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Hello all,
I'm 26 years old, and have been a manager of sorts for the last 8 years for a family owned Electronic Recycling Company that my Mom, Dad and I formed when I was out of high school. We had a lot of success but unfortunately made some untimely decisions with expansions and such and the amount of debt that we took on during a bad economy hurt us to the point that my parents decided to shut the doors.
A little background on the business prior to:
Formed in late 2003- We used Department of Natural Resources Grant Funding for initial purchases of start up items (Forklift, Truck, Scale, Hand Tools, Marketing)
In our first year of operation, we recycled roughly 24,000 pounds of Electronics
For the next 5 years we grew by over 100% a year. In 2006 we were recycling at our facilities full capacity of 100,000 LBS of E-Waste per MONTH! We made a decision at that point that we needed to sell our current facility and build a new, modern facility that would allow us to do much more to profit as well as flow much more E-Waste.
We purchased a steel building kit and hired a contractor to build this facility. Our FIRST mistake was to not sign a contract with this company. It took them 12 months to construct our facility, and it wasn't fully done when we moved in. During this 12 months, we lost an estimated $125,000 in profit due to not being able to refine certain components with machinery bought for the new facility. Our old facility did not have the electrical capacity to handle this stuff.
Once we got into our facility, 14 months behind schedule we simply could not cash flow enough to get the proper advertising avenues going again. We had simply spent every last dime of capitol to get this facility done. I'm sure we lost more money than we look at but we never got a chance to really put the whole plan together. We worked out of this facility for about another year and decided it was in our best interests to downsize. After we downsized Dad lost his drive and during our moving period a lot of our accounts that we were working with had gone elsewhere. All of this, caused by a local economic development officer spreading the word that we had closed. Pretty discouraging but there was nothing at that point I could do and my parents decided to get out and liquidate late 2010. Since then I have been doing odd jobs on and off but still have the passion for the business.
The Industry:
Within Iowa, there are 3 Recycling Facilities that handle the full scale processing of electronics. This is nowhere near enough for the volume of this hazardous waste. There are many large scale recycling companies that employ over 50 full time jobs. At our biggest, we had 14 full time. A facility like I was involved with and would like to start on my own handles Televisions, computers, computer monitors, telephones, cell phones, servers, radios, keyboards... much much much much more.
My plan:
Simply put, I've learned what not to do as far as management. I was pretty lax towards contractors not getting the job done when they stated they would. I was lax on banks that committed (with a letter of intent and signed by the bank president) when they decided that the economy was too harsh to loan the promised monies.
My plan is pretty straight forward. Where I am located, I am 1 hour from over 1 Million homes and businesses. I have a great client base to work with. My main client base would consist of public schools, collection points located at landfills and recycling centers and businesses.
Our services include transportation (For a small fee), recycling, destruction of data with Department of Defense approved methods as well as refurbishing of newer computer items for re-sale.
Facility wise, we had built a 15,625 Square foot facility. I can suffice with much less and would not build new again after my previous experiences. I would like to have 5500 Square feet to work with, with a bump out for offices.
Equipment wise, I would need to purchase a battery powered forklift, hand tools, air tools, one 15' Cube Van, Scale, Office Equipment.
I've rambled on enough... I need to find unique ways for funding. I'm not looking at needing 1 Million or even a half million dollars to properly do this. With my figures, and local buildings for sale that would be worthy of this business and work well with my flow plan I've got $250,000 allotted for building purchase, equipment purchase, advertising and another $25,000 for cash flow to begin.
What are some Ideas to help get this off the ground. As you can see I have a very big passion for the business. I was tied to our one large business loan that defaulted and it wrecked my credit terribly. After I had learned of this there was nothing I could do. Is this even a viable plan anymore? Just looking for answers/ideas.
Thanks!
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