Page 12 - One Thousand Ways to Make $1000

The First Step in Making Money

It is easier to make money in some localities than in others. There is, for
example, the Ogden hardware merchant who became rich selling shovels
during the California gold rush. He was quick to see that with people pouring
into the West digging everywhere for gold, they would need a lot of shovels.
So he wrote back east and bought all the shovels he could get. It was no trick
to sell them. All he had to do was to advertise that he had shovels to sell, and
the prospectors took them away from him at fancy prices. That kind of
merchandising does not require any skill. Neither does it require any
knowledge of business principles. But the gold rush is over. The West has
been settled. To be successful in business today you need more than a stock
of merchandise. You have to know how to sell goods at a profit. Nine out of
every ten men who start in business today fail because they cannot measure
up to those requirements—especially the last part of the formula.

So the first step in starting a business of your own is to know something
about it. You need not know all about it. But you must know something about
it. Fortunately much of the knowledge you need may be found in books and
trade periodicals. The manufacturers of the equipment which you will need to
get started are usually able to furnish you with essential information. The
federal and state governments have publications of value to you. This is all
experience which you can buy very inexpensively, yet it is experience that
has cost others much time and money. So read everything published about the
business you intend to start, to get the combined experience of others, and
begin your plans where they left off.

You will find many people who will laugh at the idea of learning how to
make money in books. They will tell you that business success depends upon
inherent trading ability and action. They will cite men who never read a book
in their lives and still made lots of money in business. Do not be influenced
by these views. No man ever started in business for himself, who did not
short-cut the time it took him to become established, by reading about what
others had done. When you read a book about business it is just as though
you were invited into the home of the author and sat down with him and
talked over your problems. Only those who think they know all there is to be