It is true that being an entrepreneur requires lots of selling. This includes selling actual products and services and selling ideas and possibilities. My co-founder and I have learned some important things about sales through this experience and we still have a lot to learn.
Our business is the Wolf Creek Track Club, a running club for people of all ages with the goal of offering more for runners. So far we have sold our idea to sponsors and partners, our business plan to judges, our event idea to the state government, and our products and services to our customers. We have successfully created strong business relationships with a physical therapist, a chiropractor, a photographer and videographer, and a graphic designer. We have been certified by USA Track & Field as a safe youth club. We have also learned to work with local businesses and banks throughout this process.
We successfully sold Moraine State Park on allowing us to hold our first event there. It took several meetings with park rangers and officials and a lot of emails but we got it done.
Our business plan made the semi-finals of the OH-PENN business plan competition and the finals of the Grove City College business plan competition. This was exciting and showed us that there were some other people that thought our business had potential. However, we ended both competitions without any money.
We have also done several hundred dollars in actual sales of memberships and apparel. We have sold items in various places and have traveled around to different events.
This process for us is still just beginning. We need to get more sponsors and actually get people to show up to the race in a month.