Starting a Business in Haverford, Pennsylvania

Thinking about starting a business in Haverford, Pennsylvania? This step-by-step guide walks you through the major decisions you should consider before opening a new business in Haverford.

Are You Ready for Entrepreneurship?

Before quitting your day job, assess your entrepreneurial instincts and capabilities.

While entrepreneurship has become a popular career choice, we recommend you do the following before you take the plunge:

• Grab a meal or cofee with other entrepreneurs in Haverford. Listen closely to their experiences and see if you think you too can be successful.
• Take a look at Business Failure. It's a short article but it's a good reality check for those are about to jump into the world of entrepreneurship.
• Involve a spouse, family member or trusted friend in the decision. Ask them directly: Do I have what it takes to be an entrepreneur? Listen carefully to their answer, as they presumably know your strengths and weaknesses.

What Business Are You Starting?

There are many businesses that you can start. How do you know which type of business is right for you? You might get some good ideas about what kind of business to start by reading Good Business Ideas.

For step-by-step instructions on starting a variety of business types, visit the Good Businesses to Start section of our site. For example, you might be interested in our Starting a Dance Club guide or our Starting a Tatoo Parlor guide.

Remember that Haverford is the place where you are starting a business. The business you want to start may already be well-represented in Haverford. Make sure you fully understand Haverford demographics before you lock in on your business idea.

Haverford, Pennsylvania Demographic Information

Haverford has an active business community that includes small businesses, mid-sized businesses and large businesses.

To give you a better feel for Haverford demographics for small businesses, we have tabulated the small business sizes, based on number of employees, for business in Haverford.

As a new Haverford entrepreneur, you may also be interested in the table below. It shows how many businesses there are in Haverford for each business category. By looking at this chart, you can get a general sense for how much competition there is in the business niche that you are pursuing.

Have You Considered Franchising?

Visit the business district of Haverford and you'll notice that many local entrepreneurs have gone the franchising route. Evidently, there must be some significant advantages to purchasing a franchise.

We advise the entrepreneurs we work with to consider franchising as an option. We have many articles on franchises, such as How to Franchise. Get a thorough education on franchising by browsing all of our Articles on Franchising.

To learn about specific franchise opportunities, check out our Franchise Directory.

Sample franchise opportunities include Subway Franchises and Starbucks Franchises. Alternatively, you can browse franchise categories, such as Accounting Franchises and Moving Franchises.

Note on Haverford Franchise Opportunities: You will need to contact franchisors directly to see if their franchises are available in Haverford.

Have You Considered Buying an Existing Haverford Business?

An excellent way to get started in business is to Buy a Business in Pennsylvania. Follow that link and you may find several good businesses for sale in Haverford.

For anybody who wants to buy a business, we recommend reading this useful article: Hold Harmless Agreements When Buying Businesses.

Picking a Company Name

Making the right decision when choosing a company name is very important. There are many decisions you'll make now that you can change later, but changing a company name years down the road is not very easy. So, choose a good company name at the outset.

Companies like Starbucks, Apple, Target, Microsoft and Intuit all have strong company names that are easy to remember and have become well-loved brands. Wouldn't it be nice if your new company name got on a similar track?

To get up to speed on what makes for a good company name, we encourage you to read this useful article: Naming a Business.

On a final note, given that you are planning on starting a business in Haverford, it's very important that you make sure no other Pennsylvania company is using the business name you want to use.

Forming a Company in Haverford, Pennsylvania

A critical step is ensuring that your business is formed as a legal entity that is separate from its owners. The principal advantage of forming your new business as a legal entity is that it separates your business liabilities from your personal liabilities.

The entity you form can be a traditional C-corporation, a Limited Liability Company (LLC), or an S-corporation.

Incorporation is a very common way to legally create a business entity. Of course, you have to decide which type of corporation to form and where to incorporate. If you are starting a business in Pennsylvania, you don't necessarily have to incorporate in Pennsylvania. In fact, you can incorporate in the state of your choosing. However, if you do incorporate in another state, you'll have to register as a foreign corporation in your home state.

There are many nuances to forming a company. To learn the basics of company formation, browse articles on our site, such as Getting an EIN. You should also consider getting professional assistance from your business lawyer. Finally, if you are starting a business in Haverford, Pennsylvania, our information on Incorporating in Pennsylvania may be a useful resource if you decide to incorporate in Pennsylvania.

Do You Need a Business Plan?

Having a business plan is critical in maximizing the prospects of your new company. Simply put, a business plan describes what you plan to do with the business and how you plan to do it. Not having a business plan makes you more prone to becoming a business failure statistic.

To learn more about business plans, read Business Plan Contests. You can also get free counseling sessions provided by your local SCORE chapter in Pennsylvania.

Raising Money for Your New Venture

Getting your Haverford business the capital it needs to succeed is not an easy task. Bootstrapping, which means growing the business without outside funding, is the best alternative, but that's not a viable option for many startup plans.

To learn about raising money, we recommend you read the fundraising articles on our site, such as 504 Loans.

For Haverford entrepreneurs on the hunt for startup funding, you'll want to take a look at our List of Pennsylvania Angel Investors and our List of Pennsylvania Venture Capital Firms.

Marketing Your New Venture

Whether your goal is to attract Haverford customers or you plan on selling elsewhere, having an excellent marketing plan is fundamental to your doing well.

You can learn quite a bit about marketing on our site. Advertising in Magazines is a good read to get your marketing juices flowing. There are many more articles on marketing on our site. Visit our Small Business Marketing resource section to see them all.

How to Sell

Being able to sell is critical to your business success. Whether you are focused on selling local customers in Haverford or are selling to customers throughout Pennsylvania, the United States or even the world, you have to be able to sell.

Not knowing how to sell can result in lost customers and minimal market share. The good news is we can help you to make selling a big competitve advantage for your new firm.

Tips on Customer Referrals offers some helpful tips on how to sell. It's one of several good articles on our site regarding Entrepreneurial Selling.

Advancing Your Entrepreneurial Skills

Successful business owners recognize that they don't know everything.

Given that you are starting a business in Haverford, Pennsylvania, you will want to take advantage of the learning programs at local Pennsylvania educational institutions. It's also worthwhile to see if there are any networking groups or organizations in which Haverford entrepreneurs get together to network and trade their business experiences.

Never Give Up

You have a dream -- starting a business in Haverford. To achieve your dream, you have to persevere, even when the odds are against you.

From this point on, you control your own destiny.

We are here to help Haverford businesses to be successful. We have a wealth of experience in business start-ups, financing, marketing, sales and more...and we've made all of our knowledge available to you.

More Entrepreneurial Resources for Starting a Business in Haverford, Pennsylvania

Here are more links that we believe will help you be successful in starting a business in Haverford.

• Resources for Haverford, Pennsylvania Entrepreneurs - Browse a variety of resources we've collected to assist Haverford entrepreneurs.
• Pennsylvania Entrepreneurial Resources - We've gathered state-level entrepreneurial resources to help new entrepreneurs who are based in Pennsylvania.
• Pennsylvania Small Business Development Center - Pennsylvania SBDCs help aspiring entrepreneurs turn ideas into businesses, help small firms expand, and provide the information every business person needs to make critical decisions. There is no charge for their assistance and their free help can make the difference between business success and failure.
• Haverford, Pennsylvania Newspaper Ad Rates - This is a nearly comprehensive list of advertising rates for Haverford, Pennsylvania newspapers, including ad costs for newspapers serving the Haverford area.