My First Business Failure
Question: If you could go back to when you started your first business, what would you have done differently?
Answer: Nothing. Because it just didn’t work. It’s not about success. I can win on accident. I can’t replicate an accident. I’d much rather know what didn’t work because what I took out of my failure was that I still can conquer the world. I just found out that this was not the way to conquer it. Failure is all subjective.
My first business was landscaping in Scotland. I should have just thought right off the bat “I don’t like mud.” That should have been reason enough to not start this business venture. I don’t have a driver’s license, so I had to pay someone to drive me around for work. It was twice as expensive this way.” Only now do I realize this is a no-brainer. I think “Oh yeah. That was dumb.” I wasn’t passionate about what I did, it was laborious hard work and I was at the mercy of the seasons. I was in school at the time, so starting this business in May made the idea seem awesome for a summer job. The idea seemed less great when it was October and I was back in class.
I wouldn’t change anything about it because I had a blast. It was a blast, but ultimately it was a bust. Sometimes you learn that it can be done, but you no longer want to do it.
Fail gracefully.
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