Do You Run a Small Business from Home? Get Organized!

The number of individuals working from home has grown exponentially over the past few months. Home businesses are flooding the market, and for good reason. Many individuals and couples have had to rethink their expenses and downsize due to the economic downturn. Instead of paying for daycare, one parent may choose to work from home.

Choosing to work from home brings several strong advantages to the table. Reduced spending on daycare, zero overhead from leasing a commercial property, and the advantage of tax write offs for the section of your home used for business purposes. Even a percentage of your utilities can be used as a write off.

Zero overhead and low start up costs are a huge plus. Even so, according to Dunn & Bradstreet, over 90 percent of new businesses fail. That includes home businesses. Even with the odds and expenses clearly stacked in your favor, your business can still fail. Here are the top reasons why new businesses don't survive their first year:

• Competition: Clients will not only go where the best products are offered, but also where they will receive the most efficient and knowledgeable service.

• Lack of motivation and poor time management: Ignoring tasks that are time consuming or that you don’t enjoy can cause your ship to sink faster than anything. If your time management skills are rusty, take a class or hire some outside help.

• Poor customer service: Once you have a customer, do whatever it takes to keep them. Fill orders promptly, return all phone calls, answer emails and maintain a helpful and positive attitude, even when facing complaints.

• Work from home burnout: Running your own business requires dedication, discipline and a large investment of your time and energy. Burnout is easy if you are not running things in an orderly fashion.

Upon examining these issues more closely, you will see there is a common thread running through each reason for failure. Lack of organization. Your competition will have the upper hand if you are not properly organized, things will quickly become messy, products in disarray, and customer service will be sub-par when you have a difficult time finding items.

If your home business involves items that need to be stored, such as with a gift basket business, jewelry making, or when shipping out products that you acquire at closeout prices--you will require a well organized and efficient set-up. The intelligent and creative staff of Gorgeous Garage will help you get organized.

With the Monkey Bars garage organizing system, you will be able to effectively use every inch of available storage space for your products, packing and shipping supplies, customer files, and more.

Product bins should be arranged in a logical way depending on your type of business. If you run a mail order pet supply company, organize bins according to item type and size. Toys should be in one area, collars and leashes arranged by size and style in another, and pet clothing stored in see through bins according to size. Storing products in see through containers helps remind you when inventory is running low and can help you quickly find the product that has been ordered.

The sturdy Monkey Bar Shelving system, built for durability and ease of use includes shelving to store boxes and totes and hooks to store items that can hang (such as packing tape or products). With our system in place you will be ahead of the game, ahead of the competition, and ready to give your customers the best customer service possible. Here's to your success!