I have a beauty manufacturing business that started as a craft company, but the first product was makeup related and exploded so I caved to the email demand and rode it out in the cosmetics industry.
I don’t like makeup and dealing with the literal mess. Contract labor has gotten almost twice as expensive in the last 5 years since starting and quality has gone way down. I currently spend about 15-30 hours a month cleaning up sloppy jobs from $33/hr contact laborers who can’t seem to tightly screw a lid on a jar of makeup powder.
There are just some very tall challenges to solve if this is going to last, like manufacturing challenges-- how to cut labor costs for filling and downpacking ingredients. Also how to compete with competitors that have been reverse engineering key components of products we sell over the last 5 years. I don’t have the motivation to tackle it again.
Currently running at about $150-250k in annual revenue 2021: $30k salary w $32 net profit 2022: $39k salary w $8,000 net profit 2023: $34k base w $16k net projected
I work like 10 hours a week mainly putting out bullshit fires and moving inventory.
From reading around here I don’t really know if I’m at the scale that a broker would be appropriate as a first stop. Curious what viable options for these sizes of businesses can turn to for an asset sale-- if that’s even attractive to anyone.
Has anyone been through similar?
I feel you and can relate to your feeling of burnout. It really seems like you’re struggling a lot and that already for a long time.
Is there anything that you would want to do instead of this company? And I would be interested in what the one thing is that you loath most about your current business and job.
I think it’s more personal for me. I’m of the age where I’m looking to start a family in a big city. I don’t want to be dealing with makeup or the industry. Recovering and scaling would involve solving a difficult packaging engineering/contract labor issue and money to throw at marketing and branding.
Most importantly, social media and marketing need to be fine tuned for continued success and I loathe the idea of marketing it. I’ve had to do some on camera interviews for morning shows and local TV as the face of the brand and I don’t like it, I’m a guy who doesn’t use or care for makeup and it feels so fake and uncomfortable. Not to mention lonely running it solo. Would love a more stable job on a team and/or managing people in supply chain, or a venture with a partner(s).