Saturday, May 22, 2010

Logos ~

After getting your company name, the next thing you would want is a logo for your company. It's more like a branding and your identity for your company.

Look around your surroundings and you see logo of different companies and what do you wish to do? For me, I always keep the rule of simple the better. Nothing complex or complicated, it will make life so much easier.

If you want free logo, you can just google it. I am big fan of google so everything is google here and there. If you like, you can use other browsers too. Free Logo - Well, everyone can use it and it might appear somewhere on someone website.
Sample of my free logo



Cheap Logo - Well, dont expect too much of designing involved. I had wasted on $$ for cheap one. Less then SGD $100.00 price tag. I nearly died when I saw the design. I had regretted wasting my money but i never want to go back to the company again. Maybe to some, will be nice but I just hate it from the first look. Haha.
Sample of my Cheap logo.



Decent Logo - After Searching much in google website, i found a friendly company who does really not bad work. Price Range SGD $100 to $300.00.
One thing to note, if you wish to revise your logo, you have to top up $. So just bear in mind, that what you pay is what you get. It is shown on the current one on the left.

Expensive Logo - $400 and above - usually they will provide unlimited revisions but as its way out of my budget, I had to drop it out of my list.

Tip : Try to keep your logo less colours for your logo design as possible. Why? When you want to print your letterheads and envelopes, etc.. the printer companies charge you by the colours, so less colour less $. I felt the pain when I requested for quotation on the printing of stationery's.

Most of the people would say it is important to brand your logo, I would agree but how much do you wish to spend on your logo? Budget yourself and search for website information and see which company you feel comfortable with.

For me the logos to be done up was around 1 week and service wise was pretty good. Contact me if you wish to know for more details on the companies I went through.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Starting up on the business journey...

Have you always wonder whether what you have done is correct or wrong? Whether you had made the right choice or the wrong choice to lead into something you don’t expect to happen? When you grow up and go and into working life, often you had wondered are there really right or wrong answers in life.

When I had first started to embark this road for floral business, I am totally clueless and tell myself how hard can it get? Well, teacher had to give me a hand to assist me on my arrangement when I was so slow in class. As I had recall, I always been the last one to leave in class. I am not someone who is perfect or very good in what I do. I think the best thing I can do is sleep. My Nickname is Piggy, it suits me as I love to sleep most of the time since young. Well, let’s not go into my personal life and head to the basic of business stuff.

What do you need to do when you want your own floral business?

Throw in alot of cash $$!
Buy Materials!
SELL SELL SELL!
PROFIT PROFIT PROFIT! $$$$

Well, traditional method is to have a large sum of capital to set up the business, but what about someone who is just an average person and don't have a rich background and wanted to have a business? Bank Loan is another way but we wish to minimize risk and less debts to pay.

There are a few ways to go about doing and for me, I am just sharing what I have learnt and hope it will help you along the way. It might work for me but it might not work for you. My friend told me before you need to knock yourself until you bruised then you find out the answer to your question. I hope to lessen those bruises for you along the way through this blog.

Before I go on, I would like to thank my mentor and friend for being with me all these time, June Tew, to guide me through to set up my own business. Without her, I don’t think I will get this far and what I have shared in my blog briefly comes from her source. God had bless me in so many ways, that I will not be able to come this far alone.

With little or less money, can you set up your own business? Well basically, yes you can, but it just takes a longer time only. Are you in the rush to set up everything in the shortest possible time? What is your time frame for your business to be set up properly? There are questions you can ask yourself and answer truthfully.

Before you register yourself to do business properly in Singapore, you need to think what you want to do for your business. Plan ahead and set out budgets and targets for yourself. Work on things 1 by 1 and slowly, you can get to it. I had mentioned before money is always my biggest problem besides time management.

Some simple questions examples;

1) What do you want to do for your business?
2) What type of business you looking for?
3) Do you need to apply for permits to bring in goods to buy n sell?

After deciding on your business activities, I think what you would need to think of is your company / business name. It took me some time to think of the name up and reasons you can see how it came about on the left hand side of my blog. Keep it simple and something that is meaningful to you. After getting the name, you have to check whether other companies or business in Singapore have it and if you wish to create a website with the company name, you may just Google the name too. More details to setup your business can be found in http://www.acra.gov.sg/

Read through and understand the type of business you wish to start on and what are the rules and laws and permits, if you have questions, you can ask or call ARCA directly. It took me awhile to understand everything but remember not to rush into setting up your business.

I had started off with Sole-Proprietorship so the cost is much lower for me to set up my business. I remembered it took some time for me to understand the terms and conditions and what we need to do and look out for. The website as mentioned above has many guides to show you how to go about setting up the business.

After getting your company name so what is next? For me I went to create my logo. I will talk on the logo bloppers.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

1 year had past since I had started learning floral arrangement

It had been some time i had been blogging due to the starting up of the business and getting things right in place. Since i had passed my exams in Jan 2010. I had decided to embark the journey on my own with my mentor help.

I had started with a good friend and along the way due to my character, I chose to do on my own and try my own style.I didn't want to hurt her friendship with me as she had been very supportive of me and I don't want to drag her down if my ideas don't go through. I found it very hard to tell her the truth but when I find the courage one day, maybe I will be able to face her to tell her. Call me a coward but the pain inside to make this decision comes with a price i have to pay later.

I feel very blessed by God to see me through all these time. There were countless of time, I would want to just give up on this crazy business idea of mine but I know i had decided since the day i had started my first class in Nobleman school until now, I cant give up on my own dreams.

My mentor, June Tew had shared this with me before and I always know, It's a lonely road if you wish to do your own business. Countless of frustrations, money problems, and hardship to find suppliers who is willing to even care to reply your emails and enquiries, the list will go on. The biggest challenge for me is money problem and time management, with a full time job and trying to set up a business with very little money is really hard. Without my parents support and my hubby and my best friend, Deborah, I will not even get to owning a website, a blog and business name.They are my blessing in life and life support when things get so tough.

There is still a long road ahead of me that I have to face but I hope one day I will be able to do my floral business full time. Thank you for everyone who supported me and give me a chance on this business. I have alot of room for improvement and thank you for believing in me.

I will share abit on what i did with very little money for business and some things you can avoid during your planning for setting up the business.