Chapter 17 Why can't the little girl's "match" be sold?

The little match girl (or Match Girl for short) lives a life of poverty with her opportunistic entrepreneurial parents.Over the years, her parents tried and failed many different businesses, and those failed investments left them with considerable liabilities. However, Match Girl's parents are type A people who are loose and never give up.In fact, they had started another new speculative venture, and they believed that this time it would be a turnaround.The new business is to sell cheap counterfeit brand-name lighters to passers-by on crowded street corners in Los Angeles. Although Match Girl's vagabond outfit can't match the decadent beauty of supermodel Kate Moss, but as the number one salesperson in the sales department, this outfit can be considered commensurate.She has to admit that the sales department is a one-person department, but the good thing is that she has the flexibility to set her own sales volume, decide which customers she wants to target, and develop her own marketing strategy, without being hampered by micromanagement from her parents (another The advantage is that she can immediately distribute the award for the best salesman of the month to herself).

The fiscal year of the new business starts on January 1, so New Year's Day is her first day of work.Although Match Girl's marketing plan does not include regular holidays and work, she also understands that a business that is just starting to operate requires a positive attitude and a high degree of market exposure.So, Match Girl took the bus to Los Angeles, picked a street corner that seemed ideal, and began to set up a stall outside the bar to sell lighters. Unfortunately, she found the streets deserted and unseasonably cold.To make matters worse, the California legislator only recently banned smoking in bars, which means many of her potential guests are non-smokers.But there was something even worse. Half an hour later, it started to rain heavily, and the round and big raindrops hit the match girl. It didn't take long for her to be soaked, and she was so cold that she had to rely on the fire of the lighter to keep warm.

Holding a cheap counterfeit lighter, she moved closer to her face and stared at the tiny flame.The warm fire made her feel good, and the smell of propane made her dizzy. In the warm, dancing flames, she imagined that she was in a more thoroughly regulated market, and that her business was profitable. She imagined herself with a more careful rollout of her business plan, with more job security, fully vested employee stock options, and a retirement plan.She huddled on a street corner by the little flame, letting herself be imaginative until the fuel in the lighter container ran out. She wrung out the rain from her hair, snapped another lighter, and resumed her daydream.This time her vision included a profit-sharing plan, flexible hours, regular participation in professional seminars, and a fast-track promotion to senior vice president.In the end, she allowed her imagination to become a rambling fantasy in which she sat at the head of a diverse multinational corporation that supplied everything from lighters to acetylene torches to rocket engines.

In this way, the match girl was so absorbed in wandering in the illusion that she forgot the time, the work in hand and the temperature.She sat on the floor and lit the lighters one by one until the stock was gone and none were sold. It was about midnight.Afraid to go home and tell her parents how she had accidentally run out of stock, and she had missed the last bus anyway, she decided to spend the night on the land bridge of the Viaduct. Sadly, no one has seen Match Girl or heard from her since.The next day, police found discarded empty lighter shells scattered under a land bridge to a strangely round pile of rocks outside a corn canning factory.Although the police speculate that Match Girl was washed away by a flood caused by bad weather the night before, some people, especially X-Files fans, firmly believe that she was abducted by aliens, who claim that aliens have a strong influence on small animals. Propane containers are of interest.The disappearance of Match Girl left her parents heartbroken for weeks before they finally made a fortune importing polyester nylon fingerless gloves made in cheap Third World factories.

Having a complete and well-thought-out business plan is very important for any company that is trying its best to succeed.Large corporations routinely hire consultants to help them plan business plans, unfortunately, many small businesses do not invest in the same steps. That's right, if there is no need to raise external funds for operations, there will be no external incentives for the boss of a small company to make a complete business plan.In fact, the boss of a small company may think that writing a business plan is a heavy project.This is just plain wrong. An effective business plan should clearly define the company's long-term vision and short-term goals, and can fully allocate resources to the development of the company; define and clarify the responsibilities and obligations of each level; provide regular monitoring and feedback mechanisms as the company grows .

A good business plan includes the following specific elements: (1) A description of the company and its future development. (2) Outline of the operating structure. (3) State the source of funds in detail. (4) A list of risk factors and counterparties. (5) Analyze the most likely return on investment. (6) Feasible exit strategy. (7) Analysis of operation and forecast. (8) Financial structure. (9) Financial forecast. (10) Product prints, brochures, literature, diagrams, and other auxiliary materials. Match Girl's business selling shoddy lighters on street corners is doomed from the start.Inadequate preparation, shoddy market analysis, heavy environmental constraints, poor marketing strategies, and unfavorable weather were the reasons for the family business' demise.

With a simple business plan, Match Girl's parents would quickly learn that selling lighters on the streets of California would not meet their business goals in the short or long term. A couple who wanted to start a flag business decided to sell flags every Sunday at an outdoor flea market in South Florida.This flea market is open all year round and is always crowded.Also, it seems that decorative flags are becoming more and more common in homes, and they know that there is a ready market for this product. The couple decided to invest about US$10,000 to start a business, but they didn't make any formal business plan before investing the money and opening the stall.

After negotiating with the owner of the flea market, the couple got a pretty good stall location.In order to keep the position, they decided to pay a full year's rent upfront.However, they never thought of asking the other party to guarantee that they could only sell decorative flags exclusively in this flea market. As a result, within four weeks, there were two more stalls selling flags in the flea market.As the weeks passed, other problems emerged.They quickly found themselves grossly underestimating the time it would take to erect and tear down the booth each Sunday.Their inventory capabilities are poor, so there are often too many of some styles and too few of others.Since they never thought about calculating exactly how much it costs to do business, they found out after a year that they were making less than minimum wage.

So the couple tried to rent the booth to others, but the trend of decorative flags has passed, and now even K-mart and Target are selling decorative flags at a lower price.In the end, to get out of the business, they simply donated all of the decorations to local charities, and the money they lost was used as a tax deduction. The business plan has its own effect, and it can help everyone evaluate the company's future performance in advance.The discipline to practice putting things down on paper and analyzing the good and the bad before starting a business can be invaluable and go a long way in preventing future aggravation and distress.

For small companies, a fifty-page business plan is not necessary, but in order to avoid the "Match Girl Mistake", it is very important to write down any basic information about the new business on paper before the company opens Otherwise, the business will soon be wiped out.