You should invest in a booth at the Ilnternational Builders Show in Las Vegas. It may not be too late to get into the show in Feb 2024. The show could bring tens of thousands of potential customers to you. You may also be able to connect with potential buyers for your company

I mean, you reached out to 100 prospects, and no one bought. I hate to break it to you, but that means no, your proposition does not appear to be worth it to your target market. You now have a few choices: find a different target market, tweak the proposition to see if you can find something that appeals better to your original target market, or give up on this idea altogether. I’m not sure your concept of targeting painters is sound. Good painters can get all the work they can handle through word of mouth. Bad ones can still get enough work from the phone number on the side of their truck. None of them take need a great website all that much.

Just another observation for you to consider: why target only static simple sites? Anyone can do one of these themselves through a number of services. It’s businesses that need more complex, dynamic sites that are willing to pay for a web developer. If you don’t have the skills to offer more robust sites, then frankly, you don’t have enough value to offer anyone.

I think processing your own payroll in-house is a really bad idea for most small businesses. Pay a payroll company to handle it for you, and I guarantee you’ll never look back. Even then, if you are paying remote employees in multiple states, you have to set up and manage employment tax accounts in each state, which is a pain. I tried it last year and couldn’t manage it. I was always getting notices from one of the states that we owed another tax or fee or that the rate the payroll company was using was wrong. I ended up terminating 2 of my remote employees for performance issues and switched the last one to 1099 (her job really fits the qualifications for contractor status). I will never hire employees in another state again.

I have a different perspective here. First, why are you running 2 different businesses? Running a business is very demanding and stressful, and it’s the rare entrepreneur who can run 2 at the same time equally well. If you’re struggling to make money, my advice would be to focus on one business and let the other one go. You said in another comment that one of them is more profitable. Focus on growing that one and stop wasting resources on the less profitable one. It’s a lot easier to grow one business than it is to operate 2 businesses at the same time, as it just means fling more of what you’re already doing, hiring more of the same positions. You can realize economies of scale at larger volumes than you can at smaller volume

I am in almost the same scenario as your brother-in-law, where my business (homebuilding) is struggling due to market conditions. I know I haven’t made all the right decisions, but I really feel like this is out of my hands, as the Fed is literally trying to kill the industry. However, we are current with the IRS but are behind with a few suppliers. The good news is that my sales are picking back up as rates are falling, and I do think we’ll get through this within the next few months. I know my in-laws have cash sitting in the bank and would probably be willing to write a loan, but I will not ask them because I recognize that although things seem to be looking up, there’s always a possibility that something else happens and this business could fail despite my best efforts. The relationship is more important to me than saving my business. I wonder if your brother-in- law feels that way about you?

If you really want to help, here’s my advice: His business sounds like he is in serious trouble. Be very careful before you get involved. Assume you don’t know the full story, regardless of what he tells you. Owners in distress will do anything to save they business, even hide or distort the truth about their business’s situation. If you don’t understand his business fundamentals well enough that you could run the business yourself, then you have no business investing in it. If you do understand the fundamentals, and you really want to help, them make sure the structural issues that got him into this mess are fixed before you get involved. For example, if this really is due to bad partners, then make sure the partners are out if you step in. Finally, if after considering all of the above, you still want to help him, treasure an ownership stage in the company, not just a loan. Put yourself in a position to make sure he manages the business well.

If at any point in this process something seems fishy, then bow out and walk away. I tried baking someone out with their business 15 years ago (not family, fortunately), and it was singlehandedly the worst decision I’ve ever made. The business still failed, and I ended up in bankruptcy.

I am in almost the same scenario as your brother-in-law, where my business (homebuilding) is struggling due to market conditions. I know I haven’t made all the right decisions, but I really feel like this is out of my hands, as the Fed is literally trying to kill the industry. However, we are current with the IRS but are behind with a few suppliers. The good news is that my sales are picking back up as rates are falling, and I do think we’ll get through this within the next few months. I know my in-laws have cash sitting in the bank and would probably be willing to write a loan, but I will not ask them because I recognize that although things seem to be looking up, there’s always a possibility that something else happens and this business could fail despite my best efforts. The relationship is more important to me than saving my business. I wonder if your brother-in- law feels that way about you?

If you really want to help, here’s my advice: His business sounds like he is in serious trouble. Be very careful before you get involved. Assume you don’t know the full story, regardless of what he tells you. Owners in distress will do anything to save they business, even hide or distort the truth about their business’s situation. If you don’t understand his business fundamentals well enough that you could run the business yourself, then you have no business investing in it. If you do understand the fundamentals, and you really want to help, them make sure the structural issues that got him into this mess are fixed before you get involved. For example, if this really is due to bad partners, then make sure the partners are out if you step in. Finally, if after considering all of the above, you still want to help him, treasure an ownership stage in the company, not just a loan. Put yourself in a position to make sure he manages the business well.

If at any point in this process something seems fishy, then bow out and walk away. I tried baking someone out with their business 15 years ago (not family, fortunately), and it was singlehandedly the worst decision I’ve ever made. The business still failed, and I ended up in bankruptcy.

If you don’t know what overhead is, then my advice would be to not do this. At least not until you study some basic business management. Before you start this, you need to be able to calculate all the costs of your food, the cost to run the business each month, the cost of labor, know how you are going to market your business, and how many customers you need every day to break even. I love the idea of this restaurant, but restaurants have a high rate of failure in general, and this idea has an even higher likelihood of failure due to its complexity. If you have a lot of capital to start up, can grow the food yourself for really cheap, can find cheap labor, and are on an island with the right kind of wealthy tourists who could support this, it might work, but you need to really do your homework before you jump into it

You don’t suck at sales. You just don’t have a process for sales. You need to find a sales coach who has experience in your industry and have them help you develop a sales process. Once you know what the process is you’ll need able to do it no problem.

They asked for the price for a specific repair, and you gave them an accurate price that you will stick to if you do the work. How is that not transparent? I’m a builder, and our position is that we are a turnkey builder and will deliver exactly what you asked for at the exact price we agreed upon. How does my cost breakdown have anything to do with the outcome? My estimates are extremely detailed and complex, and I’m just going to give that to anyone

You can always use the threat of starting a new LLC to try to negotiate a fair compromise. Whatever you do, you need to be honest about why you need to part ways. It may be tempting to make up some other reason to spare his feelings, but rip the bandaid off. “I don’t feel like you are holding up your end of the bargain, and I’m not willing to keep doing all the work for only 50% of the profits.” Point out specific instances where he has not done what he said he would do. He may argue at first, but when you lay out the details, he may come to realize that he is falling short. Usually, people who are failing know they are failing. If you can get him to admit that he isn’t really cut out for this, then he might take a reasonable offer to walk away. If not, then you can use the nuclear option of threatening to file a new LLC and abandon the current one. If he isn’t willing to work in this business, he’s not likely to work or spend money on an attorney to try to save his ownership. On that note, this might be a good time to consult a good corporate attorney before you get into pissing match.

And then never do business with anyone again without a clear Operating Agreement with a good transfer of ownership section, including a buy/sell clause. If you had that, this could be solved in 10 minutes. You offer him a price for his shares, and he can accept the offer, or he can buy you out at the same price. Given that you said he’s not interested in working and had no money, he’d take the buyout. Don’t beat yourself up for this mistake, though. Many business owners make serious mistakes in their company setup, especially with friends and family. I’m currently amending my main LLC Operating Agreement because it doesn’t have any of the stuff I just talked about.

You are missclassified. It’s not up to the business owner to decide how to classify you. The IRS has a document with a checklist that determines whether an employee should be classified as W2 or 1099, and you do too many things and are too tightly integrated into the business to be 1099.

As to whether you are underpaid, I think you probably are, but it all depends on whether you could get another job for more money. Fair compensation is a question for the market. I would recommend you polish up a resume and apply to sime similar jobs in your area to see if you could get a better offer, then use that to negotiate a higher salary. You also need some boundaries around time off. You should not be taking work call on vacation. I am the owner of my company, and I do not take calls on vacation. Everyone needs time off where they can recharge their batteries.

If you have the desire you could do as others have suggested and start your own company. You could make more than you do as an employee. You could also lose everything, so consider that move carefully. I’ve been self-employed for almost 10 years, and I am the first to say it is not for everyone. If you do, I would consider staying a bookkeeping business, rather than a cleaning business, as it sounds to me like your skillset might be more aligned with that.