I am strongly interested in getting into the Home Theater/Home Automation business here in Chicago. I have 12 years experience in Fortune 100 Information Techology shops doing things from network admistration and design to operations management and project management. While I make a decent living I am at the point in my life where I want to build something and have more contol over my future. I currently work full-time for the company that "Brings good things to life" and I attend graduate school at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL on Saturdays.
There seem to be three possible ways to get started....
1. Open a franchise. 2. Work with an successful existing company that wants to add Chicago to it's reach. 3. Start on my own and slowly develop a list of clients, referrals and know-how.
Option number 2 is the most attractive to me. How reasonable is it to expect this type of business relationship? Are business owners looking for these types of arrangements? I would love to have a business mentor/partner to assist in getting a shop up and running. There would be some type of sharing of the start-up expense, equity split and income split. Does anyone have any ideas on how to setup a fair partnership of this type?
I can open a franchise for about $150-200k. I will probably visit some of these franchises in the near future to see their retail format.
Any thoughts would be appreciated. I love keeping up-to-date on RC.com but I was wondering if there is a forum for installers that focuses on all things home theater vs. remote control focused.
