You Know the Trade, Now Learn the Business

You already know how to work, and that may be one of the biggest advantages you have when starting a business in the skilled trades. You know what it means to get up early, load a truck, drive to a job, solve a problem, deal with unexpected conditions, finish the work, clean up, and do it all over again the next day. You may have spent years learning your trade. Maybe you are a plumber who can walk into a mechanical room and quickly understand what is happening. Maybe you are an HVAC technician who can diagnose a system that has already confused three other people. Maybe you are an electrician, carpenter, welder, mechanic, roofer, painter, landscaper, appliance technician, general contractor, or another skilled tradesperson. Whatever your trade may be, you have developed knowledge and abilities that other people are willing to pay for.

Eventually, many skilled tradespeople begin asking the same question: Why am I making all this money for someone else? You look at what the company charges the customer and then look at what you earn per hour. The difference can seem enormous. Perhaps the company charges hundreds or thousands of dollars for work that you know how to perform. You begin thinking that if you owned the company, you could keep much more of that money. That thought has helped start countless plumbing, HVAC, electrical, construction, automotive, landscaping, remodeling, and other trades businesses.

So you decide to give it a try. You buy a truck, purchase tools, obtain the necessary licenses and insurance, print some business cards, create a website, and tell friends and family that you are officially in business. Then the phone rings. You have your first customer. You perform the work, hand the customer an invoice, and get paid. Instead of receiving a paycheck from somebody else’s company, a customer has just paid your company. It can be an incredible feeling because for the first time you can clearly see the connection between your own knowledge, your own work, and the money coming into your own business.