How to Start a Business: Plan, plan and plan

Starting a business requires a business plan. Sounds logical, but so many small business owners, or would-be owners, rush headlong into opening up their shop, buying in to a MLM structure or getting an e-commerce site built and launched.

Here's an helpful article found on Entrepreneur.com.

Coffee roaster Jameson Brown opened up a few months ago after many months of talking and planning. They told me how they went about planning.

"We had been friends for many years," said David Ross. He and his business partner Ryan Hamlin shared a love of coffee.

"We spent 6 months talking," said Ryan. "But we were roasting during this time and our friends liked the taste. Our issue was how to approach starting our business. We decided to go slow and go small."

As they discussed their idea, they saw it taking shape.

"You want to make sure we were saying the same thing about our business idea," said David.

"We spent a lot of time asking 'who is our customer?' and deciding the standards or quality we wanted for our coffee," Ryan mentioned.

The two business partners spent another 9 months looking for a commercial building where they could roast and have customers walk in. It also took time to handle zoning issues.

Their location is clean, well-lit and has a nice appealing brick fireplace.

However, it was a former machine fabrication shop so it took their families lots of work to scrub it down and convert it to a coffee roasting location.

They have walk-in retail customers, distribute wholesale to restaurants and coffee shops, and they have a Jameson Brown website for Internet customers. Surf on by and click on their site to learn more.