New in the Midwest

Hello Everyone.

I just wanted to introduce myself and such. I recently opened a VERY small business in Rolla, MO. We design and build custom Longboards, not an original idea, it's been an up and coming sport on the west coast since flat decks. I got into Longboarding during college (I'm 21) and a friend of mine started building his own boards and putting awesome paint schemes on them. We started very small, we still are... I want to be prepared to become the Midwest distributer of Longboards and accessories. I am a senior in business administration so I understand what I'm doing but I'm having trouble designing systems (accounting, inventory, sales records, website forms) using no capital (excel and access). Anyways, that’s my story and what most of my threads will be about. I look forward to meeting the community.

Dave

welcome, dave!

Welcome to the forum, from one Dave to another.

Don't get caught up reinventing the wheel to perform management tasks. If you don't want to pay a few bucks for accounting software like QuickBooks, get a free version. Even the most basic free software is likely to do more for you than your own accounting system created in Excel. Same with other basic management systems. Focus on what you do best. Your time is more valuable than you are giving it credit for.

Hi Dave, welcome to the forum. I agree with David, you can try free trial versions to start. Other than Quickbooks, MS Small Business Manager and Simply Accounting also seems to be good ones

David Staub is so smart! Great advice. Couldn't agree more.

As a small business owner, we find the free templates on office.microsoft.com very useful, as well.

Welcome to the midwest, good luck!

Welcome to the forum!