A lot of people sell items on eBay as a hobby, but for Britain’s oldest seller, it’s become a full-time business, earning him £100,000 per year. Geoffrey Rosenbloom, aged 79, a former RAF fighter pilot from Paisley, started selling mobile phone accessories, electronic goods and workwear on the online auction site in 2004 as a way of making “pocket money”.
However, it’s now snowballed into a full-time business for the grandfather-of-two. In fact, Mr Rosenbloom’s house has been completely taken over with his stock, with the result he’s now moving home to accommodate his business! He keeps the business ticking over by buying ex-shop stock, bankruptcy and liquidation goods cheaply and selling them on eBay at a profit.
He enjoys the freedom working from home gives him, as he says the business virtually runs itself, 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, unhampered by the restraints of having limited opening hours in a bricks and mortar shop. However, he admits the fact he’s having to move house to accommodate his stock hasn’t gone down too well with his wife!
Although Mr Rosenbloom is an extreme example and not everyone can achieve an annual turnover of £100,000 through eBay sales, his situation of storing stock at home for his business is a common one. Thousands of small businesspeople across the UK run their company from home, soon finding their house is being taken over by stock, with whole rooms filled to capacity, so it no longer feels like a home.
The answer to many people’s prayers, when looking to declutter their home, could be taking advantage of self storage facilities. Here at Storage World Self Storage, Manchester, we have a modern, converted building, offering 500 rooms, conveniently located on the edge of the city centre. You can stay as long as you like and change your storage space size as often as you wish, to keep pace with the ups and downs of running a business.
Many small firms find that they benefit from running their business from a self storage unit. If you find your business is impacting on your home life and you can’t move for clutter, it could be time to check out self storage as an option, rather than moving home!