Chapter 35

Chapter 35

Thankful for a Start-up

“Buddy’s”

 

Let me tell you a story about a little boy, who loved to make a dollar.

At age seven, this little boy was bitten by the entrepreneurial bug. The bug bit during Halloween, when he realized he could save his candy for selling. He opened his first candy shop out of a Nike shoe box, where he’d sell the candy to visitors to his home, or to spectators at his sister’s basketball games.

His entrepreneurial activities would expand at age 10, where he began to make and sell bow and arrows with his neighborhood friends. Until this time, the little boy had only sold his items for $.25, but his first bow sold for $2.50. The small step of selling the bow on the street corner, was one of the small signs of future success for this young boy. However, the bow and arrow business didn’t last long. The little boy got upset at his neighborhood friends during one summer, and fired his entire staff. And with the firing of his staff, the little boy saw his bow and arrow business slowly die away.

It took the boy a while to bounce back from the fall of his small business. For countless weeks, the boy was restless. He wanted a way to make money, a way to be on his own, and he just wanted to start a business. So, without knowing, his parents made the best $5 investment they had ever made. They brought home a bucket and some soap, and they taught this boy how to detail a car.

Austin’s Amazing Car Wash was born, and the entrepreneurial bug took a firm hold onto this boy’s life.

As you may have guessed, that young, entrepreneurial boy was me. My businesses continued to grow and expand far beyond the shoe box filled with candy. I have dabbled in video production, t-shirt design, vending machines, and most recently, the start-up that I believe will be a huge success, Buddy’s.

Austin’s Amazing Car Wash, was a car detailing business that I started at 12 years old, that turned into a successful high school business. The services offered were outside, inside, and full details, and my customers mainly consisted of teachers around the area. During my junior year in high school, the business saw the biggest success when I made $2500. For a high school student, making that much money in the summer was a huge deal. However, as a business man, I knew that this model couldn’t grow on a huge scale. Even though I knew AACW wouldn’t scale at its current model, I knew that with a unique concept or pivot, it could easily scale.

While I was in London this summer, I visited Tesco, a large retailer in Europe. For those of you who don’t know Tesco, it’s a lot like Walmart (but locals would never compare the two).

When we arrived at Tesco, my roommate’s mother parked the car at the back of the parking lot, so this company called Waves, could detail her car while she shopped. They call it “wash-while-you-shop.” Being the entrepreneurial, car washer, I had to take a few pictures. In the United States there are some mall parking lots that have car detailers, but nothing like this. This was a real company. And I would learn later, that Waves is located at 160 Tescos across Europe.  

In an earlier chapter, I spoke about the awesome experience that I had in London, but the experience lasted more than just two weeks. Those two short weeks spent in London continue to benefit me today.

After crossing the pond once more (Atlantic Ocean), and coming back home, I began to explore and plan a launch for my very own wash-while-you-shop car detailing company called Buddy’s.

I believe the best time to start a business is when you’re young.  Most of the time it’s less risky, more creative, more time, and you don’t have anything holding you back. Also, universities offer so many classes that deal with entrepreneurship.

When I enrolled into BUSI 500: Entrepreneurship and Business Planning with Jim Kitchen, I had no idea what the class entailed. More importantly, I had no idea what opportunities this small class would give me.  Firstly, the class is much different than any other class I have ever taken. In this class, I get to work on starting my own business. Mr. Kitchen encourages students to step out of their comfort zone, and really start a business.

For our first project, “Ready, Fire, Aim”, we created teams of 2-3, and had four days to start a business. All proceeds raised or earned would help send Scott, a five year old with leukemia, to Disney World. Our grade would be determined on how much money we raised, and the profitability of our businesses.

Kitchen gave us $50 in seed funding at the end of a class, and said “go.”

My partner and I raised $1904 from donations, and selling water and milkshakes during those four days. We not only broke the record for most money raised by any team ever, but also helped send Scott and his family to Disney World. By far the coolest and most rewarding classroom that I have ever experienced.

Now to Buddy’s.

The “ready, fire, aim” project was just a small project to prepare us for the big project. Starting a business.

I decided to explore the idea of the wash-while-you-shop concept that I saw in Europe this summer for business. Also, I wanted to bring on a partner to increase the efficiency and overall future success. One of my suitemates, Randy Short, was super interested, and without hesitation joined the Buddy’s team.

Quickly, we learned of the high liability of detailing the inside of vehicles, and how difficult it would be to use water in the use of these car washes, without taking up a lot of real estate in the parking lot.

So, we took our first pivot. We would only detail the exterior of vehicles, but still couldn’t figure out the water part. How could we detail cars efficiently with water?  

We couldn’t. So we pivoted another time. One of the teams during the “ready, fire, aim” project had detailed cars using this special waterless product, and introduced it to me. It was a total game changer.

Now we had it! Buddy’s would be a waterless car detailing company that provides a wash-while-you-shop service. Since we were waterless, we could detail customer’s cars anywhere in the parking lot. Anywhere! We would also shine the tires, wheels, and clean the windows.

But, where could we put these things?

Luckily, I had a small connection with Southern Season, a retailer in the Chapel Hill area that was nice enough to listen to the Buddy’s pitch in October. Randy and I shared our thoughts and ideas for a Buddy’s test market at Southern Season, and they happily told us that they would love to work with UNC students. However, they asked a few important questions that they wanted us to answer before moving forward. They wanted to meet again to work out the logistics, and what % of money would be donated/paid to them.

After various meetings with Randy, we scheduled another, and what would be the final pitch to Southern Season. We decided to donate a % of our proceeds to Southern Season’s Share the Food foundation, and we would launch Buddy’s on Nov 16, 2014. Our test market would last until Nov 22. We believed that a one-week test market would allow us to raise a good amount of money for their foundation, and we could learn a lot about our business.

A week before we launched our test market I heard a quote that rang so true, “starting a business is a lot like having a baby, fun to conceive, but hell to deliver.” The ideation of Buddy’s was really, really fun, but the hard work and grinding was difficult, but we knew in the end, it’d all pay off.

The launch week of Buddy’s was by far the longest, busiest, yet most rewarding week of my entire life.

On Nov 16. 2014, Randy Short and I launched the first ever Buddy’s at Southern Season. Customers could recognize us by the bright yellow shirts, and the sign that Southern Season had created for us. Our hours were 1PM-4PM, and detailed seven cars during our launch. The launch was awesome! My family surprised, and supported me as I launched my first company, and we made a little $$, what more could I ask for?

The week got even better.

In total, we detailed 53 cars, and raised $375.00 for the Share the Food Foundation.

We won $1,000 at UNC’s Carolina Challenge Pitch Party (Thursday of launch week), which is an event that is held each year. The pitch party, featured 110 UNC ventures that all had the opportunity to pitch to 85 judges during the first 90 minutes of the competition. The judges would listen to 60 second pitches from each team, and with five votes, selected their favorite five teams. The top 10 teams, then moved on to give a 2 minute pitch on stage.

Buddy’s received 15 votes, and was invited to pitch on stage.

Side note:

                I’m by no means Allen Iverson, but perfect pitch practice, makes perfect. During the entire launch week, I had prepared for the chance to be on stage to win the prize money. I practiced walking to class, in the bathroom, to my friends, and anywhere I could. Each time I got better and better.

Back to the challenge.

“And the first team to present……..Buddy’s,” said the Pitch Party coordinator. I looked at Randy, he looked at me, and the rest is history.

I grabbed the mic, which would soon die, and delivered the Buddy’s pitch that I had probably practiced 100 times. With an ending like, “Become our Buddy, and throw us some money,” you are destined to give a chuckle to the crowd, and place 3^rd in the Carolina Challenge Pitch Party.

The launch week also allowed us to detail an Aston Martin, and I got to drive a Tesla Roadster.

It was a phenomenal week. A week that’ll I never, ever forget. This week was years in the making. 8 long years in the making.

I’m thankful for the launch week. Not because of the success that we saw, or the money that we made, but because of the people that helped get me here. I’ve got a lot to be thankful for: the early supporters of my Nike shoe box, my former teachers, coaches, customers, random advice givers, and the good Lord above. I’m thankful.

So, the next time you pull into a grocery store, shopping center, or restaurant, take a long look at the parking lot. Chances are, Buddy’s will be there soon.

 

 

Waves at Tesco in Europe

Buddy’s at Southern Season in Chapel Hill, NC