Opening
a business isn’t exactly a straightforward, clear cut, linear progression.
In fact, it takes a lot more twisting, turning, bending, pausing and backtracking
than one wishes. Not only does opening a business require clear goals,
a feasible business plan, and hard to procure capital, but one must also
be able to balance determination with flexibility—which happens to be
one of Shelly Robbins’ many talents.
Six
years ago, Shelly was working as a community organizer for nonprofit organizations
when she decided to shift her focus away from community organizing and
divide her time between bookkeeping for non-profits and launching her
own part-time consultation business. It wasn’t long before she started
daydreaming about expanding her consultation business into a center.
That’s
when she heard about Washington CASH. Initially attracted by the group
loan system modeled on the Grameen Bank, Shelly joined Washington CASH
with the intention of building camaraderie with other minority business
owners, learning how to run a business, and gaining access to loans. Unfortunately
(or maybe not), life doesn’t always work out as we intend. Sometimes there
is an unanticipated turn in the road and we are forced to follow the path
ahead of us, not the one we had idealized. Shelly’s first turn came when
she was unable to complete the business training program due to her pregnancy.
Another appeared not long after, when it was discovered that her newborn
son was born with a heart defect and she was forced to stop working for
nine months. Yet she didn’t give up her dream of opening a QuickBooks
center, she just put it on hold.
Today,
Shelly is the founder and president of The QuickSource Inc. a thriving
QuickBooks Accounting Support Center (and a licensed Intuit Education
Program Site), where she offers QuickBooks setup, training, troubleshooting
workshops, phone support, bookkeeping, and CPA services.
In
the spring of 2000 Shelly took out a $20,000 loan from Washington CASH,
becoming the first recipient of an individual loan and our largest loan
to date. Shelly used a portion of the loan to pay for QuickBooks recertification
and new equipment. She also placed the equivalent of one month’s overhead,
$5,000, into a reserve account to provide security for herself and protect
her business from the unexpected. The remainder of the loan was put towards
hiring an administrative assistant to help develop her marketing plan
and better organize the business.
With
150 clients per year needing support, business is good. Since opening,
Shelly has certified more than 30 bookkeepers in the Seattle area and
has taught over 60 QuickBooks courses. While the business has improved
tremendously, Shelly says it still experiences growing pains. There’s
always more work than can be done, it’s hard to find good staff and her
partner recently departed, but Shelly is not letting that drag her down.
Currently she is expanding her services and searching for a CPA or CPA
firm with whom to partner. Whatever the future brings for Shelly, she
has more than enough experience navigating obstacles and keeping her eyes
on the goal.
