| Topic Name: |
agency |
| Message Name: |
Good Luck |
| Date Posted: |
03/08/2006 |
| In Reply To: |
Thank you very much for your story and reply. Wow, that whole situation really sucks!!! At least you were able to pull some worth from the training.
My situation is very different from yours. The agency I'm taking over is an E.S.P. office. No agent, he already retired. The staff there is one from his office that I like, and two that I had referred to the E.S.P. office to hire. They are licensed (by SF) and I had a lot of imput on where the new office was placed. The furniture, computers, sign etc. were paid for by the esp office fund. The office is 5-10 minutes from were I grew up.
My area has no current restrictions on any products and my A.F.E. calls to bounce any idea he has off me for the office before moving forward. He doesn't have to, but he does.
I already have focused certian team memebers towards specialization and the courses and classes they need for that. (also all paid for)
I've looked into it, and Edward Jones pays a lower commission then SF on financial products and you only have about a third of the products (overall) to sell.
Progressive and Gieco pay by the hour (salary for managers) and it really isn't much. I've thought about being independent but the trade off in marketing and advertizing is a no thinker.
The book of business I'm taking over is rather large. They don't break it up like they used to because they don't spoon feed your bills anymore when starting. They say to come in with 30k, but all the agents I've talked to say I will only use about 15k and that's not a big deal really. They give you an 18k walk-on bonus when you open your doors to help. So one month later I will start getting checks from the original book of business for overhead.
The agent I'm taking over for had no financial services licenses, so that decent size book is wide open for that. Matter of fact the team members are telling me that in-book customers ask almost everyday if I'm going to offer those services when I take over.
My wife and I started with nothing and built a business from the ground up that made almost a million dollars in sales the first year. As far as the strain of starting a new business and the time investment requirements it takes is nothing new to us. Pressure has only made my marriage stronger through the process. Since our first business we started two others that we have managed by others that are doing fairly well. We couldn't live off of them yet, but they pull about 20-25k a year profit after expenses.
I will most likely sell them in the next three years.
Like I've said before, I'm very involved in the community. I have hardly told anyone about what I'm getting into and I still get about two calls a day from other business owners wanting to know when I can start signing them. I've seen the numbers of what my AFE wants me to hit. I use to sell telecommunications in a completely cut throat business both from within and without and those numbers look like something I could almost do in my spare time.
All of my bills are paid through my other business. So if this doesn't work out, then like you, I'll have pulled some free...mark that...paid training and knowledge. If it does work out, then everything I make will be invested A. for my kids college B. my retirement. So my situation is a little differnt from yours. I really don't see what I have to lose since in reality I can walk away anytime I want.
Back to your point about selling the business or book later. If any of you are right about everything going internet, then there wouldn't be anything to sell in about 20-30 years anyway.... |
| Message: |
Well it sounds like your experience has been positive which is good. Perhaps someday you'll be as large as the agent in Chicago that insures 14,000+ auto's and has a staff of about 28 employees with 4 or so that speak various languages. I do know some things about SF in case you didn't realize it.
My dis-satisfaction was more with their IT/systems area. I have to dis-agree with your statement about replace the $24 an hour employee with an $8 an hour employee. In the case of SF from what I saw doing that would not solve anything. What they needed were more smarter and innovative IT/Systems employees and fewer number of them to get the work done without arguing over rules and procedures. Like I said I'd fire most of them and brought in a staff more responsive to what the agents needed. No joke they'd take years to get something done and don't laugh but trying to get a screen changed for a web app or ECHO system would take weeks if not months.
As I see it for you to be successful it's going to take some initiative on your part to come up with new ways of operating to retain and grow your clientele. Much like the agent I spoke about above he has on his staff several who can speak different languages.
Best of luck to you.
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