Non-existent Business Plan

It's kind of exciting to be planning a business venture. My colleague and I will sometimes have whispered conversations and people might wonder what we are being so secretive about. A few times we've had to sneak out for lunch by ourselves and exclude others that we normally would invite. That makes us feel kind of crappy though to exclude others.

The amount of planning to launch a business is truly daunting. You really just want to dive right in and start doing something rather than do the months of careful planning and budgeting. So many things that you take for granted as an employee can be so complicated when you're the employer. I've bought a business plan development software but have only spent an hour on it. Have also done some preliminary research on marketing costs such as a website, ads, seminars and mailers. But I'm practically ready to quit my job so that I can devote more time to planning and launching. My colleague is taking a more conservative route of wanting to do a test market first while we are still employed. While a test market is obviously a good idea, my thoughts on that is that we wouldn't be putting 100% into it if we didn't have everything to lose. Well, not everything but a lot to lose anyway. If it fails, we can get jobs again. If we handicap the chances of our success by not devoting 100% of our time, then we failed for the wrong reason. And we would have let an great idea die.

We're thinking that we can launch in 2-3 months but there's no firm deadline. But the saner side of me tells me to take it a step at a time as well. My job isn't so awful and it actually pays modestly well with decent benefits. As long as I do something everyday, no matter how little, toward the business venture, I'll be satisfied and will be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Total spent Saturday:
$22 takeout at fantastic Vietnamese BBQ place in Westminster (enough for 6 people)
$20 dinner for 2 at Coco's

Total spent Sunday:
$30 2 books on Amazon.com
$52 groceries (save $43 with coupons)

Total spent Monday:
$43 gas (geez!!)
$3 takeout Italian at Maggiano's (had $25 gift certificate, excellent atmosphere that is New York style, always busy)

Total spent Tuesday:
$0 brought lunch
$13 carwash with tip
$215 educational material