There's
no doubt that few people would ever think of running a
shoe
repair business from home, but Andrew Bewes is one who did,
and
he is making a whale of a success of it.
Although
Andrew's father had been in the shoe repair business all
his
life, Andrew hadn't actually learned the trade from him, as
his
father passed away when he was still in his early teens.
Andrew's
mother, unable to sell the business, simply had her
husband's
tools and equipment brought home and stored in the
cellar.
As
this was the early eighties, Andrew found it impossible to find
a
job. However, he was not one to be
easily discouraged.
If
only he had sufficient finances to re-open his father's
business,
he was sure he could make a go of it, but the expense of
that
was prohibitive when all he had was his 'dole' to get him
started.
One
day while he was discussing the situation with his mother, she
suggested
he set up his fathers equipment right in the cellar
where
it was stored and start a business from there.
But
how could he get people to bring their shoe repair work to his
home,
when it might be much more convenient to take it to an
established
shop?
At
first it seemed impossible, but finally he felt sure he had
found
a way. He would set up a number of
locations where people
could
leave their shoes for him to pick up and bring home to be
repaired.
He
decided that dry cleaning stores would be the most logical and
convenient
places, and made up his mind to try out his plan.
He
had a dozen signs made up on heavy art paper board which read
"Leave
Your Shoe Repair Work Here. Save Time -
Save Money".
He
typed up a complete price list to accompany each sign.
Thus
armed, he called upon a number of dry-cleaners and offered to
pay
them a 20% commission on all the work he received from them if
they
would display his sign and take in the shoes.
He
agreed to pick up the work twice a week, and shoes picked up on
the
trip would be returned the next week.
Things
were slow at first, but within a year, Andrew was serving
more
than a dozen dry-cleaners and had enough business to justify
training
another man to help him.
Although
you probably don't have the equipment yourself, most of
the
items necessary (soles, nails, glue, etc) can be bought 'as
required',
and there are plenty of companies all over Britain who
will
happily rent you the other equipment for between $5 and $45 a
week
as your business grows.
Ask
your newsagent to get you a copy of 'Boot and Shoemaker' - it
costs
only about a pound an issue.
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