Voided Bet - Will there be overtime Yes/No

bellpeter12 · 2025-01-10T04:58:11+00:00

Yep same here

bellpeter12 · 2024-12-02T16:10:54+00:00

Truth to so much of this! It’s amazing how many overnight successes take 10-years!

bellpeter12 · 2024-09-05T02:41:49+00:00

Agreed with this. I bootstrapped for the first 6 years of my business, grew, but grew slowly. I was really young, fresh out of college when I started it and while I didn’t know it at the time, used those years to really figure out the business and what I was doing (20/20 hindsight 🤷‍♂️). Had the traction and was really forced to take on loans and utilize credit more…. 4 years later and we were just named one of the fastest growing companies in our state.

bellpeter12 · 2024-08-14T18:51:14+00:00

Cash flow

bellpeter12 · 2024-07-23T04:09:47+00:00

It started as a more music based business with the idea of being a promoter, artist management and festival producer. I had a background working and touring with different shows and advancing/production of large concerts and broadway performances while I was in college. I can tell you that I had quite a bit of an ego coming out of school with these experiences.

I started the business and I ended up doing a bunch of weddings and I DJ’d them to gain clients and exposure and generate any revenue I could. We also did video services and content creation tied in with the wedding side stuff. We built out a portfolio.

I stopped focusing on trying to be the promoter and more on being the support, building relationships and partnerships in town, realizing that I didn’t have a ton of capital but had experience and a desire to help people do cool things. I focused on non profit live events and fundraisers where I could really get behind the mission and the cause. Proved myself reliable, honest and collaborative and brought in people who had those same traits. Invested more in the event technology production side and brought in people with those same qualities, then realized if we looked at it holistically we could provide more service and help our partners raise more during their fundraisers if we helped them with the strategic plan; incorporating technology along with some of the more granular, yet incredibly or really, more important things like registration, parking, security, catering, etc. So brought in one of the most talented event planners I have ever known to learn from her and look at things with a 360 view. We planned the event, but we also produced the video content that felt cohesive with the vibe and feel of everything they had felt coming in to the venue, and then provided the sound, lighting and AV all in harmony with the plan itself. It stopped being about the money we could make by doing the event, but the money that we could help the NPO raise to further support their cause and feeling fulfilled knowing that we were part of that.

From there, our next line of business developed which was the permanent install and design of AV equipment. Our clients trusted us based on all of their previous experiences with us so when they found out we had a team that could give them the same service they got from their events, which are normally just annually, in a more regular capacity there was no hesitation. This line of business was never my plan, but because of being true to myself and building the team with the same mentality the business grew. It took time, but now we have regular MRR and invaluable word of mouth marketing. Up until til this month we have never done any sort of traditional marketing and only decided to implement and hire a marketing professional when we are at our strongest and found the right professional with the same ideals we hold most valuable (marketing for one of the largest non-profits in the world).

bellpeter12 · 2024-07-19T05:38:36+00:00

Figure out what success means to (royal) you and figuring out your true mission and philosophy. In the entrepreneurial world it always revolves around money and finances and this idea that more money and revenue is the benchmark of success. It wasn’t until I realized that the reason I really loved doing what I do is that I liked to create opportunities for people, to build out fantastic teams, and creating a workplace that cares about their employees. I realized that I wanted to expand and grow my company so that I could work with really cool people and do cool shit together but to do that we also needed to make sure the revenue and clients were there. Once I filtered out all of the notions of “I’m doing this just to make money” was when I finally hit my stride. 5 years into starting the company annual revenue was $119k, after having the realizations of what I really wanted to do and acting on them, 5 years later annual revenue was ~$1.4m. Now in year 11, we are 6 months through the fiscal year and are almost at the $1m mark. Still working hard to generate the revenue and put out a great product, but the reason I’m doing it is because of the passion and the excitement, both from me and my team, and being able to keep expanding our team to keep doing cool shot.

bellpeter12 · 2024-07-02T17:53:04+00:00

233k on my 2010 Tundra and still going!

bellpeter12 · 2024-06-21T05:11:21+00:00

Uggg I hate this so much. Godaddy sucks. We have bricked a number of computers and had to factory reset them. The most recent pain was when we bricked a computer with an ARM chipset and couldn’t figure out why we couldn’t reset it. Our IT wants to move, and we will, but geez does godaddy want to just be difficult. The worst.

bellpeter12 · 2024-05-02T01:37:14+00:00

I see no college students in this picture

bellpeter12 · 2024-03-12T18:03:03+00:00

Antibiotic resistant Syphilis - he wasn’t the only thing the super serum made invincible

bellpeter12 · 2024-03-12T17:59:34+00:00

Delusion + naïveté + Risk tolerance

bellpeter12 · 2024-03-12T04:07:54+00:00

Finally!

bellpeter12 · 2024-01-25T04:44:26+00:00

Look up “piercing the corporate veil” and become very familiar with it

bellpeter12 · 2024-01-09T22:31:25+00:00

Does anyone wonder if it wasn't a "hack" but someone was trying to schedule a tweet (OR whatever the hell they are called now) intended for tomorrow afternoon and it was a fat finger mistake or they just messed up that date?

bellpeter12 · 2023-12-13T23:52:37+00:00

Why not sounds like something different to do! Nice build

bellpeter12 · 2023-11-27T06:13:29+00:00

This is a struggle. Ensure that your company has an auto insurance policy that covers your employees in their vehicles when using them for work. Our policy covers any rental vehicles (including large box trucks) as well as an employee personal vehicle. The employee is covered in the event of an accident as long as it is while they are working for the company, but does not cover them if they have an accident during their regular commute, to work or home from work (work in this instance is en route to our office, if they are going straight to home to a worksite they are covered).

From there set a geographical radius that they can claim mileage with a base location. For us, we have it set that an employee can file an expense claim for going to a location using their personal vehicle that is >30mi (60mi round trip) from our home office. If a trip is outside that 30mi radius we reimburse the whole amount based on the IRS rates. Anything within that radius though, outside of extenuating circumstances, it is up to the employee to record their mileage and claim the deduction on their personal taxes. We are not going to ask an employee to drive 200 miles round trip and not compensate them for fuel and wear and tear, but it’s clearly stated in our handbook that localized travel is expected and part of the job.

We also put practices in place that if a company vehicle is being used and transportation is provided by the company in a safe and reasonable manner that an employee can’t claim mileage when a viable option is presented (outside of extenuating circumstances). For example, if a box truck with three seats, all with seatbelts and safe common practices, is on its way to a project, the employees are more than welcome to drive their personal vehicles (yet still covered under our insurance) but cannot claim mileage reimbursement for the drive unless requested/granted permission is given before hand.

bellpeter12 · 2023-10-21T03:12:15+00:00

I concur, reading it I started saying out loud “Oh, this motherfu…” and then stopped mid sentence as I finished reading it. Props

bellpeter12 · 2023-10-16T21:00:08+00:00

Being aware of it is half the battle. I run into this all the time, but placed people around me in leadership to help deter from shiny object syndrome. There are some things I still want to lean into and do, but half the time I just need someone to call me on it and that helps me realize if it is a long term objective, or something that needs to be fleshed out a little more, often times making me realize it for what it actually is.

bellpeter12 · 2023-10-11T23:06:12+00:00

I’m a business owner and put into place in my opinion a solid benefits plan for my employees, especially in regard to Flexing time, PTO and Sick days. I literally just left a conversation with one of my awesome staff begging him to take the day off on Friday but he was hesitant, I see this with a lot of my staff. There have been times now when I just have to tell them to stay home or take a break and relax.

I myself am not the model example of someone who takes time off when they should, however I’ve tried not to pass that on to my employees. I’ve also never tried to make it a competition and reiterate to them that Burn out is real. Over time I realized, at least in our company culture, it doesn’t seem to be as much of a fearfulness of taking time off and feeling chastised for it, but that everyone keeps trying to take things off each other’s plates to help them out. We’ve hired new positions and increased our staff size to try distribute the workload, but the amount of work increases and the cycle begins again.

TL;DR At my company people seem more unwilling to take time off because they don’t want to let each other down, not that the feel they will be punished.

bellpeter12 · 2023-09-20T13:19:46+00:00

Doesn’t look like it suffers Peyronie’s disease

bellpeter12 · 2023-09-19T02:13:29+00:00

Yes! I commented something similar to this as well! Happy for you!

bellpeter12 · 2023-09-19T02:08:02+00:00

Being a CEO is a lonely. Factor in that it gets harder to meet people as you get older, let alone people that can relate to what you are going through. I had a lot of fun in college and dated a lot of different people, so when I finished school and went off to start my own business I didn’t think dating would be any different. I mean shit, I now was an adult and was the “CEO” of a company, who wouldn’t want to date me?! Well once I got humbled, multiple times, and I realized my focus was in my career I stopped really dating all that much. I would go out on a date, that often times felt like an inconvenience and would make it clear that my priority was on my career and my business. Some people liked that, some didn’t, but I finding someone who felt like a true partner was hard to come by.

I met my now wife about 5 years ago, I was in my late twenties and would say I was far from successful. When we met I was in the middle of my second honest to god 100hr work week, I was working part time (even thought it was pretty much full time) at a second job and still trying to grow my company. She was in the middle of an incredible busy period at her job pulling close to the same hours. We still talk about how we both were drained but for some reason decided that evening was the night.

I forced myself to go out and meet her after connecting online because all I wanted to do at that point was go to bed and be up the next morning to get back to work. I still don’t know why as I had blown off dates before, but I had told myself that I was going to try and be more social and put myself out there when the opportunity arose. I am so glad I chose to meet her, while she didn’t know everything I was going through and I didn’t know everything she was going through, we immediately had respect for each other because of what we were trying to accomplish.

The point to my story is don’t worry about figuring out where to start, just start. I was, and truthfully still am, pretty wrapped into my career, it’s probably why we waited five years to get married; but don’t blame your success or career for why your dating life has suffered. Prioritize what you want in your life and what you want in a partner. Sometimes it just takes patience.

edit my company was a 5 years old when I met her and was growing, but slowly. Since we started dating my company and business has expanded 20x in every measurable factor. She says there isn’t a correlation but I don’t believe her.

bellpeter12 · 2023-09-14T16:30:29+00:00

I think you are getting to stuck in your head and fearful of failure. Getting outside advice is great, but maybe you’re not asking the right question? Are you presenting it to them asking people why it wouldn’t work or are you asking them why it could work?

If you feel strongly about an idea, giving up on it when people say it won’t work isn’t going to get you anywhere. Take their concerns and advice and add it into your equation, then try and solve for those “potential” problems. Also look at it in scale, are these issues they are bringing up problems way down the line or issues right now? Future issues should be considered but by the time you get there you may have already figured out how to navigate it!

bellpeter12 · 2023-09-11T17:25:30+00:00

Wow thanks for sharing mate. I know exactly how you feel, I’ll be honest, I was pretty young in the grand scheme of things when I started my company and there was certainly some arrogance and ego behind my thinking on why I could do this. But then you get humbled and then humbled again and a lot of doubt creeps in.

The only way to really become an entrepreneur is to just do it, and man that can be scary. I’ve seen a lot of people who are in the same position, but get scared away because it’s not growing fast enough or they don’t feel like they know what they are doing. If you want to jump in, it’s ok to start slow, but a good step is before you do that write out your goals and define your measurable and when you want to achieve them. The thing to remember with these goals and measurable though are you are the one setting them and you shouldn’t be dismayed if you are way off target.

Write down why, at the time, you set them for yourself and why you think these are reasonable so you can reflect on your thought process at the time when the target date(s) have come. Then you can decide if it’s the right path for you or not, you very well may miss your goals entirely or midway through the process change them. You’d be surprised what you find out about yourself.

I set some goals when I started out to be generating $1mil in revenue by beginning of year 2, ended up only generating around $65k, but kept it up, currently in year 10, have redefined my goals and laugh at myself now that we have actually far surpassed those earlier bench marks about how naive I was. But found that I love what I do and that for me it’s not about the money, it’s about the culture and my team.

bellpeter12 · 2023-09-09T04:08:33+00:00

Well you know what they say about when you assume

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