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Tree fivers


One of the first, most immediate, effects of starting Three Fivers was the realisation that I don’t have what it takes; I’ve no interest in the acquisition of money.

In part this is environmental - I’ve pretty much always had enough, and in part it’s attitude; money is only a utensil. I know people who are very wealthy and the happiest of these are the ones that also treat money as a means, not an end.

A secondary realisation is the polarisation of society in recent years is demonstrated perfectly here; my idea of how the three businesses might thrive is polarised, I’ve imagined only having too little or having an absurd amount - the idea of earning ‘a decent living’ has been lost. Like becoming a reality TV star - in lieu of actual talent - people focus on trying to be the next Elon Musk, ignoring that this role is already taken.

What these nuggets of self-knowledge do, however, is re-focus the real purpose of this experiment; can a viable business come from a £5 cash injection?

The astute will note that I’m somewhere with this; along with three different types of business, I’m keen to try out different business statuses and revenue methods too.

Most interesting to me is the publishing company because publishing is vey difficult for well capitalised companies to make money at; choosing spot lamination for the cover of a book was sometimes enough to prevent its publication at one big publisher I was associated with. But books don’t go off, require watering etc and so this opens up the prospect of charging very little but having to put no effort into shifting stock by a certain date. The ‘long tail’ form of passive revenue.

So, provisionally named “Treehouse Books”, I’ll aim to more or less give the books away. How I’m going to do that will have to wait for a following blog, because it’s almost Christmas.

Happy Christmas everyone.

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