RUN AWAY, Recordist, you are just setting yourself up to get screwed.
I've also heard the "I want to get out in two years and sell to you guys schtick" Its usually just a lie to make you hump even harder to build up his business. If that was honestly his intention, you would already own some of the business.
What happens when you are doing your own work for a non-related customer and the boss is mad because you are using his electricity to not do his work?
What happens when a customer realizes they can go straight to you, and eliminate the middle man?
So say you do put a machine in his building, you give him a cut rate, he certainly is not going to like writing an employee a 5 digit check. A lot of nasty stuff will happen then, especially since you plan on using his tooling.
What happens when you realize you can make more money and be happier out on your own? Are you going to swipe his customers? Where are your customers going to come from if you don't, it'll be a real touchy situation if you steal his customers and stay in his building.
When my boss found out that I was out buying machines with the guy that used to run the shop(the guy who had my job before me, good friend from way back in college and my business partner), my boss was not happy.
He told me I was going to steal all of his customers, funny thing is in the shop he hated it when I took on outside work and actually made him money, the only reason the reason the outside work came in was because I made a deal with a few buyers, if they didn't have to talk to the owner, I would get the work.
I gave him a one year notice, and a promise that I would not even talk to any existing customers for a year after I left. I made it 4 months before it became unbearable. I did keep to my promise of not talking to a customer for a year, (they called my partner). I just made it over the year mark and called a buyer to ***** about some welded assemlies that are late, (machine, passivate, bond-lube, assemble, get$$$, assemble into final assembly, get more $$$$). He was mad as hell at me because I hadn't/didn't/wouldn't talk(ed) to him in over a year.
Two of our best customers also cancelled POs and actually went and got material and castings from my old job, one even went so far as to buy the fixturing for a particular job I had made from my old boss to avoid a setup fee. The scary thing is that all prices have increased, some substantially, some by a small bit.
The old boss still won't talk to me, but he will talk to my partner. I wasn't gone 2 weeks and the old boss was asking my partner to have me go over to the shop and help out. There are still calls to come help fix a machine, apparently they need a tech in there often, lots of crashes($75 an hour for a 6 hour round trip plus $95 an hour working time). I did all the machine repairs, I only had a tech in there once and that was to maintain a warranty on a spindle. He also keeps
'nuf of my story, if you think you can do it, do it. You don't need to be tied to somebody, or have your moneymaker in somebody else's building(that big thumb crushing down on your head). Stuff a machine in a garage. If you are in an industrial area, go looking for some space to rent from non-related businesses.
Run away, your boss has no interest in you actually succeeding, he just wants a free mill and extra capacity for no money.  |