The Weight of Money

I’m sure I’ve mentioned that I work from home running my own sewing business. The past 6 months have brought about a lot of new avenues for customers and items and I’ve crossed over from being a purely service based business (sewing up what people bring me) to a sewing and manufacturing business. I now have products that I sell locally to individuals and stores. This is a great plus, but it brings more complication to our finances.

Where you’re running a service only business, there isn’t really any outlay of cash up front. So far, I’ve only needed to keep myself stocked with thread and needles to meet my customers needs. Now that I’ve moved into making my own products, I’m constantly searching out the best prices on materials ad need to stock up on raw materials. That makes a month like February somewhat painful because I’ve no money set aside for these purchases and am mostly going on (positive) speculation that I’ll be able to sell everything I buy.

So far, I’ve already placed 4 orders for materials and I doubt that will be slowing down anytime soon. I have a large, upcoming customer order that is proving difficult to fill because it is difficult to get the materials that I need. I wish it were as easy as being able to walk down to the local fabric store and they’d have what I need in stock. But, I’m looking at a lot of specialty items that go for too much retail and too slow through wholesale or co-op orders. It’s frustrating trying to keep expenses down but still have the materials I need in the time that I need them.

On the other hand, it is also very nice to just take a few leaps of faith that turn out positive. I recently purchased enough material to make several bags (when I only really needed to make one) and have already sold them all. I like knowing that within a week of purchasing materials, the cost is already covered a few times over. This will certainly help me out as I continue to get more and more materials ordered, but won’t be quite enough to cover my entire spending for this month. Hopefully things will come in sooner than expected and I can fill the large customer order that should put me back in black, financially speaking; till then, I’ll be seeing a lot of red for a while.