What's your dream business?

Start it today. (No, really.)

Author

Daniel Giacopelli
January 24, 2025

Serving up weekly intel for small biz owners since 2025

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Welcome to Issue #1 👋 

Hello! Danny here. Nearly 500 of you have subscribed so far (thank you!), so you probably already know and agree with what I think: small businesses are amazing. The world needs more of them. And there’s never been a better time to start one. Which is why I’m creating For Starters: to empower as many people as possible, starting with you, to start something new, whether it’s a donut delivery service, an IT consultancy, or a surf shack on a deserted island (hopefully not too deserted).
Here’s the manifesto in 6 words: You can literally just do things. Start something small (today, not tomorrow), give it some love, and watch it grow. You don’t need to quit your day job. You don’t need anyone’s permission. I promise, no one’s even paying attention, they’re all in their own little world. Just start. And use this weekly newsletter full of expert advice, inspiration and, soon enough, a LOT more (👀) to guide you on the journey.
In the meantime… Tell me what you’re working on! Share your business ideas, dreams, challenges, wins, failures and updates, plus feedback on how you’re finding the newsletter, to [email protected]. Gimme a month or two if it’s hate mail. I’m just getting started, after all.
P.S. If you’re reading and not yet part of the club, you know what to do:

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This week…

  1. INSPO ↣ Wine, wheelchairs, bakeries & bonsai

  2. TIPS ↣ Juicy biz advice from a curry rice samurai

  3. IDEAS ↣ Mahjong & cottage cheese (but not together)

  4. TOOLS ↣ 1,400 companies making in the US of A

  5. TOWN HALL ↣ For Starters community shoutouts

01. Inspo for starters

People building amazing businesses.

↣ First of all, it’s been nothing short of inspiring seeing LA’s small businesses rise to the occasion during the fires, helping out those who’ve lost everything, donating free food, services and time. They don’t need to do this, they shouldn’t have to do this, but they are, and that says everything. It’s been heartening to also see LA locals rallying behind impacted businesses. Below are some of the many that were completely destroyed, the owners/employees of which you can support:

↣ Wheelchairs are really expensive. Cambry and Zack Nelson are trying to make an affordable one with their company Not a Wheelchair. This is such a great story:

“Not a Wheelchair aims to offer a base-model, custom manual wheelchair at a similar or better quality than most of the insurance-approved wheelchairs in the U.S. for $999. Yes, that’s just under $1,000 for everything — wheels, handrims, tires, side guards and rigid, angle-adjustable backrest included. And the company plans to have a turnaround time of weeks, rather than the monthslong slog that it typically takes from order to delivery.”

↣ In other manufacturing news: In France, fashion vets Emmanuel Diemoz and Antoine Bejui bought an old school heritage company called Tolix, maker of metal furniture. Now they're injecting fresh energy into the operation. (You don’t have to be a founder to be a starter.)

↣ Chris Kontos – photographer, editor of Kennedy Magazine, and Athens’ go-to man-about-town – recently opened a cosy wine bar. It was mentioned in a recent FT piece (‘Athens – the coolest wine scene in Europe?’). I’m a fan of Chris’s taste and general approach to life. Can’t wait to see how this translates into hospitality. Bonne chance 🍷 

↣ I’ve just discovered that, for more than a decade, the Lin family in Singapore (mom Claire, dad Pann, son Renn, daughter Aira) have run an incredible biannual print magazine together called Rubbish FAMzine. This goes way beyond cute DIY project and veers into 'whoa' territory.

↣ A London jewelry wholesaler has found viral fame on TikTok 💎 

“Thanks to the online buzz, the business’s model has completely flipped: with retail going from representing five per cent of the business, thanks to a few “drift-by” weekend customers, to nearly 70 per cent, with the depot now open seven days a week to the public. With over 10m pieces in his inventory, Goldsmith is confident he is set for life, telling me he’s probably only about five or six per cent through the stock.”

↣ Speaking of… It’s true that some businesses have made their fame on TikTok (RIP-ish?) and others splash QR codes on every surface, but businesses like Analog Sea – a maker of exquisite little books, which often arrived at my desk at Courier with handwritten notes – have barely got a website. They do have a PO Box, though. This is intentional, not an oversight. Sometimes less is more. In an age when tech in general and AI in particular is eating the world, maybe the businesses that will stand out most are the ones that go against the grain and represent our lost humanity? Time to get off the soapbox, grandpa…

↣ Did you know there’s a Syrian-Korean mom-and-pop corner store in Brooklyn?

↣ Related: ‘The eternal bossman’, a celebration of Britain's essential corner shops via The Economist’s holiday issue (afraid I don't have a gift link 😢)

↣ Happy 2nd birthday to From Lucie, a beautiful bakery in New York’s east village 🥐 

↣ In other baking news: Texas-based Emily Harryman launched Plain Jane Bakes almost a year ago. Here she recaps the ups and downs of 12 months in business.

↣ Chani Nicholas and Sonya Passi are co-founders of the astrology app CHANI, and they do things a bit differently 🔮 

“Partners in business and in life, Nicholas and Passi managed to turn CHANI into the second-largest astrology app on the market despite prioritizing sustainable, slow growth and never once taking VC money. The magic’s in their community-driven business model, which includes heaping benefits on employees and channeling money to FreeFrom, their nonprofit supporting survivors of gender-based violence.”

↣ In a London railway arch, reptile-obsessed Steve Irwin stan Dylan Clancy has just opened up a tropical pet shop called Bermondsey Exotics 🐍 

↣ Mitch Williamson moved to Japan a year ago to become an apprentice to a bonsai artist. You win, Mitch.

↣ Alright, maybe the flower sellers of Hanoi win 💐 

You received this email because you’re subscribed to For Starters, a weekly briefing for the next generation of small biz owners. Have an idea or feedback? [email protected]

02. Tips for starters

Roll up your sleeves.

Také Sato is a Tokyo-born, London-based fashion stylist and creative director. He also runs the food stall Samurai Curry Rice, now a member of the street food group KERB. Let’s hear how Také got Samurai off the ground…

Photo credit: KERB

“

When Covid hit in 2020, I lost a bunch of styling gigs. 2022 in particular was tough for me and friends in the industry, with clients ghosting us. By the summer of that year, I wondered if there was anything else I could do to bring in some money, outside of fashion and design. In Japan, we say I-Shoku-Ju (衣食住), which means clothing, food, shelter – the 3 essentials of life. Clothing: done it. Shelter / housing: wasn’t so sure. But food: hmmm. There’s sushi, onigiri, ramen, and there’s curry rice, which I cooked weekly. I knew the recipe by heart. It was autumn of 2022 and I had nothing to lose. I decided to start it and see how it goes!

I had zero connections at food markets. I didn’t know about KERB. I didn’t know the word gazebo – I called it a tent. I contacted Maltby Street Market, Borough Market, a few other major ones, and no one replied. Then I discovered The Blue Market in South Bermondsey. It was the closest market I could walk to, because I didn’t (and still don’t) have a van. So I started trading at Blue Market, quietly, as a test.

I expected to sell 10-20 portions per day. No one knew me and footfall was quiet. On Facebook Marketplace I picked up an almost-new commercial rice cooker. I bought a soup kettle, a chopping board and a hand wash, loaded it up in a crappy wagon, and walked to the market. On day one, the debut of Samurai Curry Rice, I sold 7 portions of my beef curry rice. Now as a KERB member, I sell 60-70 portions in 3 hours!

Food businesses are a lot harder than I thought. It’s difficult in the sense that making good food isn’t everything. Your presentation needs to be eye-catching, the logistics are very hard, you kill your back, and while if the weather is nice you can do really well, if it rains heavily, then you’re left with a lot of portions worth of food.

Making more money leads to more investments. Selling 60-70 portions is great, but that money doesn’t stick around. Now you’re able to serve so many portions, you need to switch to gas to speed up operations. I used to use electricity because I couldn't afford a gas system. But now you need to spend £80 for a new gas cylinder, another few hundred pounds on a gas burner or griddle, £100 on the gas safety certificate. Boom, boom, boom, gone. I’m now eyeing up a used van (£10,000, useful for my fashion shoots too!), a new gazebo (£600), an aluminum table (£300), and a few hundred quid on front panel signage.

I’m super interested to see where Samurai will evolve. Once I become more established, I’d love to find ways to expand by opening up a small creative office with coffee, snacks, a studio. Who knows?

03. Ideas for starters

Biz ideas & market gaps.

↣ New-ish profession alert: chef-agents, who help chefs navigate their careers at a time when the demands on chefs are only growing.

↣ Small biz merch: Neighborhood Spot has made waves in NYC with shirts and bags emblazoned with the logos of the likes of Casa Magazines. And in Paris, the super cool GiftShop (which got a recent writeup in NYT) is following a similar path. Where’s the merch marketplaces for iconic businesses in Honolulu, Marrakesh, Seoul, etc? Someone get on this.

Au Pied de Cochon. Credit: giftshop.club

↣ Mahjong, the tile-based game originating in 19th century China, is growing in popularity in social clubs and hotel lobbies. Pick up a set from Chop Suey Club – founded by Beijing-born, New York-based Ruoyi Jiang – which does game nights at Ace Hotel. Or swing by a game run by London’s Four Winds Mahjong Club.

↣ Cottage cheese: boring, healthy, sexy? The sector is taking off. You can even say it’s no longer a… cottage… industry. I’m here all week, folks.

↣ And I’m fully onboard with this gas-station-turned-cafe proposal:

04. Tools for starters

Resources ↣
Reads ↣

“Detroit’s comeback seems to be gaining serious momentum and spreading out to other neighborhoods farther from the city center. In the last nine years, the city has provided grants to help more than 170 small businesses open up, most in outer-lying areas — a sign of economic optimism that would have been unimaginable a decade ago.”

Just for fun ↣

  • The perfect game? Yes. In inKONBINI: One Store. Many Stories, you play as Makoto Hayakawa, a college student who takes a break from her studies to look after a small-town konbini while her aunt is away. “Stock shelves, help your customers, listen to their stories, and see how some of the tiniest choices you make can impact their lives…” Who needs Call of Duty when you’ve got inKONBINI?

✱ Town hall

🏫 Shoutouts & opportunities from the For Starters subscriber community. 

↣ Segi Adewusi is building Flower the Fruit, a small-batch jelly brand that incorporates fruits and botanicals like hibiscus, strawberry and lime. “Right now, I’m working on refining my packaging and connecting with experts who can help with branding and scaling my production. I’d love to collaborate with designers, chefs, mixologists, or anyone who shares a passion for the fruitful intersections found between food and art.” Reach Segi via Instagram DM or [email protected].

↣ Alice Katter, who runs Out of Office Network, has just launched Culture Kit: "A monthly box filled with topics, tools and resources that makes your team’s culture building effortless." She’s on the hunt for 5 partners to receive access to the first 2 months of Culture Kit for free in exchange for honest feedback. Shoot her a message: [email protected]

↣ Marianne Olaleye runs JAIKU, a brand storytelling agency, and is co-founder of Puff Puff Ministry, a West African doughnut brand which she launched with her sisters. They’ve already worked with clients like Google, Netflix, Meta, TikTok and Amazon. “This year I want to get better at asking for help. It's impossible to scale two businesses at the same time without bringing people in to support me. So, I'm excited to connect with new people and I would love to hear how other founders approach hiring and team building.” Reach Marianne via IG, Linkedin or sign up to her Substack.

📩 Share your news & updates: [email protected]

❝

“The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.” – The late poet Mary Oliver

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