After a few tense weeks with absolutely no contact from EI, I found out today via their online portal that I’ll finally be getting some payments.
Looks like I might even get a little more than the max since I think I qualify as low income… LOL.
No payments as of yet, but next week I should see around $400 plopped into my account.
You have no idea how relieved I feel about this. I’ve been going over my numbers in my Mint account and without regular income of some kind I’d be in a real hard place.
I’m still looking for jobs but it’s slim pickings out there! I haven’t heard back on anything. It’s hard when you’re switching careers. If I had stayed in my old field I would have had a job by now for sure. I have the perfect resume for media jobs… but not so perfect for anything else *sigh*
The Big Idea
In other news, I think I have a business idea! It may be only part time to begin with, but hopefully I can grow it to something bigger. It’s not a new concept or anything, I want to open an online store and sell cool stuff. Particularly handmade/artisan things like you can find on Etsy. The difference is that I will hand-pick everything and curate the collection. I will also be handling all the marketing and promotion (which is half of any business anyway) to promote not only my store, but the artisans behind the work.
I want all the items I select to be beautiful and functional where applicable. Jewelry, housewares, health & beauty stuff… anything! I want to sell products that are interesting and have a story behind them so that the people that buy them can be proud of what they own and tell those stories! I’ll be doing some interesting things in terms of marketing (sorry, I can’t share all the details!) and will hopefully have community tie-ins as well. I want to support the local craftspeople that pour their hearts into their work.
My first challenges though are coming up with a good name, and also sourcing some neat items to sell. If you or someone you know makes interesting things and they would be interested in selling through me, please let me know! Ideally they would be located in North America so that shipping isn’t outrageous.
Anyway, there’s a little blurb for ya. I’m looking into some local business resources to get more information on writing a business plan and securing funding. Anyone have some additional Canadian resources I could tap?
5 responses to “Finally Getting EI”
You can check out the Ontario Business Program Guide. It's an online directory of resources that support Ontario businesses: http://www.ontario.ca/en/business_program/index.h…
Also, I'd look into free advice and mentoring. Many MANY organizations do this. Enterprise Toronto. Canadian Business Youth Foundation. Even Youth Employment Services as well as BDC to name a few. Here's a link of additional Ontario resources: http://www.ontario.ca/en/life_events/job/004475.h…
As for writing a business plan, there's an online game that I found by the Ontario government. It's meant for students but it's pretty decent as a learning tool: http://www.ontariocanada.com/ontcan/1medt/smallbi…
The first thing though is to do more research on your market and who your competitors would be though. Good luck!
Eee! I'm so glad you're finally moving forward with this idea and sharing it around. I'd like to suggest The Right Brain Business Plan to get you started with groundwork stuff, if you'd like to use something that's not just Word documents and Excel. She walks you through nine aspects of planning in a not-boring way. (I'm going through it right now and love it.) And keep us updated!
My recent post Forgiving Myself First
I think Etsy's really has this one nailed… are you trying to do the same thing? If that's the case I am not sure it's a great business plan.
Haha fair concern, but no, I'm not doing anything like Etsy. They are way too big for anyone but eBay to challenge!
My recent post Finally Getting EI
That would be AMAZING! You looked stunning when I met you, the colours and jewellery choices were perfect. I can totally see you curating jewellery 🙂