One person business?

I've been laid off and with this economy decent job prospects are few and far between. I've been contemplating going back to school but I'm having a hard time stomaching the though of more student loans. I am more and more liking the idea of starting a business that I operate by myself.

My questions are these.
Is there anybody here that is making a living running a one person business? How do you like it? What would you do differently?

I have worked as a diesel mechanic for quite a few years and I'm considering just renting a small shop space and starting up my own repair shop, the downside is that to work on anything modern requires pretty substantial capital investments which I'm not really up for right now. I would love to find something small and self contained, and relatively cheap to get into. I'm not trying to steal anyone's business idea, I just want to find my place in the world and am hoping to gain some inspiration from other peaoples experiences.

 

Hi Hayduke,
I have the experience of one-person business.
about 4 year ago, I left the company and start my one-person company. It's a consulting company providing marketing research and industrial consulting services in semiconductor field.
Now, I have several persons already.
My major customers are from semiconductor companies and government divisions.
this year, I startup a trading company with my partner. We export some goods to US.
If you have interesting, I think we can do some cooperation. Especially in metal parts field.

 

dude, BLOW GLASS!!

 

I took auto mech both in highschool and started in trade school. this was late 70's early 80's. I didnt go into it as a career and now everything under the hood has changed..a lot. point being if you leave desiel and try to come back youll find the same thing. Theres gonna be a lot of changes made here over the next few years in the emissions from desil engines and this will be on the offroad agricultural/construction equiptment as well as over road. I have a friend that works for an independant shop and they specialize in tuning desiel pickups. pooop em up, dyno them. A route would be to specialize what you work on. Another idea that comes to mind is that the pipeline and windtower outfits have a lot of equiptment, which needs service and repair. You could try get on with one of them, live in a camper and go all over the country.

 

Becoming a sole trader is a difficult task. 99% fail in first 3 years, so ensure you have clear aims and a worthy get out clause.

Cheapest small business are internet/service based ones.

 

i work part time as a screenprinter, and part time i print from home, all my customers are musicains. it has it's ups and downs, but still over all i don't know what else i could really do that would pay as well. i haven't worked more than 30hrs a week in about 4 years.

it is really hard to start on your own, especially since everything costs so much, and you have no money coming in.

if your good with mechanics, why not fix normal cars? i know i am always looking for a trustworthy mechanic. i've known of several people in the past who just fixed cars in their backyard, and that is how they made a living, and they never had a shortage of work.

or maybe try to get into electric, alternative fuel vehicles, demand is small now but it seems like it would be a growth industry.

good luck

 

Duke. I have stumbled on what really is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I know you hear that all the time but I can almost guarantee this, if you work at it. PM me for information. anyone else can pm me too, I'd be glad to share the information with you.

Chuck