Oh, this one is pertinent. Not to say that to date, the challenges haven’t been, but this one really delves deep into where I’m at in my business journey and where someone thinking of opening a retail store should spend a lot of time thinking about.

There are 2 types of income streams.

The active stream, whereby you are active in the creation of the income. This may mean you work in your stores, or that you are actively required to make business decisions.

For those outside of retail, you may be a coach, or a yoga teacher, or a consultant, or any other service provider, whereby you have to be there.

The second type is often referred to passive, or residual income.

You put effort into the creation of something, like a book, or a course, and then don’t have to be actively involved after the initial launch.

In retail, this would be when you are at the point of having a manager/CEO of your company that handles all of the running of the business.

For most of us, there is an in between. You may have staff in your store full time, but still actively plan out what’s happening and when, control the finances, do the rostering etc.

One of the key points of my Bringing Business To Retail podcast, is to get you thinking outside the square. Bringing strategies, not normally used in retail, so you can wow your customers, be forefront in our customer’s mind, and make money doing all of this.

Can you put together a video tutorial on your products? Can you develop a course, like how to dress for your shape?

Once created, you can either use this to generate income (sell the course) or as an upsell or bonus for VIP clients.

I talk more about this in my Be A Kick Ass Retailer course, which is coming at the end of 2015.

But for me, I hover between the two. I still love being part of my stores, but I’ve also developed the Launch Pad course, and the Be A Kick Ass Retailer course, so that I can help people, and earn residual income.

What is your ideal business model? Have you planned it out? Is this a new idea for you?