Absolutely. Yeah. And. And I, I don't regret it, and I would almost certainly make the same choice again. However, I am aware of what that meant. And there was a point in time, you know, whatever, seven, eight years ago, where it was like, oh, man, I got to, like, I got to put my ey the ball. And, and that's, to me, that's like, that's inspiring note, like, that little bit of panic is like, all right, this is my fault, and I can, I. I can fix it.

So, yeah, I had, I had a, A comment from a. Somebody that I'm working with the other day, and they said, you know, everything with worth doing is tinged with the edge of fear.

Right.

And so, you know, like you said, oh, man, I got to jump back into this thing. I got to push myself. I got to get that. And yeah, if you're thinking, okay, I got two years to kind of ride this out, and you don't have a plan or a system, riding it out.

Isn'T what you want to do.

Yeah, I mean, maybe you're going to sell it. Maybe you're going to. I don't know. I don't know. That doesn't sound like a very good use of your time, and it doesn't sound like good use of money. I mean, certainly I've renegotiated leases before when things didn't work out with, with locations and, you know, they're used to that discussion. It's not like you're just telling them to go pound sand. I would, I would argue that you could probably get 50% off or at least to tell them, hey, we're Going to close this place down, please put it up for rent and see if you can lease it out.

My remainder out. Yeah, exactly.

So, so yeah, I think that because the thinking is now, otherwise you're just pushing that stuff out two years, you're.

Going to, oh, you're kicking that can down the road. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it, it, it is worth. And my friend was, he was like, oh my gosh, thank you for saying that. And, and it really did. Like I think there will be a positive outcome from this, but it's one of those things where it is worth talking this out with someone because you, we. I don't, I don't mean to point fingers. Like I know that when I point 1 out, 3 are pointing back at me. You know, we don't necessarily hear our own words objectively and a lot of it is like you said, the excuse like, well, I don't want to lay people, I don't want to make hard decisions. So I'm just going to kick this can down it.

And I've done that same with letting people go that you just know or stopping. I've worked with my wife for I don't know, 15, 20 years now and I'm always about a year behind making some crucial decisions. She'll say, hey, you should get out, you should go, you should leave because these people don't need you here anymore. Or this, this market is dried up. You should go start another business. And sure enough, I'm always like, no, no, no, no, no, I can do it.

Yeah, I can fix this, I can fix it. Yeah.

And I'm going through one right now. I mean I've rode a great wave. Talk about the down business. Like the handbag business is just like non existent now was. We've done millions of dollars in, in business. It was a terrific business, but I probably should have moved out of it about a year ago. And so now I'm sitting here going, okay, how do I do this? So now I started talking to my accountant the other day about is there a way to donate a business and what the benefits are?

Get a write down for that somehow.

Yeah, I'm gonna, I have a really great charity nonprofit that I've worked with, with this company and I'm, I've, I'm trying to figure out is there some benefit for them, benefit for me. And if it, if it does happen, I'll certainly talk about it.

Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Well, I'm sorry to hear that. That it's, you know, a bit, it's.

Normal, it's a thing.

Normal. Right.

And my part of my problem is, is that I then I look internally all the time, oh, I'm doing something wrong here.

It's not working sometimes that's true. Like, like, like for me, seven or eight years ago, like, that was like, right. Certainly the market does what the market does. But yes, I took my eye off the ball with that. Like that, that I looked at it and it was like, oh, I can fix this by simply paying attention. Correct.

You know, it's a little different than right. And one of the ways that I've realized that it's not me, it's just the economy and people are not buying $1500, $2000 handbags as much as they were when. Before COVID and during COVID with stimulus money. Yeah. And that goes back to kind of where we started about being connected. Now you're very well connected with your industry peers.

Absolutely.

And that's crucial. It's very important for me because then I can hear these discussions and oh, you're down as well. Okay. It's not just me. It's not even my market or business that I'm in. It's just the economy in general.

Now, it may be on the way back up. We hit some records in the last week here.

We did.

And, and, and you know, being in the business of selling advertising. Right. We, we are. I, I always say that we are a leading indicator of both down and up economies because when people run out of, start running out of money, they cut their marketing budgets immediately. But it is one of the first things that comes back when they have money again. And we're like, Q4 has been pretty soft the last two weeks. We've been tearing our hair out here. Like, I have not stopped. It's just been crazy. Now that's a good thing. It's. Yeah, it's good. But it's like, oh, okay, people think they have money now. Let's, you know.

Yes.

Now let. Check with me in two months. I'll let you know if they actually have money. Right. But, but things have loosened up a little bit in, in terms of the sentiments of spending. We'll see if it continues. But yeah, it's been fascinating. So. Yeah. And just in case anybody is listening who is impacted by the decisions that I make, and I know there are many of you out there, the folks who work for me, the shows that we represent, this is not one of those euphemistic conversations where a friend is actually me. It's not me. I'm not thinking about shutting down my business. Yeah, right, right. Like it's all good. This was actually a conversation with a friend in a related but different market. So.

Yeah, yeah. So if you, you know, how's your year been with your business? Whenever you're in your service business, product, business, e commerce, you know, feedback at BusinessBrain show, we'll talk about, we can share your experience and anonymize it, of course, and talk about it on the show. We'd love to hear from you and I appreciate hearing from any sharing any experience that you have. It helps us all.

Absolutely. Yeah. Feedback at BusinessBrain show. And of course, check out Gusto. Com BusinessBrain. I'm really going to do this. This seems like I got to do it. So have a good week. Keep living that charmed life. We'll see you next week.