Pulling the ripcord. Major life change

It's like the Mafia. Once you're in, you're in for life.   Why I don't tell all my talents to everyone!  They still find me too though.

In reply to ShawnG :

That is an honor that you have skills that are so high level that someone wants you that bad. I have always been super impressed with your depth of knowledge and the things you do. That person is fortunate to work out an agreement with you.

Thanks for the kind words guys, I appreciate it.

If this works out well, it will mean less hustle at home to pay the monthly bills too.

Sorry for the late update.

Trip to deal with my client worked out very well. Looks like this is going to be a regular thing for me!

On the home front, we're getting frost at night so I've been pulling out the garden and getting things ready for winter. We had an absolutely miserable year for the garden. Our spring was so wet that everything got drowned. Corn didn't do well in spite of re-seeding we got nothing. Potatoes, garlic and squash did very well.

The cold spring and an error on my part also contributed to our bees not doing well so there was no honey this year but I'm confident for next year.

We're changing our plans a bit for the garden next year. We're narrowing our focus a bit to things that don't need as much attention from me. Next year will be only specialty potatoes, garlic, corn and zucchini as this seems to be the only thing people want to buy.

We're also starting christmas trees next spring. I need to consider something for retirement and trees are ten years in the future. We have our order in for an initial batch of 50 trees to see how each variety will do. We're planting Scot's Pine, Blue Spruce and White Spruce.

There's zero christmas tree farms out here and the only real trees come from the hardware store in a sock. There's no "Pick and Cut" type places. When we lived in Langley there were probably 20 tree farms in a 100km radius to do your shopping at. The people we've talked to about the idea seem excited.

At worst, I'll end up with a wind break or have some landscape trees to sell.

Got our bees all prepped for the winter too:

Snug as a bug...

Bees are a special skill. I have three friends who all tried raising them out here and all gave up after opening dead hives several Springs in a row. But up there is drier so maybe they will winter better once you get the hang of it.

In reply to bearmtnmartin (Forum Supporter) :

They made it through last winter with less insulation so this one should be OK as long as they have enough food. Fingers crossed.

Wife unit had her glass art in the Saskatoon Glassworkers Guild sale last weekend and absolutely killed it. Sold a lot of her pieces in just two days.

I'm going to be at the Sask Snow Outdoor Leisure Show this Saturday, kissing hands and shaking babies, trying to promote the repair shop a bit.

Sunday I get a day off.

Monday I catch a flight back to Vancouver to work on customer vehicles for a week.

Now I just need to figure out how to clone myself.

And... Here's the thing with owning your own business...

Pros: You're the boss.

Cons: You're the boss.

Had a brand-new ignition coil that was installed two weeks ago on a customer's truck go bad. Napa is covering the coil under warranty but I get to eat the labour on the replacement. Yay me...

Today I discovered that my wonderful new method for cleaning carburetors isn't so wonderful. Yeah, the crock pot with antifreeze gets them clean but it also melts out the nylon throttle bushings and decel enrichment valves.

Looks like I get to buy my customer a carburetor core that I can overhaul since the little brass insert can't be removed without damage and the valves aren't available anyway.

Looks like I'll be making a big, fat zero or maybe even be eating the weenie on this job. Oh well.

Oh, and my shop heater crapped out today. Turned out to be a bad high limit switch so at least it's a $15 part instead of a $250 heater. Too bad it's two weeks away.

Time for a New Year update.

Markets have stunk for the past few months. We were signed up for a couple big Christmas shows and barely made our table fee back or not even that. I even had people tell me "Oh, we're not here to buy anything, we just came to look." Well, there won't be anything to buy if all anyone does is look.

It's not just us though, every artist we know is taking a hit this season. People just aren't spending money right now. Times are tough and well established businesses in Saskatoon are shutting down because nobody is shopping.

But, we're going to make it.

The shop is busy. Things were slowing down and I had nothing new coming in so I put up an ad on Facebook on Boxing Day. Now I have 6 sleds in the shop for various repairs and a '52 Buick in for some sheetmetal repair in the trunk floor. Just have to get them billed out because money is tight at the moment.

Wife unit has taught two classes on fused glass in the last month and is doing well. Students have been happy and she has enjoyed it. She will be teaching more in the new year.

The market garden business stunk this year. Our corn didn't produce and nothing else did well except pumpkins and potatoes. Also, the locals here seem to think that vegetables should be free. Our prices are the same as the local grocery store but my lettuce lasts for a week, rather than two days. Still too expensive.

Because of this, we're going to change direction a little bit with respect to the garden.  

We're going to keep going with our garlic, potatoes, pumpkins and corn but we're moving to other crops.

There's no Christmas tree farms out here. If you want a tree, you have to go to the hardware store and hope the tree you buy in the sock looks half-decent when you get it home. It's going to be a 10+ year investment before we will see anything out of it but we have to start somewhere and I don't know if I will be turning wrenches in 10 years.

People want to spend money on experiences now so we're going to do a U-choose Christmas tree farm and a Pumpkin patch (sunflowers too) in the years before that. Free hot chocolate, pony petting, sleigh rides, rides in a Model T Ford sort of thing. Probably have to build an outhouse too.

I've got a bunch of trees ordered for the spring, if they do well, I'll order more next year.

We're going to use the 1V geodesic dome which we used for a greenhouse to build a small farm store on the property. We're going to feature Jenn's art, plus some other local artists work for a commission. Some signs on our corner, at our driveway and along the highway will help. 

People already travel down that highway to visit the little resort town 20 minutes from us so, hopefully they will be in vacation mode and decide to take a small detour.

We have all the equipment we need to handle this plus plenty of space and we're only 5k off a major highway.

If the Christmas tree thing doesn't work, there's always a market for landscape trees.

I just realized that I posted the Christmas tree thing before but I feel like we've talked about it a fair bit now, asked a lot of people and got positive feedback. I think we've hashed the idea out a bit more now.

Happy new year Shawn! Glad you are still plugging away. Every year will get easier I expect.

In reply to ShawnG :

Shawn, 

Go to your most frequented Napa auto parts store . The one with your most active account. Speak to the manager and get signed up for the Total Quality program. It provides you as a "shop" with the ability to get Mitchel rate paid back to your shop when you have to replace a defective part within 90 days of install.  It does cost 3xx$ a year . But it's pretty cheap insurance if you ever get a bad water pump or steering rack for example. Even a couple little things like bad coils or the like can make it pay off pretty quick. 
 

I run a Napa and am always pretty forward with my customers . I occasionally sell a new dud part, everyone in the business does. Even the dealer.

Good luck this winter , I admire your willingness to change and take so much risk on the farming front . That's a hard way to make a living . 

In reply to 1SlowVW :

Thanks for the tip, NAPA was one if the suppliers I talked to and received a bigger discount this month. I think I'll wait before I hit them up again . 

In reply to ShawnG :

It's not a service that costs the store anything. Shouldn't be a big ask. It's just not something advertised as it's not a real popular program. It's kind of an orphan because it doesn't have a volume rebate so it's only really applicable to 1 person operations. In my opinion. Of course maybe you sign something that says "I'll buy xxxx dollars of parts a year and the fee goes away. But that's decided at the store level. 

In reply to ShawnG :

Ultrasonic cleaners are the answer I have used one for years their cheap and do a great job without damaging the part being cleaned

In reply to danvan :

Yes, I have an ultrasonic cleaner.

It won't touch some of the crud that I'm coming up against these days, not even close.

Usually it's alternating trips through the hot antifreeze and hot degreaser in the ultrasonic along with a soak in some chem-dip.

Whatever junk this modern fuel is leaving behind is, it's awful.