about starting their own businesses i'm your whole sleeping engelen today i am joined by a phenomenal guest she is a former corporate executive turned entrepreneur she's the c e o of her own business and we're going to talk about th business and then we're going to kind of morph into some of the issues the lessons learned over actually running her own business so without any further delay i'm going to invite and welcome kathy lee to the show thank you very much they aren't i'm so excited to have you on conversation with my sister not long ago about why both of us kind of went into health care type fields and you realize when you have three out of four grandparents that come from the west indies and how prestigious of this to work in the health care field and be a healthcare provider i realize how i was surrounded by people who wanted to serve other people my mother started out as a dental assistant and then she became a hospital administrator  kings county hospital in harlem hospital my father who is a motor men for the m t a in new york he would never leave the house without a science fiction book and my aunt who is my father's was my father's sister in law she was the second black woman to graduate from yale medical school and she was a pioneer in sickle cell research and treatment and she was an idol for me so i the first thing i did was to go to school was a bio major pre med and to you know just getting into that grind and looking forward to it but like a lot of people who study they get tripped up by organic lemon and then you're thinking oh oh maybe not going to get i middle school but there are you know and still read professions that i can get into so i went to work in the lab in the clinical lab i trained at st mary's hospital in brooklyn and became license and i was running emergency test test in a hospital so you do your analysis sima tala g blood banking things like that and it's very rewarding because you know a lot of the the exams and the test that you're doing leads to a diagnosis but i did know i wanted to be with people and i wanted to you know get that that interaction with folks so it was in the long term career solution and i was looking for something else yes yes and so i went back to school and got my m b a and i thought maybe i would also go into hospital  what ended up happening though i took a little sideline and a look at those days you had to have some experience in sales despite whatever education you had so i drove a truck for free to lay out of the products so i can yes sell popcorn and things but it was a great experience and i learnt enough and had enough experience on my resume that i was picked up by the pharma companies and started from there so it's really good  progression started in pharmaceutical sales and moved up to marketing research work for some very big companies bayer johnson and johnson merck along the way and yes major companies and  during along the way i had small businesses of my own at home and praise about tennis so i had a tennis business or is designing bags for some of the sports team yes and i sold a lot of things  that again if i ever had the opportunity and once my time in the pharmaceutical industry ended with all of the downsizing and i got a package that was my moment that was just when it started then the p absolutely is all at some point while i was going to business school i bought one of those little pocket books that the title was something like how you could take one hundred dollars and make it make yourself a thousand iraqi millionaire and have some really great tips in it i was single and i didn't know if someone would you know marry me and take you know sweeping up my feet or some sugar daddy so i said i have to take care of myself right and it said by an insurance policy and to get a four one k learn something about the stock market some basic things really important and then it said if you want to move to the next level you might think about owning a business a recession proof cash rich things like car washes real estate and vending machines things like that i tried a few of those things by the way made some money but not enough to live on but i could see that being the natural progression the car wash i would have loved to have done something like that i just didn't have the money for it right so the laundromat was kind of lingering up there in the air and i said well if i ever kind of kind of get the finances together maybe that's the goal and what kind of laundromat if that ever that opportunity presented itself to me and i thought about the progression of the laboratory business when i first got into the business is very manual lots of slides lots of test tube amps and thousands of them coming in at you all day long very not automated at all but the pay was never very good and the hospitals were finding it very difficult to recruit people into those positions and so they were looking for machines that produce the work for them some of it aids the specter of aids and hepatitis coming in no one wanted to be exposed to that so the labs are empty and so the hospital said get me the best technology get me these machines that can do anything and they don't need any people and stressful enough the very last position i had at johnson and johnson was as a brand product manager for the laboratory business and we would sell these car sized analyzers that would go into the navy ships big hospitals and they cost two hundred fifty to three hundred thousand dollars apiece it was a big capital investment and my role there was to price those pieces of equipment train the sales people and find ways to move that equipment into their place of business and so when i went looking for the type of equipment that i wanted it had to have that high technology it that it was a natural tie and it had to be at logically friendly it had to be easy to use it had to have prestige specifically about this type of equipment that wound you that made you say ok this is it this is the business i'm going to do for with this business that's the number of technicians outnumber the  salespeople at this particular meeting with the electrolux people there must have been by technicians there to answer questions about how it was wired wow and texting feature how it weighs four for the right amount of water and know the features talk about the features that are at a spin doctor laundromat yes that's the speechwriters terms of the machines as i mentioned they can weigh the clothes and determine exactly how much water can be put into the machine and the benefit to that certainly for the customer is that they don't have to put as much detergent it and that scares a lot of people because they used to seeing a lot of suds and you have to kind of train the customer up to that but they want to see a lot of stuff going on they don't see the action but it's cleaning with the agitation so that's the the first thing second we do have the texting feature we're the only story in the tri state area that has both texting and laundry carts so there's no quarters as well so getting back to the texting we have the capability of texting when the washes done the machines have their own cell phone you could also text the word status at the store and it will tell you if you count of how many are occupied so before you leave the house you know whether or not it's crowded and not you can strap believe that the dryer is have what's called moisture sensing they can tell when there's not enough moisture in the air that means that it's time for cool down as he does damage the fabric that has four temperature settings in it piece from the back and from the the lower part of it the cards in no quid no quarters it's very safe for the customers they don't have to collect them they're safe really from from robbery or anything and i could add all these quilty programs onto it that touch your butt so you can load loyalty programs onto the card themselves so special offers and coupons and any time i advertise outside the staff a code or it's provided on the coupon and the customer is that an opportunity let's talk about the business piece of this is there a way somehow if people who are interested how is that something that is available to other businesses yes so we have partnered with other businesses on it i  the point program to raise money for charities on the one simple wish i calculated all of the people that used our comforter settings on our machines and provided two dollars for every use of that machine and it's all from peter ised wow i can i can tell activity of on any machine all them all and so that was one use of it the chaos where you get the cards also have the allow you platform to advertise your business and because customers have to at some point interact with the machine to load the card to get a new card check their activity they're staring at this ad at least once during the course of the two three hours that they are with their families so that is something else that is available on nationally wonders we're going to take a quick break when we come back i want to pick up on this business piece  and then kathy was ok with you i'd love to kind of forward from some of the lessons that you learned moving into this business and then any tips that you would like to share i'll sort of take a listen that would be fantastic thank you everyone thanks so much for tuning in and we'll be right back introducing simply supreme increase your energy increase your stamina be sure to sign up for specials in great deal deal marketing can skyrocket traffic to your website and your business from i catch ing promotional ads and client testimonials to whether they are training series that showcase your expertise give your brand  blues visit staging exacts dot com today get your show me here get your business on the map technology and some of the smart technology but i'd like to share we're going to seriously quick tips any lessons learned going from their corporate environment into starting your own business anything that you had anticipated first i had not really anticipated that some of the people that i had to work with a partner with did not necessarily have their act together for example the space that i occupy used to be a carpet remnant store a thousand square feet almost one thousand square feet and the landlord had decided they were just going to drop a wall and make two stores out of it but they had a relationship with the township and so they thought i don't need any plants and i'm just doing this and as so when my neighbor occupied one half of the store and got set up i come in  see the space sign the lease and the township said oh no your landlord needs to file electrical plans because of this fire we have no way of knowing where the wires are and we're not letting split anything so why don't you wait until we get the plants from your landlord and so then the three to five month build out plan turned into a fifteen month build out plan and so now i'm in the position where i have to negotiate with the landlord about the rent for the lease that i just got finished signing the public utilities i did not anticipate that but that was a really trying time but i got through it and we did open other things that i didn't anticipate i didn't i didn't realize helm of the perception of laundromats was so poor that it took a year and a half to find the space that i'm in right now and it was far away from where i live because i was in middlesex lived in middlesex stories and mercer everyone assumes that i'm from the trenton hamilton area and i said n you know anyone here had to get here because everyone else said no as soon as you said the word laundromat the hair stood up on people's head and instead i don't want those kind of people here i don't care if i have an empty store i will leave it empty because i don't want people hanging out i don't want any robberies crime anything else and it was me personally insulting that you come from a metropolitan area and just about everyone uses in whatever class but there was such a resistance to it that i sed it was no for a long time before i found the spot i was said i'm glad that you share that because maybe it's no use particular industry but when you start a new business it's oh you're going to get ready to hear a whole lot of who's all of a lot of them you know one or two and then so what do you do and we talked about this offline you know the thick skinned that we both i love it not going to stop it you know you had to just keep moving until you figure it out is not what we i learned in corporate america that you learn how to navigate it's very true and learn how to make it through and you talked earlier about those you know a quarter of a million confidence level that comes with that so anyway i say all that to say those are the kinds of things that i think help us as we go through them the ups and downs of running your own business and let's get to some tips any tips that you'd like to share specifically related to if you're thinking about moving into your own business i think that it's really important to get us feedback from as many people as you possibly can and be able to take that feedback no one's necessarily trying to kill your dream but have you have your business but tied up if you're nursing a small business on the side and you're thinking about taking that leap into the business ask yourself the question and be honest is this business making any money if i'm breaking need better because if you're still at a nine to five job you mean i realize that you're taking on water in that boat and you have bought a printer using your car to make the sales calls and there's money going out of the household and if you leave the job and you're not breaking even that something has to be patched that  an income statement you know it's there's lots of templates online and i do some volunteer work for score in the small business association has lots of free stuff online do a little income statement for yourself and it's and see where you are and if you're not going to get to that break even in a reasonable amount of time take a step back and yes and certainly in a business that has a big capital expenses a restaurant laundromat car repair or when you need a lot of and as maybe a tie into that make sure your credits straightened out because when my husband found out we had to have a lien on our house so i could get this equipment well i don't want to thank him and it wasn't that conversation so just to say that having something on the credit report that maybe certainly not your fault or whatever clean that up because if you need the money you're going to have to you know have that looking pretty good the thing i would say is i think it's important that you have some type of written plan it's a lot of people think they don't need one but it's kind of your bible to get your pathway to follow in to the next stage take the time to put something like that together and know where you want to go who's going to be doing what you say to be specific i mean i think you and i know exactly that since you have a yes thank you to have a business plan this is what my product or service does this is what my customer looks like this is what i expect to break even the so much money i'm going to need to start up as in who is going to be doing what this my my structure and how much money i need to eat successful yes and you just write it off in little pieces it's again there are lots of templates online a lot of free services to try to get it together you're going to need it if you want to get money from the bank do you for franchise or anything else so that's really kind of important a little side thing i think it's also important of advice make sure the families on board they can give you a lot of lip service always so happy you're happy to do a little nose right but if you're assuming that your kids are going to get up at three o'clock in the morning it could donuts or something else or most somebodies lawn because you want to start your own business know what they're you're changing their their whole standard of living you may not be there for their field hockey games and stuff things change you need to talk to them make sure that they're really on board with everything i think that when we talk about business we leave that discussion  and that's a major discussion that's a major consideration house is going to affect my house because your money is going to change always where you're not you know when it's not coming in every two weeks x amount of dollars suddenly the dynamic you see how about that and i think that's everything because we still have to manage there and then keep our heads together as we go out and run shows you know keep our businesses together and figure  smoothly for myself because sometimes people say oh yes there she is she's going to do that i know she's going to start their business but don't when it happens it's like god right she did it she did it was going to her now to me that that that's a difficult thing i think it's also important if you're stepping aside aside to realize that when you were in corporate you had all these specialists doing all these great thing you had lawyers you had finance people are countless you have to do that all yourselves if you're not killed up be prepared to pay for that or else you're going to be wearing an orange jumpsuit and i get it all together all of that is so everything we talked about that when you're in the corporate environment yet it's difficult but you only had to do your piece of it there were fifty was compliance it was legal there were that you know there were so many and there is a puzzle and then suddenly when you are the c e o in your own c suite right all of a sudden you're absolutely right all right now you've got to go pay an attorney you've got to pay an accountant to make sure those things are all right you know as you said you can do some research so you're generally familiar yes but you still need a team of people that it's so on trend i didn't even think about you know we're also busy i can get a text message to let me know what the thought of those kinds of things are so congratulations on the business thank you and i love that it's an and give me a call because i'm to your point we have a very unique space and it didn't occur to me that i had to i could leave it as a was and be a sort of fantastic as it was to have networking meetings exec's dot com please feel free to reach out to kathy she gave you her phone number will have been up on the screen as well reach out to her support her business thank you to all the sponsors for today's show and we look forward to seeing you again in the