How I Built This ‘N’ That

My accountant, Robert Cratchit CPA, crunches his numbers in two dark rooms above a Panda Express, surrounded by beige filing cabinets that are older than Stonehenge, and a dusty display of museum-quality calculators and ink-jet printers that beep and belch with irritating regularity. The only window is permanently jammed shut in favor of an ancient A/C unit, recycling lukewarm air tinged with a vague hint of industrial-strength soy sauce.

The ambience in Bob’s office might inspire Edward Hopper to set up his easel and open his paintbox. A portrait of two shadowy figures furtively burning the midnight oil. Nighthawks At The Paper Shredding Machine, perhaps. I often think it’s the sort of place where Bernie Madoff did his internship.

Last July, after placing a to-go order two egg rolls and a thing of fried rice, I made my bi-annual ascent of the Bob’s back stairs to deliver some important news. ‘I’m starting my own color grading business,’ I told him. ‘It’s called Baldwin Colour with color spelled the English way. You’ll be seeing a lot more of me now that I need to file taxes quarterly and everything.’

His face darkened momentarily, as if this meant not just cooking my books but stewing them for several hours in a combination of congealed fraud sauce and dry-rubbed embezzlement. Fortunately, his mood lightened considerably as I explained my intention of earning a living by making web videos look nice. In fact, he may even have chuckled while shuffling through a stack of manila folders, searching for the appropriate forms.

‘A word to the wise guy,’ Bob said as I was leaving. ‘You should write a business plan, he suggested, doesn’t need to be ten pages, a couple of paragraphs will do, just a brief document outlining your services, a little market analysis, maybe some sales strategy and a vision for the future ….’

I froze in the doorway, completely nonplussed. Write a business plan? About what I do? I was hoping I could, you know, just fly by the seat of my pants. Really, all I need is enough color grading hours each month to pay the mortgage. I don’t need a business plan for that.

After all, it wasn’t like I’d be appearing on Shark Tank any time soon. Asking for fifty thousand dollars for a thirty-percent stake in my business. Demonstrating the value of my skills by applying a face refinement node to each member of the panel: ‘Observe how I can reduce the shine on Kevin O’Leary’s forehead while brightening Lori Greiner’s eyes at the same time.’

‘Sure, they both look better now,’ Mark Cuban responds. ‘But I really don’t care about that and neither does any other normal person who isn’t an art director. So I’m out.’

‘Thank you for your time.’

Anyway, should I require a loan at some point, I’ll just show the bank the seat of my pants. ‘Not too much wear, seams still intact, no fading, no stains. We’re very impressed with your fabric care,’ the bank will tell me. ‘Here’s fifteen grand. Go buy yourself some more data storage, little fella.’

Bob shook his head at these histrionics. ‘It’s not that difficult,’ he said. ‘Writing a buiness plan is standard practice. A statement of intent you can refer back to when going forward. And speaking of going forward, are you absolutely certain it’s smart for your business to spell color as colour?’

To be honest, I wasn’t certain of anything, except the fact that I wouldn’t be writing out a business plan. I’d rather start a Pinterest board about bowler hats and pinstripe suits. Write a business plan. Next thing you know, he’ll be telling me to form a mega corporation, brand the company as Big Color, then float myself on the New York Stock Exchange.

Accountants, eh? Who needs ‘em. If the IRS instituted a flat tax they’d all be doing Uber Eats instead of rolling their eyes and smirking at your optimistic list of home office deductions.

Nevertheless, at a loose end the following morning, I sat at my computer and typed out these terrible words “Business Plan: sign-up for Baldwin Colour account on Facebook and invite people to like my page.” Then I drank my first cup of coffee and deleted the entire sentence. It’s going to be seat of the pants strategy or bust.

Recently, I was listening to NPR’s How I Built This, a podcast about entrepreneurs who get rich by selling unnecessary innovations to gullible, impulse-purchasing consumers. The interviewee is usually some slick, A-type impresario who’s monetized a problem that didn’t exist before their own contagious self-delusion invented it … and all that problem’s lucrative side-effects.

This week, it’s a former Instagram software engineer who is now CEO of a pet care company that makes miniature Crocs for dogs and tiny Birkenstocks for cats. Next week, Robert Cratchit, a former accountant and ex-con who repurposed an old fast-food franchise storefront into America’s first cryptocurrency-based Savings and Loan Association.

At the end of How I Built This, the host asks his guests what percentage of their success do they attribute to hard work and how much to luck. Without fail, they modestly reply that it was fifty-percent sweat and fifty-percent good fortune. ‘If I can do it, anyone can do it. All you need need is perseverance and a dream.’

At Baldwin Colour, the ratio is forty-percent hard work, forty-percent luck, eighteen-percent keeping copies of my clients’ files so I’m the hero when they accidentally delete their versions and didn’t make a back-up, and two-percent a cinematographer who shall remain nameless who repeatedly forgets to white balance his camera. I believe those are solid and stable numbers. Don’t you agree Mr Wells-Fargo?

Honestly, the ‘thinking-out-of-the-box’ type businesses profiled on How I Built This seldom seem like profitable enterprises to me, yet the whizz-kid founders behind them always manage to raise millions in funding from venture capital firms. So what do I know? My stakeholders are Mastercard and Visa, who demand prompt repayment every month or else I’m staring down the double barrels of spine-chilling APR surcharges.

Still, despite the lack of any coherent business plan, flying by the seat of my pants is going reasonably well. I’ve actually been able to expand to three pairs now: medium gray for broadcast spots; tan chinos for web video; and black wool for attending industry events in the evening. I guess that’s what you can describe as ‘growth.’