The Truth About Starting a Business After Being Laid Off

Trader Stu explores the challenges of post-layoff entrepreneurship and shares exciting news about being featured in an upcoming apocalyptic survival video game called "Get Prepped."

• Being featured as a trader character in "Get Prepped," an apocalyptic survival video game releasing this winter
• Average gamer today is in their 30s with disposable income - not just teenagers
• The Michigan Renaissance Festival sponsorship and themed weekend events
• Post-layoff entrepreneurship challenges and unrealistic expectations
• Most new business owners after layoffs rely on unemployment benefits for startup capital
• Without proper advertising and marketing budget, new businesses struggle to survive
• The three biggest challenges for post-layoff entrepreneurs: cash flow, marketing, and time management
• Approximately 45% of small busines

“Whistles In The West” was written, recorded, and produced by Durracell, exclusively for use with Trader Stu’s platform, always rocking the cowboy hat. The track is protected under U.S. Copyright rights to use have been granted specifically to Trader Stu for content and promotional use related to his brand and media presence.

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The thoughts and views expressed in this podcast are solely those of the host and do not reflect the official policy or position of Metro Trading Association. Although the host is an employee of Metro Trading, this podcast is intended to educate entrepreneurs on the benefits of professional trading, regardless of their location. Additionally, the host reviews various pieces of camping gear due to the association of trade, barter, and prepping.

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Chapters

• 0:49 Welcome to the Trading Post
• 1:40 Getting Featured in a Video Game
• 4:08 Renaissance Festival & Sponsorships
• 5:50 Layoffs and Fake Entrepreneurship
• 11:20 The Hard Truth About Advertising
• 18:55 Post-Layoff Businesses: Why They Fail
• 23:26 Working From Home Realities

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:25

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Trading Post. I am Trader Stu and this episode is sponsored by the Michigan Renaissance Festival and Metro Trading Association. And of course I don't know if I told you guys this yet or not, but I got to give a shout out because I'm going to be in a video game with Press X to Play Games X to play games Sarita is making and her team actually is making a game called Get Prepped and it's about an apocalyptic video game to where you go around and you gather items and get ready for whatever apocalypse is about to happen, and it can be anything from I don't know, like civil unrest, I think, a comet, a nuclear blast, famine. I guess there's gonna be different things in there that you're gonna be able to survive and get through, and I am gonna be in the video game as the trader at the trading post. So this is gonna be so cool. It's funny.

Speaker 1: 1:26

I've always wanted to be in a video game, like when I was a kid. I was like you know what would be cool, you know when you make it, you know how you know when you make it. When you're in a video game, that's how you know and I always just thought that would be so cool and I guess I made it. Maybe this is it, this is it, I made it. But we are trading kind of a little bit for it. Like, right, I'm going to give her a shout out, advertise the game. And oh, by the way, if you don't know, you can advertise in her video game. It's $20,000. The average lifespan of a video game these days is five years. So if you do the math, it's five grand a year. You know, five times four is 20. And you will be featured either on a billboard or maybe your building is a safe house for the video game and you gather there and it's a, you know an area to where your name's on it and all the players within it um gather and then so you're kind of sponsoring the safe hold or whatever, the safe zone. So, very cool concept. This is the way the future. I mean, this is it, this is where everyone's hanging out. Now, you know video games. They're not your uh, you know, 14 year old nephew or whatever, playing a game in the basement. The average is, uh, she said in her 30s is the average gamer, uh, age right now, and uh, so these are everything from you know. I mean, they're not just like the, the stereotypical you know dude in the basement of the mom's house. I these are doctors, dentists, lawyers. These are the people who grew up playing these high-end video games and now they're out there in the world with money. This is how they blow off steam in the free time is to play video games. Check that out.

Speaker 1: 3:05

Also, I cannot wait for the Michigan Renaissance Festival to give me some swag or not swag ideas of what's coming up in the weekends. Each weekend's themed. So you know it's always fun, it's something every weekend. So one year it was like chocolate on a weekend and one year it was bring your dog. There's tons of dogs there. It was so cool. And then they dressed the dogs up too. Like you know, there's dragons and different One had a. It was like a knight, like a stuffed knight or whatever, riding the dog and it was pretty exciting to show it off. It was. The dog had a ton of fun, you could tell. So definitely check out the Michigan Renaissance Festival this summer and fall.

Speaker 1: 3:52

And my video game I say my video game Get Prepped is supposed to be released this winter or spring if things go to plan. So, and then Metro Trading Association. I work for. You know it's my full-time job. I work for. You know it's my full-time job and that's what this ended up being all about.

Speaker 1: 4:11

This podcast is starting to spiral into a looks like something of an endeavor. It was supposed to be just a way to share a little bit of ideas that I had about trade and barter and business to business and you know all sales and marketing and the realm of B2B and it's kind of taken off on me and it's fun, it's cool. It'd be cool if I got a little like a side income, money from a little extra second income. That'd be neat, right? I mean I am getting tickets, right. Michigan Renaissance Festival is sponsoring the show, so I'm getting tickets from them to give away, and I've also been invited to the media night. So there's that as well.

Speaker 1: 4:55

One of the downfalls of doing this episode at work is, uh, the mail just came, so if you heard the jingle, I'll try and edit that out. The door open and the postman came in and did it's his thing, so all right. So a couple of things I wanted to mention. I was talking to one of the members in our group and we happened to meet each other at a different event, and I don't want to mention names, it's not important, but the topic of conversation came up. It was.

Speaker 1: 5:28

It seems like there's a lot of people that are experiencing some layoffs, and I know you might depending on what you watch media-wise for your news you may or may not have heard of all the layoffs, and I was part of them. I don't know if it was because of tariffs or whatever like that. This is all before that. This is supposedly because of weather and my job. It needs to snow and ice and if it doesn't, then business ain't good, you know. So I was let go along with I think it was 45 others in the plant, and of course, you know stuff like that that doesn't make the news. It was nowhere in the Detroit news, it wasn't in the local news news. It wasn't in the local news.

Speaker 1: 6:12

I mentioned something about it when I had a YouTube channel and that I got laid off and I started going crazy, like actually crazy, I don't know. People sit around all day and just don't do anything. This causes some, I think some mental illness. Dude, you know they say that the devil's uh, our idle, idle hands are the devil's playground. It truly, it truly is. I mean, I even had a new baby at the time to help out with my wife and uh, it still wasn't enough to keep me, you know, going, and it was in the middle of winter. I got laid off in January, so it wasn't exactly like I go outside and, you know, go tinker around really, and uh, even if I did, you know baby needed me. So I don't know it was, um, it was a tough one and uh, so I'm back to work. Obviously, over a year ago now I think it's been a year now, july oh my God, it's been only been a year. July has been a year since I've been back.

Speaker 1: 7:00

So, anyway, we're talking about is getting laid off and people starting these like I don't know, entrepreneurship. He seems. He said it seems like people are making up job titles. He's like I swear to god, if I meet another, uh, business consultant or a business advisor or, uh, I don't know a social media, um, you know, not an influencer, but like someone that helps you with social media or an seo creator, you know these make up these titles. But you know, sometimes it's like the SEO creator thing is, I mean, that's, that's a dead. I think it's a dead industry.

Speaker 1: 7:38

I'd snake oil anymore these days, from what I've been hearing, because AI has been taking over. And I'm not gonna be wrong. I know AI looks for certain keywords when, when you ask it a but you know when I did I use perplexity. When you enter it, it's just it scans everything within seconds and it gives you a synopsis of you know what it gathered. And I know some people say, oh well, you know, it'll tell you to eat a rock a day. That was one of its health advisor things, because somebody on Reddit made a joke and suggested oh, you should eat a rock a day. So then AI doesn't sense sarcasm, you know what I'm saying. So people are like, oh, and I'm not saying they actually took their word for it and ate a rock a day. It was just a joke, you know, but it took it seriously. Anyway, you can figure it out. You know that if you were to go out and do a Google search and then gather your own data and spend an hour or half hour doing that and read several articles and several web pages, you can tell that whatever AI just spit at you is a logical thing to take. So anyway, I digress on the SEO thing. I didn't mean to do that, but it is a dead thing, I think.

Speaker 1: 8:53

And people are making up these businesses and they have no money. So he's in marketing and he has like a paper magazine or whatever like that, right, like a print ad print stuff. And it was just like man. 10 years ago I'd walk into a business and I'd say, hey, you can put an ad in my book, whatever it is, and for about the third of the price of a month of being in the yellow pages and and you get in there for the whole year. You know it's one ad print and it lasts 12 months, right, okay? He said people write me checks, dude, like no, no, no problem, and it was three times as expensive as it is today. Now it's 10 years ago and, uh, when? Money? You know the before inflation, everyone was making 17 bucks an hour, right, so I don't know. All he was getting at is like nobody has any money. They're opening up these businesses and I think that that is putting a false sense out there of how well the economy is doing, because they keep touting oh, you know this, many small businesses registered last year to open and everyone applauses like, oh yeah, that's great. You know, that doesn't mean anything. I don't know why that means anything, because most of those fail. I don't know if mine did, I don't know if it failed, I just gave up on it. So an LLC. And then I opened it in. You know, I think it was January of 2020. 20.

Speaker 1: 10:21

And then three months later we all got put on lockdown. So there went that one and then I just was trying to scramble to get my money back on my drone that I put into and the camera equipment and anyway I got what I felt enough of my money back by doing gutter cleaning, which wasn't the original LLC. And then, after I got my money back, my shoulders I couldn't take it. I thought I was smart and got these carbon fiber poles and I thought I was safe by standing on the ground and using a vacuum system called SkyVac, and I just couldn't do it. I couldn't lift my arms up over my head, I already got bad shoulders and I already shouldn't be doing that work. But I mean I was out. I think it was like $3,500 or five grand. So I got something back.

Speaker 1: 11:03

So I did a few jobs and then once I couldn't stand or walk or lift my arms up anymore and I just beat my rig down, I shut it down, I liquid, we call it, liquidized it or anyway, shut down the LLC. And so, yeah, most of those don't LLCs don't mean anything anyway. And by certainly I know I did. I did have money for ValPak. I put money into ValPak, dude, and I got so much jobs, so much work, that I had to turn work away because they were putting me in ValPaks up north and it was like do I really want to drive an hour to go make you know what $200 or $300, whatever it was you know to do a gutter cleaning, and so I don't know, I had to put money into it and you've got to advertise, dude.

Speaker 1: 11:50

I just talked to a guy yesterday. He does, he owns Viking. I've got it right here Viking Trees, viking Tree and Stump, cool dude. I talked to him a little while back to try and sign up for Metro Trading Association and I called him back because I got his flyer in my mailbox saying that he was in the area. And you know, get a good discount. And you do get a good discount by if you get your trees trimmed while they're like on the road right, because they're already there, they already made the trip and you're just helping them out by giving them extra work for the day. So they give you like a great deal.

Speaker 1: 12:27

And I got like five of my trees trimmed for like 700 bucks last year. I did it and, uh, the same thing, a guy was door knocking and he was like, hey, we're up the road, you know, we could do your trees here, for I think it was 700 bucks or 750, whatever it was and I was like done deal, dude, cause I was waiting for that to happen again. I had a guy do that to me a year before and I just wasn't ready for that. Like I was like whoa, whoa, $700, that's a heck of a door knock. But then I got a quote for it when I was ready to get the trees trimmed and it was like $2,500, you know. So I was like, okay, I got this money earmarked for the next time this happens, and sure enough, the next summer it happened on my street.

Speaker 1: 13:01

Anyways, we're in a town full of trees and these old, big, huge old trees, so there's um, often they die and you know, or weather, and they get blown over. So then you get tree trimmers in the area and and they, they hook you up because it just it just helps them out. Anyway, he said the guy that owns viking is like you know, I am three weeks out, dude, I can't do trade right now. It's not for me, because I, you know, and I already got to buy another truck and trailer and another chipper and, uh, you know their crew, you know all this stuff Right. So he's like I got good problems to have.

Speaker 1: 13:32

And I said, yeah, dude, it sounds like it. Uh, and he said I'll tell you the secret is he got to advertise. Dude, you just got to put money in advertising. It'll keep you busy, you know. And of course you gotta get, you know, you gotta be a good businessman and not, uh, not advertise too much to where you're not profitable anymore. And obviously it sounds like he's not, he's buying a truck and trailer, but uh, or, he is profitable. I'm saying and, uh, you know, he'd over extend himself and he's doing it right. And that's the thing is that you got to advertise.

Speaker 1: 14:00

And I consider joining a trade group is a way of advertising and marketing, because you're going to put your name out there, you're in front of a bunch of business owners and you're going to get word of mouth marketing, you're going to get cash business from it as well. So my entry and level of entry is super low compared to joining a chamber or a B&I group or a ValPAC ad or a newspaper ad. Joining a chamber or a B&I group or a ValPAC ad or a newspaper ad, and it's just. If you join a trade group you're pretty much they don't make money until you make money. So find one in your area and do that if you can, because that's the greatest way to go, I think, to get going. I know I did it with my gutter cleaning business, so you know.

Speaker 1: 14:55

With getting laid off, I guess what I'm trying to say is that or if you are laid off, have some money earmarked, if you have it, if you can, to get any advertising money you know from them. Because and even like the bigger businesses, I've noticed too he said he goes man you know, say an ad is like 1200 bucks they're easy numbers, I don't know and he's like yeah, they're like, can I do it in a hundred bucks a month or can I do it, like you know, three times or four times times three? Can I do it in a few hundred bucks a time for over each quarter, and he's like dude, you don't have $1,200 for advertising, you know. And before he said, people just write checks. I hardly finished my sentence and they already wrote me a check. I was on my way. So business is tough right now out there for everybody.

Speaker 1: 15:38

I guess is from what I'm noticing, not just if you're importing things, don't let that fool you Like, just if you're importing things, don't let that fool you. Like, oh yeah, tariffs or tariffs, this, um. But I will say this I had my roof quoted, uh, to get new soffits and and fascia and uh and gables installed. Last year it was five grand, this year it was almost nine grand, almost 10 grand, um, but minus, uh, the shed, so that was a thousand bucks and then minus the siding, so it was 7,500 bucks compared to five grand last year. So it went up, was that 150 percent? And he was right. He said I gotta tell you, aluminum was like 100 bucks per whatever, and now it's 150, you know, per. I don't know if it's per foot or whatever it is, but uh. And so yeah, it was. He was right on Like it went up 150 percent. So there's that aspect of it for, like, the roofing companies and you get these textiles and I get that. I do get that. So let's see.

Speaker 1: 17:31

I want to go over a couple more things. I'm just kind of reading some bullet points I wanted to mention as well. So did you know that many of the people who get laid off start a business within three to six months? Um, they don't do it, like I said, with no capital or an investment plan. So that's where the you know long-term success kind of falls away three to six months after a layoff. That's because they find out that they're on, indeed, and monster, and they're like I don't understand.

Speaker 1: 18:01

I put out a hundred applications and I got no callbacks and I was part of that crew, dude. My resume is is pretty on point, dude. I mean, I top secret clearance and expired by now, but I had one. I could easily get one again. Uh, I can fix anything. I'm certified in refrigerant and hydraulics and pneumatics, diesel engines, turbine engines.

Speaker 1: 18:28

I was a flight engineer, a mechanic, in the Air Force. I was in the hydraulics and snowplow world, for God, eight and a half years, I think it was, yeah, eight and a half years, and nobody would call me back, dude. I'd get interviews, a couple here and there, but nobody. Usually before I would just get hired on the spot Like perfect, we love it. You're in, when can you start? Can you put a two-week notice in? Or one week? What's going on Now? They're like, okay, great, well, we'll think about it and we'll call you back and you know whatever. Yeah, never happened, dude.

Speaker 1: 19:04

And I know people that have good resumes and good you know work ethic and been at a job for a long time. They're laid off and they can't find a job. It's a tough racket out there. I see it all the time, even on Facebook and next door app. People are like man, I don't know what to do. Like, you know, I got laid off or fired or you know whatever. They shut the building down, the business went out of business and I got a whatever. My unemployment ran out, I got a severance package and it's all gone and nobody will hire me.

Speaker 1: 19:30

And uh, I'm not saying like you know, like, well, go work at McDonald's. They're always hiring at Hacklebell, but yeah, but I don't know that. I, I get that and I don't get that. So if it comes, push, come to shove. Of course, yeah, but you know it's not like you're getting 40 hours a week at these fast food joints, yeah, they're paying 17 bucks an hour, but at 12 hours a week or six hours a week, you know what I mean. It's not like you're getting 40 and making a few hundred dollars a week or 500 bucks a week. It's not, it's still not even enough. So 500 bucks a week, it's not, it's still not even enough. So, but yeah, uh, what else we got here? Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1: 20:06

So this says that most post layoff entrepreneurs are heavily reliant on family friends. Uh, and unemployment benefits for startup capital, uh. There's no formal investment or savings, yeah, which limits their ability to scale or sustain operations. It's even tough for them to get computers. I was surprised by how many people can't afford a laptop to get a business rolling man. It's crazy. So then, when you're under investing and you don't have enough funding, you struggle with the cash flow. Of course, I don't know how they even pay rent. You know you got no marketing. Like I said, the time management, and so those are the top three challenges. Is what this is saying Cash flow, marketing and time management. And it's cited by post-layoff founders. So it says, of course, you know these are stalled growth early and failure early failure. So yeah, of course it does, man, oh yeah.

Speaker 1: 21:05

So another bullet point here so it was a common barrier for startups is an unclear or unconvincing business vision and lack or demonstrated impact of early customer traction, which are critical for attracting investors and customers. See, I don't know about the investor thing. Investing in a small business, I think that's I don't know how people do it. Man, you got to have so much cash flow and so much I don't know revenue. How do you invest in a small business when you know that? What is it like? 45% fail within the first few years.

Speaker 1: 21:35

It's tough, dude, especially right now with everyone trying to get it rolling off of unemployment benefits, and that's what they're doing. They're using unemployment to roll their business. You know that's tough. It's a tough gig, dude, and I'm not saying I tried it too. I'm not being hypocritical here. I lived it, man, I've been through it. It's not like I'm like oh, these guys are all fools. No, I was the fool, I was in it. I did it too. And guess what? I failed. Because there's no way that you can keep it rolling, dude, without that. The guy I was talking to said I've got $100,000 in my business when I got it rolling. You've got to have some kind of capital and get it, get it going. But there's no real commitment anymore and it's a gig work. That's what. You know what it is. I think that's what it is.

Speaker 1: 22:24

People are treating the new businesses as maybe a gig work, like, oh, I'll kind of do this on the side, I'll get a tax write-off. Oh yeah, and, by the way, all these awesome tax write-offs that used to be happening since COVID, those are gone. I think it's really hard anymore these days to write off a part of your you can do like a square footage of your living room and like the path to your bathroom, and I think you're part of your bathroom, and then you know a part of your utility bills and all that stuff for tax deductions. I'm pretty sure and I might be wrong, but I don't care, I'll say it anyways I don't think you can do that no more, because I think I've asked before and I said, yeah, you can't. I mean, I think I asked my tax person. They're like yeah, dude, it's really hard to prove that anymore because everybody's working from home right now. You know, or were anyway working from home.

Speaker 1: 23:09

You know, during COVID or post-COVID, I was working from home with my old job, you know from, of course, 2020, all the way through it, 24, when I got laid off and at that point I think we were doing two or three days a week allowed to be working at home. It was kind of like whatever you wanted to do and I had a cool gig at home. I had an awesome setup. My other two buddies didn't have as nice a setup. They were at the kitchen table or in the basement and I had like my own office. I had a desk and I had my three monitors and I had I had all the setup and I didn't really have any kids running around.

Speaker 1: 23:42

Yet. You know, my stepson was around every two weeks, but in the winter and fall and spring he's gone. He's at school all day, right, so it was perfect. By the time he went to school I logged in and half hour after he got home I logged out. So there was no real distraction. It was nice.

Speaker 1: 24:00

But now, oh God, I can't imagine working from home right now with my kid right now running around. He's only two. He's two next month. That'd be tough, dude, and he'd, and the problem is he'd know I'd be in that room with the door closed. I mean, it would be brutal. I don't know if people do it or why they want to keep doing it. You know, working from home, because I don't know about most kids, but this kid that I have, he is determined. If he knows you're in there, he will break that door down, dude. So anyway, that's it for now.

Speaker 1: 24:37

I just wanted to go over a few things and my post, my opinion on you know, the uh, the entrepreneur of today. It seems like uh, or I guess I should say the post layoff entrepreneur, and not to discourage anybody, it can be done. And you know there's stories out there and you hear about the one or five percenters that that rocket make it happen. But just know, going into it, you got to have a unique game because when I go to these networking events there everyone is kind of like doing the top same, like 10 things, maybe five things that they're all doing, it's all with. You know, maybe ai or social media or I don't know.

Speaker 1: 25:11

I don't really understand the business coach thing, like unless you're, I don't know, like a bill gates or something like that, like a really like, unless you're, I don't know, like a Bill Gates or something like that, like a really successful, like you're making millions and you sold a few businesses, and then I'll take your advice. But if you're you know a business, and then I don't understand why I would take the advice. I don't know. Any rate, that's it for now. Whatever you do out there, be good or be good at it.