Here’s another article written exclusively for pinklighthouse.com by bizymoms.com

There are many of us who have a keen knack for trading, and we simply know a good bargain when we see one. This natural skill can be turned into one of the most successful home business ideas by engaging in buying and selling activities at garage sales and flea markets. Most of us do not have the financial capacity or the risk appetite to indulge in a large volume trading business. So garage sales and flea markets offer an attractive opportunity to conduct the same business at a small scale, with very low investment and risk, and such a business can be run from the home itself.

In fact, you can start your home business in this field with absolutely no investment. You can simply clean out your closets, attics and garage for old stuff that you do not need. Simply load all the stuff in your vehicle and sell it at a garage sale, a flea market or a swap meet. You will be able to earn an amount of cash from this sale that you can use as capital for your flea market home business.

If you have a sharp knack to judge good products that are available at throwaway prices, you can start buying a few such items that you are sure have a strong demand in the market. Therefore, apart from good buying sense, you also need to have a pulse of the market and be aware of what the trends are as well as the hot selling items that are in demand. Accordingly, you can buy a few surefire items from the flea market and refurbish and clean them up for sale at another place.

With your initial buying and selling efforts and your experience in flea markets, you may then consider starting your own garage sale or a flea market out of your home. All of the items that you have purchased from a variety of places can now be put up for sale at your home. Sometimes a flea market may also specialize in a particular product such as furniture, while some other flea markets may deal in all kinds of merchandise under a single roof.

In fact, it is not necessary to deal only in used merchandise for your flea market or garage sale business. You could even make a tie-up with a wholesaler, a general merchandise liquidator or a surplus trader who keeps a large stock of items that are production overruns, order cancellations, or leftover items from stores. All these are basically A-grade quality products but available at much lower prices due to odd lots. You could create a successful business if you can buy the right products at the right price, which will always have assured demand from customers.

BIO: Bizymoms has been helping women <a href=”http://www.bizymoms.com” target=”_blank”>work at home</a> for over a decade and now helps those who are looking to start a home business with a variety of <a href=”http://www.bizymoms.com/ideas.html” target=”_blank”>home business ideas</a> to choose from. Visit today to get your business started!

Your Name: pam

Date Joined MK: 10/2007

When Left MK or Still Active?: active

Initial Inventory Purchased: $5000.00

How were you recruited?: my daughter in law

Memorable experience you had in MK: my grand opening

What did you learn from MK?: keeping a positive attitude

What are you doing now?: selliing [sic] MK

Additional Comments:

first of all, I want to say that MK has changed my life for the better..IF I  never sold another MK product this experience has been a blessing. I don’t care for negativity, anyone who complains about this company needs to remember that WE are in charge of our own destiny, if you ( or I ) fail it is because of us. I have never had any job where I was completely satisfied. SO I just wanted to ventilate about some on other sites where these women are crying  about how Mk ruined their life, I say ” you just have a to blame somebody else” IF I fail it is no body’s fault but mine..AND thanks for this opportunity to speak my mind. there’s another Mk hate site that will not allow anyone to speak anything positive about this amazing company!

PinkLighthouse.com is now on Twitter, like so many other sites and people.

As far as I’m concerned, the jury is still out on Twitter. While I use it for several other sites and can see its usefulness in many applications, I also see the ridiculousness of it.

But I thought PinkLighthouse being on Twitter could engage some interesting discussions. When this site is experiencing glitches (which, thank goodness, doesn’t happen often) you can check in on our Twitter feed and get the status of things.

And in the less than 24 hours since PinkLighthouse.com joined Twitter, I’ve already discovered pyramid schemes on Twitter!

It’s called “Viral Followers” and there are several sites online where you can sign up to be part of this scheme.

It works like this:

• You go to one of these websites and enter your Twitter username and password and it “retweets” a message to six or eight other Twitter users
• As a result, you will automatically start  “following” the 6 or 8 people in front of you “in the system.”
• Your “retweet” contains a link to the viral follower site and when others follow this link and sign up to do the same thing, they will have to automatically follow you
• You get more and more followers as a result.

Isn’t that exciting?!   It’s a pyramid scheme to get you more Twitter followers! Yea!

And it continues on and on,  up to 7 levels deep until you have ten of thousands of followers!  As one of these viral follower sites says, you could get over 87,000 followers “if the scenario…happens exactly as I described it.”

Where have we heard this before? Oh…that’s right! MLM! You recruit a bunch of people and they recruit people and if everything happens just the way their little diagrams show, you end up making a bunch of money!

So you can collect thousands and thousands of Twitter followers, and if you’re lucky, maybe one or two of those people will give a hoot about you or your business or website (since this is what most of these people are trying to promote.)

I know that the people participating in these types of pyramid schemes think that more followers are going to translate into more money or visibility for them. But have they stopped to think how ridiculous it is to blast their “tweets” to anyone and everyone who signs up for this thing?

You can market your brains out, but if you message isn’t going to the right people, the people who are interested in and might need your service or product, you are COMPLETELY wasting your time.

But hey…if you get bored collecting “friends” on Facebook, at least you now know you can head over to Twitter and collect “followers” as well.

I’ve mentioned before (See this previous article) there have been numerous stories in magazines, newspapers, and on the television talking about how lots of women are flocking to the direct sales companies given the downturn in the economy.

Yesterday, I picked up my newspaper only to find yet another article about companies like Mary Kay and AVON seeing an increase in their sales forces.

Mary Kay rolled out a new ad campaign in March to try to recruit new consultants. According to this latest AP article, Rhonda Shasteen claims that the traffic on the Mary Kay website increased by 108 percent during the month of March.

Every story I’ve read or seen is always the same. So-and-so was laid off and then decided to sign up with XYZ “direct sales” company and at her first party made $2000. Something like that.

And what a great option direct sales is, they point out. An extra fun job where you can make some extra money.

But here’s what I want to know: Who is going to buy all these products? All these women are signing up to peddle these products, to make some extra money in this lackluster economy, but who is going to be their customer?  You need CUSTOMERS to make any money selling. As more people sign up to sell these products, there are now even more consultants competing for the same customer.

Another thing these articles never mention: These products aren’t cheap. As people are being more frugal, I doubt that they are inclined to pay $13 for a lipstick or $15 for mascara when they can find comparable or better products at the drugstore or Wal-Mart for half that or less. Besides price, the selection at the stores is phenomenal…and you don’t have to deal with a sales person calling you every other week to try to get you to hold a party or invite you to a “girls’ night out” recruiting event.

What burns me is that these stories never mention the expenses, or if they do, they gloss over them. I’ve never seen any mention of the pressure that Mary Kay recruiters exert on new consultants, trying to convince them to shell out thousands of dollars on initial inventory. Never.

The problem is that the people writing these stories know NOTHING about what they’re writing about. And thus, the picture they paint is distorted and incomplete.

This is an article written exclusively for PinkLighthouse.com by the great people at bizymom.com. Enjoy!

Tips for creating more profit from your work at home business

When looking to increase profits for your work-at-home business, you should be willing to do anything and everything that is required to ensure that these profits actually come to you. Here are a couple of tips to ensure that you get more profits.

1. Outgoing expenses – When looking at profits in a home business, what really matters is the expenses that are being spent and the income which you are making by selling your product or service. If you aren’t able to make the profits that you originally envisaged, then you should trace back your expenses and see where it is going wrong. Are there some areas where you can cut down on expenses? If possible, look for some low cost alternatives for particular services which yield nearly the same quality of service that you are currently receiving. If there are some unnecessary expenses, trash it. This is the first step towards creating more profits for your work-at-home business.

2. Targeting Sales/Customers – You should now review your sales and see who is buying your product. You should also see whether the current market that you are operating in is sustainable and also see whether you can go further and reach a wider market.

3. Advertise your home business – Once you have identified the target market for your business, you should look at the advertising mediums that you are using. Are you constantly reminding the customers about your products & services? Maybe you have to improve your website. Put an ad in a local paper or send out some flyers. Try sponsoring a local ad even so that you can get more people to see your name. Use word – of – mouth as well.

4. Be creative and adventurous – Don’t be afraid to look outside the box. Be creative. Give your customers a 30 day trial or give them some discounts. Let them sample your product and if they are impressed, they are sure to purchase your good or service. Increasing profits in your work-at-home business is a matter of reviewing it and acting upon the result of the review.

Just like how building your business took so much focus and effort, maintaining home business performance and good profits will take a lot of effort throughout the life of the business. Whatever you should do to make the business succeed should be done. Trial and error is the only way towards achieving success in your work-at-home business.

Bio:

Bizymoms has been dedicated to helping women work from home for over 10 years! Visit today to enjoy our interactive message boards, informative articles, help and advice from the Bizymoms’ Home Business Support Team and achieve your own work at home dreams with our home business start up kits.

Your Name: Heather

Date Joined MK: 3/28/09

When Left MK or Still Active?: Still Active

Initial Inventory Purchased: 1200
How were you recruited?:        I wasn’t really recruited. My IBC gave me some info/literature when i asked about it and I took it home, read over it and decided to go for it. I actually had to track HER down..lol

Memorable experience you had in MK: My first sale and my first debut party. Mary kay is a hobby for me. I love doing it. I love make up and I love the products. I couldn’t sell something I didn’t already love. It’s the excitement behind the sale and the interaction with other women that I enjoy the most..also parties I love a good party

What did you learn from MK?: Confidence. Standing up and speaking in front of a group of 10 or more is scary. Nothing my college public speaking class could have prepared me for. But over time it becomes easier and easier and I have come to look forward to it! I feel good about myself when I get recognition and when I hear a customer tell me how great she thinks she looks!

What are you doing now?: Currently prepping for a facial class next week. Making goodie bags to hand out to potential customers.

Additional Comments: Know your goals and know where you stand. Ask yourself “what do I want from this business” when you’ve found your answer stick with it. Some are personal use others want to make money. I’m a little of both. I know how far I want to go in this and I know my limits. Be careful of your NSD or SD and never do anything if it doesn’t feel right. Those who choose to cheat or lie to move up shouldn’t rep. the company as a whole.

Your Name: Allison

Date Joined MK: 03-28-2009

When Left MK or Still Active?: Still active but in the process of leaving

Initial Inventory Purchased: $1800 (biggest mistake EVER!)

How were you recruited?: I ignorantly recruited myself by going online and finding a random consultant and emailing her.  Not my brightest idea ever, it turns out.

Memorable experience you had in MK: The first time I ever called my SD on a blatant lie.  She told me that I could accept a 12-month fellowship in another country and still make money off my team, even though I couldn’t actively sell.  Big fat lie and we both knew it.

What did you learn from MK?: Always listen to your gut, especially when an older, well made up woman is trying to push thousands of dollars of products on you and is not letting you get a word in edgewise. 

What are you doing now?: Nannying for the cutest little boy.  They are paying me $12 an hour to come watch tv and sleep here (the baby is in sleep by the time I get here after my full time job).  Ive made over $600 alone doing that this week, which is more than I EVER made in MK!!!  And its way more fun!!!

Additional Comments: After arguing with my SD about returning my product to the company, and having her lie to me about MK, I decided to take a shower.  When I went to put my MK night solution away after I was finished, I dropped it on the tile floor and it shattered (why they put it in a glass bottle, I will never know!).  A large piece of the base flew up and slashed my leg.  As I’m standing in the middle of the night solution and my blood is running down my leg mixing with the solution I realize- my blood runs just as red (not pink) as everyone else’s.  That was the last straw for me.

Every time April rolls around, I think of all those Mary Kay meetings I attended, where the Directors would spend the entire time advising all us Consultants on what Mary Kay expenses were tax deductible.

Turns out they tried to find a way to make nearly everything a deductible expense.

But the trouble is, deductions do not equal income, and if you’re not careful with those deductions you could find yourself in trouble with the IRS.

While it’s true that things like your cell phone costs, if used for your Mary Kay business line, and other things like mileage and meeting costs can be deductible, it’s not the same as income.

So what if you have thousands of dollars of deductions? Your goal as a business person is to create income. Deductions reduce that income, sure, but there was so much emphasis on how Mary Kay created tax deductions that it missed the point.

If you’re showing a loss on your income taxes, guess what? You didn’t make much money. Sure, there are things you can deduct that you would have as expenses anyway, perhaps. But loss is loss. And if you show a loss on a business you’re reporting on a Schedule C for several consecutive years, the IRS may not see that as a business and you could be in trouble.

Straight from the court decision document:

After a trial on the merits, the jury found that Defendants infringed Mary Kay’s
trademarks and engaged in unfair competition and passing off with the specific intent to cause
confusion, to cause mistake, and to deceive. The jury also rejected all of Defendants’ affirmative
defenses, and awarded Mary Kay an accounting of profits. Based on the jury’s verdict, Mary
Kay now seeks the entry judgment for the amount of $1,139,962.00, plus post-judgment interest
at the applicable legal rate.

Yep. That’s over 1.25 million dollars that Mary Kay is now trying to get from Touch of Pink.

Ouch.

As proceedings continue, the Touch of Pink versus Mary Kay Inc case continues on.

Apparently the jury has been selected because a jury roll now exists in the documents of the case.

There have been numerous documents filed in the last few weeks. Basically it’s a formal rehashing of the same issues, with each side stating their assertions.

As I mentioned earlier, Touch of Pink Cosmetics did score several victories in the case already and this is noted in one of the case documents:

On February 20, 2009, the court granted partial summary judgment for
the defendants on Mary Kay’s claims of tortious interference with contract, tortious
interference with prospective contract, and unjust enrichment. For that reason, Mary
Kay has removed those claims from its list of contested issues of law and fact that will
be a part of the trial of this case. This should not be read, however, as an
abandonment of those claims by Mary Kay. Mary Kay respectfully disagrees with the
order granting these portions of defendants’ motion for summary judgment and
believes that these issues should be presented to the jury.

There are lots of issues still to be determined, naturally, and I’ll keep you up to date as best I can.

I know we’re all eager to see what the outcome of this case will be.