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Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

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Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#31

Post by legostormtroopr »

monkey26 wrote: post #29
stanislavb wrote: post #9

Not exactly a resource but more of an advice - learn software development. Unless you are familiar to some extent, you will always be dependent on a competent software engineer, and that will make it much harder to build a lifestyle business. Second advice, use Ruby on Rails or Django as a web framework and don't follow after the complexities of JS and other newcomers. Phoenix (Elixir) is awesome but that will requir…

I don't want to hijack this thread, but what does Django do? I ask, cause I have a service that is a Rust backend (kind of specialized in what it does) + a SolidJS frontend... But I've seen a potential area for growth, I didn't imagine at first, and that would be stuff like user profiles, authentication, and managing stuff. And I really don't want to cut all this more "CRUD" like stuff in Rust and an SPA. I don't kno…

Out of the box Django offers: authentication, database management and migration, a web server, a template engine, URL routing, and probably more - pretty much everything an app needs in a single framework.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#32

Post by halfcat »

monkey26 wrote: post #29
stanislavb wrote: post #9

Not exactly a resource but more of an advice - learn software development. Unless you are familiar to some extent, you will always be dependent on a competent software engineer, and that will make it much harder to build a lifestyle business. Second advice, use Ruby on Rails or Django as a web framework and don't follow after the complexities of JS and other newcomers. Phoenix (Elixir) is awesome but that will requir…

I don't want to hijack this thread, but what does Django do? I ask, cause I have a service that is a Rust backend (kind of specialized in what it does) + a SolidJS frontend... But I've seen a potential area for growth, I didn't imagine at first, and that would be stuff like user profiles, authentication, and managing stuff. And I really don't want to cut all this more "CRUD" like stuff in Rust and an SPA. I don't kno…

Django has all that built in: auth, users, CRUD.

It comes with a built in admin portal that lets you work with all your data in list views and detail views, with sorting, filtering, and searching. For a lot of scenarios you can get away with just using the admin portal (like we have accounting people log in there and import CSV files, etc).

It’s great for managing a data model, setting up a database schema and managing the migrations for you. And once that is setup it’s pretty trivial to enable API endpoints to do all the CRUD-style stuff, if needed.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#33

Post by BenFranklin100 »

Lifestyle businesses are underrated in my opinion. They are also more achievable than a multi-million exit, especially if a lifestyle business is the planned goal. A lifestyle business does have particular challenges however. Specifically, moving it from a stage two to stage three business as described in Scale by Finkel and Hoffman:

https://www.amazon.com/Scale-Seven-Proven-Principles-Busines...

A stage 1 business depends on the founder doing the work; a stage two business depends on specific people doing the work; a stage three business has enough systems and checks in place that people are interchangeable.

With a stage two business, a critical person leaving can threaten the entire business. This is a particular issue in the software field where people tend to job hop. Creating a stable lifestyle company that is more than a three or four person shop, thus requires a large and sustained effort to document all critical processes. Don’t underestimate this challenge.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#34

Post by lettergram »

BenFranklin100 wrote: post #33

Lifestyle businesses are underrated in my opinion. They are also more achievable than a multi-million exit, especially if a lifestyle business is the planned goal. A lifestyle business does have particular challenges however. Specifically, moving it from a stage two to stage three business as described in Scale by Finkel and Hoffman: https://www.amazon.com/Scale-Seven-Proven-Principles-Busines... A stage 1 business d…

I think life style businesses are fine, provided you’re the only one that’s not interchangeable.

For instance, if I run a business and hire workers to develop features for the website and have a few people in the factory assembling widgets. It’s fine so long as I can approve the PRs and train up the next folks as needed.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#35

Post by BenFranklin100 »

lettergram wrote: post #34
BenFranklin100 wrote: post #33

Lifestyle businesses are underrated in my opinion. They are also more achievable than a multi-million exit, especially if a lifestyle business is the planned goal. A lifestyle business does have particular challenges however. Specifically, moving it from a stage two to stage three business as described in Scale by Finkel and Hoffman: https://www.amazon.com/Scale-Seven-Proven-Principles-Busines... A stage 1 business d…

I think life style businesses are fine, provided you’re the only one that’s not interchangeable. For instance, if I run a business and hire workers to develop features for the website and have a few people in the factory assembling widgets. It’s fine so long as I can approve the PRs and train up the next folks as needed.

That would be a ~ three or four person shop in my experience. It’s small enough that you the founder know how to do everything themself. That’s a fine business, but often it’s tough to take a vacation and leave it on autopilot for a few weeks. And heaven help you if you ever come down ill.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#36

Post by BenFranklin100 »

hermitcrab wrote: post #11
stanislavb wrote: post #9

Not exactly a resource but more of an advice - learn software development. Unless you are familiar to some extent, you will always be dependent on a competent software engineer, and that will make it much harder to build a lifestyle business. Second advice, use Ruby on Rails or Django as a web framework and don't follow after the complexities of JS and other newcomers. Phoenix (Elixir) is awesome but that will requir…

Contrary view. Your success running a lifestyle software business is likely to be far more dependent on your marketing skills and efforts that what what tech stack you use.

The OP isn’t making a point about the software stack insomuch as they are making the point that your developer has you by the short hairs if the stack is too specific or if you have no idea how anything works. Use something that someone else will have a fighting chance to take over when the day comes that your developer gives you two weeks notice. And be sure to document everything.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#37

Post by rovr138 »

CrazyStat wrote: post #24
rovr138 wrote: post #20

What’s “lifestyle” in this context? I can think of a couple of meanings, but the first thing I’d recommend is a lawyer to figure out your language, privacy policy, exposure if using certain terms. For example results, quality, etc would need legal documents to basically say ‘results may vary’ based on jurisdiction.

A lifestyle business is a small business that’s designed to support the owner with a steady cash flow, rather than focusing on growth like a VC-funded startup.

Thanks for that!

I was thinking of focusing on others lifestyles. Things like food, exercise, shakes, etc

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#38

Post by lettergram »

BenFranklin100 wrote: post #35
lettergram wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think life style businesses are fine, provided you’re the only one that’s not interchangeable. For instance, if I run a business and hire workers to develop features for the website and have a few people in the factory assembling widgets. It’s fine so long as I can approve the PRs and train up the next folks as needed.

That would be a ~ three or four person shop in my experience. It’s small enough that you the founder know how to do everything themself. That’s a fine business, but often it’s tough to take a vacation and leave it on autopilot for a few weeks. And heaven help you if you ever come down ill.

Vacation for a few weeks? I never imagined taking weeks of vacation unless I’m between jobs or businesses. If you can take weeks, then you’re probably not needed at all or so sparingly an occasional email would do.

Re: Ask HN: Best resources on starting a lifestyle business?

#40

Post by codeonline »

hermitcrab wrote: post #11
stanislavb wrote: post #9

Not exactly a resource but more of an advice - learn software development. Unless you are familiar to some extent, you will always be dependent on a competent software engineer, and that will make it much harder to build a lifestyle business. Second advice, use Ruby on Rails or Django as a web framework and don't follow after the complexities of JS and other newcomers. Phoenix (Elixir) is awesome but that will requir…

Contrary view. Your success running a lifestyle software business is likely to be far more dependent on your marketing skills and efforts that what what tech stack you use.

So wouldn't it follow that choosing a low effort stack translates to more time being available for the real task of marketing and business activities?
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