We'll see how far we get here.

On starting a business, an introduction.

It’s Tuesday. If you’ve been here for a while you know I shoot for getting a post out Wednesday. And it usually actually happens Thursday. Sometimes Friday. If it’s been a week, Sat or Sunday. But in my ideal world, I’m posting the written piece on Wednesday and the PhotoRoundUp© on the weekend. That’s the rough mental goal I have for Substack. There are other things I’d like to do more often too. A short story/ week. A weekly news roundup. A fiction story/week. And I follow a few accounts that somehow manage daily posts in addition to their professional jobs and it’s wild to me. It makes me want more focus. It’s honestly not so much about time, but use of time. I seem to be good at wasting a fair bit. But here we are, me laying out these goals in text with the hope that seeing it written will help me plunge further into my writing. Because as I’ve found on my time of pushing out a weekly newsletter, the more I put into writing here, the more I also write on my fiction projects. When I wait and put something together very last minute here, it means it’s later in the week and I probably burnt a lot of writing opportunity across the days.

For someone that holds himself as fairly laid back, for someone that believes in the natural pace of the world and a synchronicity in finding our way through time and space, I tend to beat myself up a lot when I waste time. But in the waves of my life I certainly have troughs that include a lot of wasted time. Part of me thinks that is important. Part of me says that is a thing I tell myself to justify wasted time.

I’m a believer in boredom. I want my kids to be bored. I want time to get bored myself. Boredom is the opportunity to dive into things we might not do otherwise. Boredom has gotten me into some very good projects and activities. And lately the phone, a thing that had been eating too much of my time, became boring to me, and I couldn't be happier about it. Getting bored on my phone just minutes after picking it up is a fine place to be in this modern world. I put it down and go do something else. Clean the garage. Work in the garden. Water the ferns. Take Acre to play some frisbee at the park. Sit down and write. Draw a picture. Whatever. This is the type of thing I hope for myself and I hope for my kids as well. The electronic consumerism that we’ve gotten sucked into is simply insane. Someday this era of wasted time will be remembered unfondly. By some anyways. (Maybe?)_

But I digress.

I had two things in mind to write about this week. The beauty of the Lawson Atlas as I see it regarding authorship, is I’ve really pigeonholed myself into nothing with regards to topics to discuss. I’m not one to brag about my own skills, but in regards to willingness and ability to write about nothing at all, I have a gift. And you all have been kind enough to come along with me in this fun. But I actually give a little credence to what we are sharing here, because the human mind is built for inquiry into multiple arenas. That is to say, we are curious creatures, and we do well in diving into curiosity. And while there are plenty of genre specific outlets out there, we are broad creatures. And we don’t necessarily like to tackle the same thing over and over and over. I love writing a book because its weeks and weeks of being focused on one single line. But there is another part of my brain that absolutely loves the opposite as well. I love to look at maps. I love to pick a point on the map and then start reading about that spot, at random. That is writing here for me. Pick a point in the mental map, and dive in a little. What usually takes about 15 minutes to read usually takes me a couple hours to write. Often here, I’ll write a piece only to realize I don’t quite love how I got through it, so I’ll rewrite it again. Sometimes again. Sometimes I’ll work on an idea for several hours but never quite get it to the point of clarity or understanding and I simply delete it. Usually if a piece can’t be fixed in the second round, it has no hope during the third. It’s time to move on. Most of my ideas for what I’ll write about come while I’m out running or on a bike ride. Usually on the uphill stretch. (In Montana we don’t have a lot of up and down and up and down… we have UP. Then DOWN. That is running trails and riding mountain bikes in Montana. So by default my best ideas are while I’m moving slow and up.) But those discarded pieces… they sit in my the back of my brain. Sometimes I’ll forget about them for a few weeks, but then while scrolling though the Notes on my phone there it is. Waiting. Still asking to be written.

One such piece has been this way in my mind for well over a year. I keep threatening to write it. I threatened myself with it again this week. But the problem comes in that it is a longer idea that is going to require a bit more time. So maybe it will be in multiple pieces. But, and here is a window into the inner workings of my current mind, that of a business owner, a parent, a dog owner, a fiction writer, and someone that places utmost importance on daily exercise and enough sleep… What if I get it going and then drop the ball? I hate dropping the ball. But the way I shifted on my thinking in this is, start small. Add. If it needs more it will ask for it, much like a novel asks a lot of things of the writer until they get to the end, together.

So this idea that I’ve been putting off is on starting a business. And why you should or maybe shouldn’t but still should think about it. And you should. You should at least think about it.

This idea may take a bit to get through, and will likely be a little convoluted. But I think it’s actually an arena, like coffee, that I can speak to, because I’ve been there, I’ve done it, and am still doing it. And it’s worked. And the more I think about it our societal woes, the more I think that small businesses are one of the solutions.

Today my mind jumped back into this topic based on a tweet I came across this:

This cynical little line by Andre was followed by

:

I follow Kevin on X. I like his positivity. He’s looking forward and looking at the better side of things daily. A few good little dopamine positive shots can go a long way if you spend any time on X, which is just a weird place, and I think that’s part of what I like about it. But only in small doses.

So I added:

And that is a decent summary of my introduction to why starting a business is good.

Small businesses do not necessarily make you rich. But everyone seems too focused on “rich” instead of “rich life.” They are different. We all know “money can’t buy you happiness” but we still pursue it as if it’s going to get us into heaven. But in a life that becomes increasingly shorter with every breath, every day, every year, there comes a time when we begin to realize that dream of wealth is a mirage and that if we’ve hated every day of work, we’ve wasted a lot of days. And the simple fact of life on earth for 99% of us is basic… you will have to work to live. I know TicTok and IG have promoted otherwise, and there are countless people in all the social media apps spreading word that you don’t really have to, that you can be a ten minute millionaire, but the real truth of the matter is while you may well become a millionaire through work, work is involved in life, no matter what. So why approach it with so much disdain, angst, and animosity. If you do, you’ll find yourself ever slunked in more of it.

So as I see it, people who are genuinely that unhappy with their day to day jobs really should set out to change the situation. I’ve done it countless times over the years. I’ve had perfectly good jobs that for one reason or another made me anxious to move on. So I did. And at each step I took a calculated risk in moving into a new arena. There is always risk involved in change. But there is also risk, often more subtle and quiet, in not changing.

So when I hear cynical stories about how much people hate working for others, I’m of the opinion - if you really can’t deal, move on. Don’t be surprised though when you find out that the next step offers equally as much actual work. Work is part of any job, and most of our existences. But you can find work that feeds your mind (and body) so why not change?

And the next logical question is, if you hate working for other people, why not start a business? Now of course, as an owner of a business for the last 15 years, I can safely warn this… You always work for someone. Never forget that any job you have involves others. As a business owner you get to decide who want to deal with and who you don’t, but ultimately you are selling a thing or service or product to people. The robots aren’t buying for themselves yet. (Yet!)

But if you have an idea for a business, you can go for it. Especially in America. In no other country is entrepreneurship so widely encouraged and accessible. No, that is not to say it’s easy. It’s anything but easy. But it’s an option. Loans are available if the idea is good, no matter your race, religion, background, etc. Don’t listen to the Victimization Crew… America is a great place to start a business. And it doesn’t have to be glamorous. In fact, the less glamorous the more likely to succeed in some ways. I use to try to sell screenplays. It is an incredibly hard product to produce. Doable though. And I wrote several. But selling a screenplay has AWEFUL odds of success. There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions trying to, and the odds of success are rather low. That’s not to say, don’t try, but have a back up plan. That is the whole reason I went into coffee. I needed a job that I could like. I wanted to produce a product, an actual consumable thing. I didn’t want to make alcohol. I wanted something that could easily and naturally involve travel. And I loved coffee enough to be curious about it in a way I could hold my own interest. I bought a small coffee roaster, one that I could resell and not take too big a hit in my stomach, just to make sure I had a handle on the possibility of roasting coffee. For no good reason, I quickly realized I could do it, and that my brain had an understanding of how it worked, why, and how to manipulate it. Additionally I had experience with selling things wholesale… I’d worked as a sales rep for a local distributor, selling wine. I knew every fine dining restaurant owner and every grocery buyer in town and already sold something to them weekly. I’d built a great relationship with every account. These relationships proved the cornerstone to making our business work with the model we chose. The day we started roasting commercially we already had accounts ready to buy.

I’m not saying you should start a coffee company. In fact, since we’ve opened the market has become so saturated, I’d probably suggest you don’t. I don’t think I would in today’s market. But there are a million other niches that you could step into. some obvious, other’s less so. It’s one of the reasons I’m so utterly impressed with the likes of

Revelry Collection

- the balls it takes to jump to into publishing in 2025! Are you kidding me? If you’d asked I wouldn’t have guessed it could work. And yet there he is, producing this awesome thing. And even if he doesn’t do this forever, he’s doing an incredible thing right here, right now, building blocks for his own future. Amazing. My friends at County Highway are doing the same thing, though they come from a lineage of publishing… but still, they are going for it.

But there are other things too. I’ve gotten to know the guys at Limmer Boots a little. Custom hiking boots. They just went for it. Another friend of mine is both an electrician and a saddle maker. Another friend owns a bakery. Another runs his own photography business (talk about challenging to make successful, holy cow!) In fact when I go through my list of closest friends, most of them work for themselves.

Working for yourself is highly rewarding. “Owning your own business is great, you get to choose whatever 80 hours of the week you want to work.” There is a little truth in this, especially in the early years of a business. I worked my other job for about 2 years before I was able to pay myself through the coffee company. This translated into waking up 4:30-5, working at the coffee shop until around 9… then working for the distributor until evening. Sneaking home for dinner and to see the kids and then either passing the baton as my wife went to work, or if she had the night off, going back to work more at the shop until 10 or so. We juggled some insanity for several years. And it wore us thin, literally. But then it started to get more sane. Suddenly we were able to focus just on the coffee business and quit our other jobs. Then a few years later we were able to rein in our time to some sane hours.

You hear, accurately, that approximately 20% of small businesses fail within the first year. By the end of the fifth year, about 50% have closed, and around 70% fail within ten years. But this isn’t always for what you think… while many, especially in the first year or two fail due to it being either a bad idea, bad execution, or simply the operator’s failure in ability to commit fully, I have seen that many of the closures that occur between year 2-10 are more due to burnout. The freedom is nice, but only if there is some reward in time, or at least some sanity in hours. But if you are in year 7, even if it works financially, if you don’t get to breathe, this is when a lot of small business owners call it quits. And there is no shame in that. I know many people that have quit, and gone on to work for others with a whole new appreciation for just that… working for others is a massive drop in responsibility, stress, and time. And that can be a win. Many did that until they came up with another idea, which they then executed with more acumen and success. Lessons learned from the first round.

Too many people think in regards to “failure” when someone closes a business, but it really shouldn’t be. Many people have to try a couple businesses before they find the equation that works for them. I’ve seen it. And once they get their new thing going, dialed by lessons from past experiences, it’s off to the races, and they win. They work for themselves, are comfortable financially and have at least a decent amount of free time to do what they want. I

When I think about the people I know, I know many people that do well working for themselves, and many others that do well working for others. There is no right way to be. The key is to find the balance and not carry unrealistic expectations. Work is not the four letter word it’s made out to be in our digital era.

Other parts of entrepreneurship and starting a small business relates to community. I think communities thrive when small business flourish in number. When people are shopping at local stores in stead of Walmart, the money they spend is being reinvested in that community. Missoula is a strong town when it comes to supporting small businesses. People make a point of it. Take pride in it. And that is one of the reasons it’s such an awesome community. I’d like to see more of it. Once you’ve started you own small business it changes your perspective on purchases and makes you consider which ones you give to locals vs multinationals. It’s easy to see that as you spend more locally, your community benefits.

Also, there is the whole quality factor. Local products tend to be more expensive, but they also tend to be better. I have a few bookshelves in my office, mostly built by me, and those are ok, but the one that is the most amazing was built by a friend of mine who is a carpenter. It’s wild how good it is. It’s a thing that will live well beyond me. Same with my Limmer boots. The Super Pacific topper on my truck. Even our coffee roaster… it is hand built in California and is a thing of beauty.

We’ve gotten to accustomed to cheap shit that breaks and just has to be re-purchased again. Buy better, buy less. It’s a mentality that is all but forgotten. A good bit of furniture in my house was passed down from my grandparents to my parents to me, and I’ll give it to my kids. It’s beautiful. It’s solid. It was built with longevity in mind. In the last 30 years we’ve been told not to worry about quality, just accept cheap shit from China or wherever, and appreciate how much of it you can buy and that you can just replace it when it breaks, because it’s so cheap.

But this mentality has not only resulted in incredible waste, let alone loss in aesthetic beauty and appreciation for what goes into the things we surround ourselves with, but it’s diminished our culture, our country. We complain that people don’t get paid enough, but add to that we have to recognize that we need to support people making things, good things, things built to last. And that rarely happens with regards to anything for sale at Target or Walmart. And while it is often more expensive to buy things built locally/domestically, those things tend to last much longer and have more intention built into them. I’m about as bored as disposable culture as I am with social media, which is to say, I’m very bored with it. When I see a thing that has been crafted by hand with intention, I’m drawn to it. And most of those things come from small businesses. Yet another argument for more people to get into the game.

I feel like I’m only warming up here, but I have obligations I have to get to, and I want to push publish.

Let’s consider this a Part 1. of starting a business.

I haven’t even gotten close to the second topic I had in mind to write about this week, On Cameras, but I’m not even going to pretend I can get to it. I can’t right now. Let’s put it on the list. and feel free to remind me.

I’m pushing SEND early this week, so maybe if I’m lucky I’ll sneak another in, in addition to the PhotoRoundUp©

Until then, thanks for taking your time here. Let me know what you think. Let’s make a conversation of this. And if it strikes your fancy, please share/restack. I’m quite admittedly trying to grown my writing presence here, because the more I do here, the more time I get to write. It’s a little selfish, I realize, but I also absolutely love the community I’ve found here, the conversations, the new people, and the support of ideas and ways of life that are being neglected in other forms of social media. Thanks for being part of it.