Eric | Application Preview
Eric's grant application outlines his plan to hire 8-9 people to help expand his business, which focuses on creating products for Etsy and developing software applications. The funding will be allocated for salaries, office equipment, and raw materials. He aims to enhance product offerings and utilize employee and customer feedback to generate new ideas.
Eric emphasizes his persistence and work ethic, citing his upbringing on a farm and his experience in the U.S. Army as influences on his determination. He shares the development of his software project, Scoreboard Everywhere, which tracks game scores and has evolved into a more versatile app and portable scoreboard. Despite putting significant effort into the project without sales, he believes that with more resources, he can fully realize its potential.
He points out that his business model is distinct, as he offers a diverse range of products and does not face direct competition. Eric plans to continue leveraging his unique designs and customer suggestions to grow his brand, likening his approach to Honda's diversified product strategy.
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General Information
Business Registration Number: NV20232842902
Location: North Las Vegas, NV, United States
Length of Operation: 6-10
Number of Employees: 1-10 Employees
Annual Gross Income: Less than $100k
Annual Gross Expense: Less than $100k
Open to Loans: YES
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Funding Usage
I'm going to use this money to hire 8-9 people, including myself. I need someone for marketing, one person as a general manager, 2-3 people for designing and building products for Etsy, and 2-3 software developers to create and maintain the apps I've already written as well as the apps on my "To Do List". I will perform a "many hats" position, including training everyone on current products. I will divide up $15k-$20k for office equipment/furniture, computers, office supplies, advertising, and other tools/equipment needed. Anything beyond the salaries will go for raw materials for Etsy products, R&D, and business costs such as hosting.
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Business Plan
My growth plans include designing more products for my Etsy store as well as developing software that's been on my "To Do List" for the past decade. I also plan on asking my new employees and potential customers for new product ideas or suggestions. I get many ideas from people wishing a product existed. I also plan to add on any manufacturing capabilities to make my products, as well as hire more people to do more software development as we continue creating new apps and maintaining the apps we've already written. You should invest in me because I don't quit. Some people call that stubborn or hardheadedness, but I don't quit on a project until it's done. I grew up on a farm and I was in the US Army, so I know about hard work and don't shy away from it. I may take timeouts, but I get right back to a project that when I've dealt with anything that interrupted the project. For instance, I've been working on a piece of software I call Scoreboard Everywhere. It started off as a fairly simple mobile app to keep track of game scores, like softball, football, and volleyball, but now you can keep track of sport scores that have more than 2 teams playing, share the score with anyone that has access to the internet, and I've developed a physical scoreboard that's portable, battery powered, and wireless so you can share that score with people in the stands around you. It took me about 3 years of nights and weekends to get it where it's at now. That was 5 years ago, I'm now back at it making the scoreboard easier to build, rewriting the mobile app to be used on iOS and Windows as well as Android, and I'm rewriting the web app, as well. And I'm doing that without a single sale of the app or the portable scoreboard. And, yes, I do actually know when to quit, but I also know that this product has possibilities I just haven't been able to tap into yet because it's not my fulltime job to work on, and I don't have the marketing skills or the manufacturing ability to make it widely available.
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Self Identified Competition
My business has so many different aspects that I don't have any direct competitors, as none of them produce as wide ranging products as I do. My business model is different than most, in that I don't have one specific product area. I'm more like Honda, where my products are diversified among various industries. Most of my products stem from projects I started for myself and am reusing the designs for my business. Other products have been suggestions by friends, family, or even strangers that want the product to exist so they can have it.
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