Daniel Cheung
26
minisidekicks.com
Online Retailer
Dec 2005
My decision to start my own business has come from a natural development in my career and a strong desire to develop myself professionally.
Primarily, this initiative came about through the encouragement of entrepreneurialism by my last employers and with this, the year’s worth of business mentoring and coaching I received from a very close, personal friend of mine, Uncle Ken.
All these factors and with the reading of some self-motivation books, including Rich Dad, Poor Dad; has made me want to work towards creating assets rather than working for pounds per hour or salary basis. At this point, I realised that I wanted this was the key of success for others and ever since, I have embarked on my quest to start my own business since Jan 2005.
MiniSidekicks.com is the online trading name for Fun Creations where we offer a personalised caricature model service for our customers from a photograph.
It is a personalised gift for any occasion whether it is a graduation, wedding, retirement, birthday or even anniversary. We have so many different backgrounds/themes to cater for every occasion the opportunity for business is endless in the retail gift industry.
This type of business has been about for many years but only on a very small scale. It is only recently that a commercial scale of one-off personalised models can created from a photograph!
The personalised caricature model is still a relatively new concept and not many people are aware of this product yet in the UK. These models are better known as bobble-heads in the USA.
The models are designed to appeal to the broadest range of middle class people who wants to give the ultimate present that will leave them laughing and giggling as well as something that will give the “wow” factor and a gift idea that is personalised.
Minisidekicks.com is not my first business idea, I have been working meticulously hard to come up with a new plan every week since Jan 2005! Every idea that has come up, either was too silly, or required far too much funding and was therefore financially not feasible for me to implement at that particular moment in time.
It is gut wrenching to see all the motions for this business go into place especially as this is the first business which I have financially backed.
Minisidekicks.com come out of inspiration as I was bidding for a business to buy towards the end of 2005, in which it sold caricature drawings as a service to its customers. My bid was denied but I did not lose faith in the business, as I loved how the business worked so it spurred me on to find a business, which was similar to it.
Then I remember seeing this service/product whilst I was on vacation, so I thought why not bring it back to the UK by creating a business out of it?
My primary inspiration has to be from a close friend of mine, Uncle Ken. Uncle Ken had achieved the dream and success that many people in life aspire to. His obvious financial disadvantages in the earlier parts of his life did not act as a barrier for him to succeed but more of a catalyst to spur his entrepreneurial spirit and increase his personal success.
His personal experiences and wisdom in life and in business has proven invaluable to the shaping of me as a person and in addition to the way, I approach business and life.
Even though, he is older and wiser than I am, I love learning from this wise man who shares his experiences.
Other inspiration for starting my own business comes from those who have made personal success from nothing including the likes of Michael Dell, Bill Gates, Sir Richard Branson, Sir Alan Sugar, Li Kar-Shing, Huang Guangyu and the newbies such as Alex Tew and James Murray Wells.
I especially respect people, who find new wealth and then are able to part with it in charitable donations to benefit society. Full admiration to Bill and Melinda Gates for the Foundation they have started to help those in need!
During my vacation in 2005, I have always observed one thing with the many different kiosks retailing this service/product - it is never short of attention from the passing trade even when it is closed!
Toyshops, clothes shops, gadget shops, electrical shops and even Nokia and Apple outlets always have trade, but never the same level of interest and awe that customers have when people see these products for the very first time.
I have questioned many retailers about these products, and they are selling hundreds of models to the local market on a daily basis! This is imminent evidence to me, to support a potentially mass market for this business in UK and Globally.
I am therefore quietly confident about my business model and in addition about my products/services.
Planning and knowledge is pivotal to everything one does. I made it a fundamental part of my learning curve to understand the industry first, planned several international trips, and arranged to meet the industry leaders to gain a further understanding of the service/products.
This was a huge financial risk, as nothing was secure, but a risk, which has worked out very favourably for me in terms of exclusivity, knowledge and understanding.
With this understanding, I was able to plan in-depth and test how financially sensitive my business plan was and to start the motions of this business.
A lot of research were carried out into this business venture prior to initiating it. I had to have a full understanding of the caricature drawing industry as well as the caricature models/bobble-heads industry.
A lot of people and companies have approached me, wanting to resell my products, but they do not really know how the industry works and do not realise that the products are all handmade and assumed that they are all machine generated and therefore I should be able to offer significant discounts. I just simply laugh at those who think like that!
Primarily, my professional background come from a retail background so I understood the retail market and I was recently assigned to a dispatch/logistics project, which has helped me to understand and negotiate the deals and contracts I needed and wanted.
I am always persistently seeking advice from Uncle Ken, my personal close friend and business mentor.
His wisdom is unparalleled and he is always willing to provide me advice on the financial advice as well as advice on different aspects of business including planning, financing and strategic corporate growth.
In addition, I have an accountant who works out my personal taxes to advise me on VAT and taxation issues. I also sought advice from friends who are tax consultants abroad. Design and branding issues I turned to another friend who has just started his own design firm JD2Design.com and has helped me create logos that are very impressive for my business!
I guess I am one of the lucky few, who always have someone close I can turn to for different advice!
I tried turning to the government for help with small firms but I was out of luck, as the quota was already reached at the local centre and subsequently I was unable to obtain the help and advice from this source.
In the end, I just resulted to turning to other sources of help such as Startups.co.uk, Shell LiveWire (shell-livewire.org.uk) and Business Link (businesslink.gov.uk). All of which has been a tremendous amount of help to me as well as Uncle Ken.
Most definitely, there is far too much red tape in this country just to get something started. I encountered many difficulties in trying to start up and found that setting up a business in the UK costs too much and there is too much red tape associated with it.
Every procedure in the process of starting up has an associated cost. As soon as you start your business no matter what industry it is; the inbound enquiries from people wanting to sell you some sort of insurance just seems ridiculous for a start up business when capital is limited!
The upside of it, I guess is that it covers your back for any unforeseeable circumstances.
In my opinion, I think there should definitely be more grants and business loans with more favourable interest rates for young business start-ups.
In addition, easier access to free business advice would be ideal for those start-ups as well, as it is the younger generation of start-ups that will be leading the countries business for tomorrow.
In my opinion, writing the business plan is the worst part of any business as this is possibly the hardest part, as you have to cram all your thoughts into a logical and readable document, which forms the structure and the plan of action for your business.
I personally, used a template, which I found online from HSBC and not any particular proprietary software, and have been using this template for the basic structure for all the business plans I have ever written. I have written so many business plans now, that I am quite confident that about writing them.
My business plan is important to me, and over the period of 3 months, it has been updated and changed quite a few times, which goes to show the initial plan is never kept to.
This was always due to expanding the thought process and trying to overcome any forms of barrier to business and to diversify the business opportunities and thus increasing potential sales.
I also think it is important as a business owner; you should be able to understand your very own business including its strength and weaknesses as well as opportunities and areas of threat.
Anyone who throws me a question about my business, I am able to answer confidently about the direction I wish to take this business.
