Growing up in Ohio our little " Band of Brothers " always dreamed of owning and operating our own bait shop. About 10 years after all of us completed our military tours of duty. Our luck ran out as our dream became a reality. After struggling to keep afloat for about 8 years. We finally realized this was no way to enjoy life.
Selling live bait seems easy. But you soon find out your money goes out of your hands in gysers and comes back in like little spurts from a dried up well. Long hours and very little monetarial reward makes long days seem like an eternity. No matter how early we opened and /or how late we closed. Customers would complain about us always being closed when needed most. Depite being open 17 hours out of a 24 hour day.
It was not all bad we need meet some great people. But all us lost money over that period of time. Despite all our services to the public. Like repairing rods and reels , fixing Coleman lanterns , light gunsmith work etc etc etc.
Short of someone maintaining an illegal drug habit. I can't think of a faster way to get rid of money. Our favorite joke was when a customer decided he was going to open a bait shop like ours. They thought since the parking lot was full a lot of the time. That we were busy getting rich. Those that did actually try to do it. Went out in less than two years. Most did not last one full season.
Just one sad little story on how money goes up in smoke. Prior to the Memorial Day weekend we loaded up on live bait. This 3-day weekend was our biggest money producer. 1500.00 of live bait mostly minnows and night crawlers. Was delivered that Thursday afternoon. We opened up to abnoxious odor 6 am friday morning. All the bait had died. Seems shortly after we closed our neighborhood where the shop was lost power. It was back on when we opened up. Never knew about the power outage till a local guy came in and told us.
So if you think you will be more clever on operating and will be successful. Not to worry we thought we had all the answers too.
