₦airaland Forum

Hehehehe. Two red cards.

[quote author=A-40 link=topic=786674.msg9402210#msg9402210 date=1319384166]You didnt see Bosingwa tug Wright-Phillips's shirt abi?[/quote]So the tug on the shirt means a red?

This has to be the worst ref in ages.

These guys are working very hard. SWP is helping the left back double up on Danny.

David Luiz!

We are unable to get a passing game on.

MRbrownJAY:
^^^i think you are confusing ONE thing with the OTHER. movie downloads have absolutely NOTHING to do with the price of internet in 9ja.

Hehehehe. ISPs operate on the basis of traffic contention - They expect not everyone will be using so much bandwidth at the same time. This is true for many countries where piracy is checked. In Nigeria where any thing goes, everyone is downloading GB of data online, maxing out the available bandwidth of the ISP and causing congestion, the ISP in turn is unable to sign up more customers because bandwidth is consumed from every soul downloading everything. They then have no choice than make as much money as they can from the few customers they have to compensate for the huge costs of carrying data.


Do you understand now? Now never say that again.

I am lost for words! . . . In my life time, I cannot believe this.

Massacre. . Absolute whitewash.

Oops!

Imagine these self righteous Utd fans leaving the stadium at 70mins.
This is when you know real fans.

Hehehehehe.

Wow!

Ooops!

Goal.

Goal.

I will be really surprised if Arsenal wins this.

Haha . . . Suddenly it holds no relevance. You guys were the first to post about Bolton's newly found form against 'Wigan'. I told you to hold your argument until they beat a middle table team, they haven't and still remain bottom and you dare tell me I am being pedantic.

Imagine the hogwash.

[quote author=Mr. Globe link=topic=772970.msg9393788#msg9393788 date=1319270500]He gave a biz plan you can start NOW and start making profits with a million or MORE.[/quote]This just sums you up. Did you even read my post? Please come back and tell us where the profit is coming from if you dare.
With his plan, you'd be lucky to break even.

Story. . . Bottom line is after 9 games, Bolton have just 6 points from a possible 27pts. The 6pts from 2 wins - the first against QPR who just got promoted and Wigan last week who were 2nd bottom last week, bottom this week. That's hardly any achievement. You say they played big teams hence the reason for their position but they lost to newly promoted Norwich, have today lost to mid-table Sunderland and are 3rd bottom.

What exactly is your point?

So where's Ibime and Dayo creaming last week over Bolton beating 'Wigan'?
I asked them to only put forward an argument when they beat a mid-table team.

Hehehehe. I didn't even come back to see all your insults. I am a pile of poo all because my opinion differs. If you gave me a million, I will take my chances.



I rated the dude's entry on the creativity. Nothing more. I didn't call it a plan neither did I call it an essay. I didn't like his idea that relies on a government and officials of schools but in order to keep my post short enough, yet passing the message, I decided not to touch on many things. I touched mainly on the good parts. However I didn't forget to put this when I started,

Now don't get me wrong, a few of the things he has written may be far fetched.

Even though I did, I expect you not to see this because like you said, you didn't finish reading.


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What Emmanuel has over Spotless is coherence, planning and literal arrangement. In terms of developing a good idea, he has not done any better than Spotless. A few nicely put words has nothing to do with a proper business plan. Take a look at these few examples.

1. PLANNING & PRICING

Emmanuel has decided he will target Medical books because they are costly. Other items he intends to stock include professional studies books, e.g (ICAN), JAMB, WAEC, . . . Yet in his final paragraph he states that his budget is 600,000. If the average cost price of a single book comes at N1,000 (gross underestimate), that's a paltry 600 books. If we have decently, 6 categories of books, that's 100 books per category. Seriously?

Secondly, considering the fact that most students rent books for a term/semester, what deadline do you give?  2 weeks? 1 month? Most professional studies students will want the book for the entire time they are studying, usually an average of 3 months. THat seems to be the same length Secondary Schools and University students will want a book for. Now at Emmanuel's target price, 40-70% of cost price of books, if you implement a month's deadline, and the customer needs the books 3 times in a term it means that at 40% of the cost of the book, you are asking the customer to pay 120% of the cost of the book in one session. . .That's past the cost of owning the book. . .Seriously? Is this even a plan? Who approves and rates this?  That's a major fail and the business is DOA. Is this what you mean by he's spent time on it?
Is it even totally thought through?

Now let's stick to study duration model which is an average of 3 months which means a student will typically want to borrow a book and keep for a whole semester/study duration i.e. 3months and also consider that 40% is the only figure that can be worked with as no sane person will rent a book at 70% of cost price;  at 40% price point per book rental, total revenue from book rentals over a period of three months = 40% of the total cost price of all books(N600,000) which is N240,000 - Which in turn equals 80,000 a month. Bear in mind this is revenue. Not profit and this is working on the assumption that all books are rented

Now Emmanuel wants to employ two members of staff, will pay for electricity, amortize the cost of the store over the year and all other running costs, are you telling me this is your idea of a "self sustaining business" ? Mr Business Executive, Is this your idea of being creative? An array of carefully plotted sentences don't translate to good business idea. Now considering the fact that rental price point of 40% of cost of books is grossly infeasible, how much less do you think revenue will come to?

Now also consider that revenue of 80,000 is a hugely inflated by the much depressed N1,000 average cost price of book. How does this affect revenue with a budget of 600,000 when Emmanuel's prime target market (medical) have books that cost as much as £20 - £300 per book? That's N5,000 - N75,000 per book.


2.  IDENTIFICATION

Emmanuel's idea is to register customers with a passport, driver's license, student's ID card. . . . Is there any consideration that these docs can be faked? What do you have in mind to stop an expelled student with a Student's ID and a fake NEPA Bill from borrowing a N3,000 book for another student who then doesn't return the book? As a private business person, what is the plan if your customers deface the book, tear off the pages or lose the book entirely? That's your whole N600,000 gone. . . How do you get back your money? Call the police? What's the effect of this on your N80,000/Month revenue? Business Executive is this your idea of "sustainable"?



3. STAFF

Emmanuel wants a system where a customer calls to rent a book for a fee. However, at what point is this payment made? There is no online payment system in Nigeria so I assume the payment is made at the door of the customer when the Casual staff has journeyed to the customer's house. Seriously? So what if the customer decides they don't want the book any more or it's the wrong book? Who pays for the transport to and fro? Are you going to force the customer to pay for what they refuse? Haha! Big hole in the business plan eh? Lemme show you an even bigger one.

Your staff will notice this and use this as an avenue to steal from the business by faking customers who have refused service on getting to their door step. . . They pocket the transport money and cost you for maintaining the phone at the same time. . . Is this your idea of sustainable?

Lemme throw one more big hole in it. . . How do you prevent your staff from making the rental money for themselves? Who accounts for books rented and cross-checks figures against events? What if your staff totally erase any records of any rentals? How do you know? I mean you have 1,000 books. . . Are you going to hire an independent auditor who comes in every evening before closure and counts every single book against rental events? Is this even a sustainable process? What if you have 3,000 books? Employ two auditors? So what's to stop the auditors from colluding with your staff?

Another example. Someone comes in, borrows a book. Your staff buy that same book and put on the shelf, so everyone who asks for that book gets their own copy and they pocket that, they get rich renting out their own books at your expense? What's to stop them?

All from your meagre revenue? I have not even done a research just a few things off the top off my head Mr Business Executive . . . . . I must ask though, Is this your idea of a business that's sustainable? A nice collection of very well articulated sentences don't equal a good business plan and this in your idea deserves more than N15,000. . . Seriously?

BAM! Now this is what I call a creative mind. Very innovative and futuristic and has 'huge potential' of sustainability.

Now don't get me wrong, a few of the things he has written may be far fetched.

For example:

* Underestimating the costs of storage and delivery of Ebooks. . . Serious Encryption Services have to run with Ebooks sales and delivery and they don't come cheap. And the storage of online content requires top notch network security which don't come cheap either.

* The assumption of a hitch-free postal system in Nigeria.

* A few assumptions here and there on figures.


That said, in terms of rawness of ideas and creativity, I am rating this dude. Why? Because he focuses on reachability, cutting the sometimes overwhelming costs of staff, and physical items and all other running and recurrent expenditure involved in running a chain of stores. Now he doesn't just focus on e-books, he brings the physical book into an online portal. He highlights, ease of registration and hints on ideas on creatively relating with and retaining customers.

The same model will and can work with DVDs, CDs as he stated. And apart from seeing your potential customers in person, I fail to see the significant advantage of a physical store. Some may say "It's a Library and people will go there to read" but you need a big enough space to let people come in and read in the first place. Add to that, the cost of furniture, electricity, staff, decoration, security and you are already running into millions and only one one store. . You need ample space to appeal to a large section of the public.

His model however is not bound by space limitation and a narrow target market. In-fact it will work across all target markets as long as you can stock those books.

I like his idea of customers paying to have the books,DVDs and CDs delivered to them which in many cases is just about how much many customers will pay to reach that 'single' physical store except, in this case, they don't leave their homes.

I liked his integration of local content which will form the crux of rentals in the first place. He creatively also discusses the idea of incentive to the local content copyright holder - although he doesn't inform us how this is fiscally possible.

He makes an effort to discuss potential revenue. He could not have been spot on but he realizes a need to touch it.

Above all, the implementation of scratch cards to access Ebooks is genius. I know he didn't develop it but he is informative enough to know where it applies. . He even goes ahead and uses that as an advertising avenue to market other products - DVDs, CDs.

Finally he is bright enough to know that a portal that has the potential to attract lots of traffic is an avenue to generate some targeted advertising revenue.


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Yes he may not been as coherent and many of his ideas are still rough around the edges and need a lot of refinement, this is my opinion is a much better post, in terms of creativity, than the fella in 3rd. This dude is the sort of mind I like to work with.

Kudos Mr Spotless. Anyway we can meet?

Why would you wanna do that?

[quote author=Mr. Globe link=topic=772970.msg9385753#msg9385753 date=1319150522],
You keep generating controversies,  Lol[/quote]My DNA is built to find holes. . . That's what I do for a living.
And I find holes in everything, especially in business.

Seun, are u going to show us the 2nd winner or should we stop expecting it?

You guys don't know it but I am the secret judge. . . 
You still think I joined the essay. I did not dude.
If I did, Seun will ask for my number.

I think the 3rd position did a good writeup and I quite appreciate that this is an essay and perhaps not a business plan, I do however feel the premise of the essay is totally missed. The Essay states "FOR PROFIT" Library Business essay but I fail to see any forecast profit analysis.

How did the writer come to the conclusion that a potential customer will be willing to rent a book at 40% - 70% of the cost price of a book (Survey or otherwise)? Also, how does the writer assume that this price point will just about make "PROFIT"?

One important point also missed out is how many books can be bought in the supposed 400k-600k budget, which determines the frequency of rentals and ultimately the size of revenue.

I fail to see analysis of running costs, overhead costs and all recurrent expenditure likely to push the business to it's breaking point.


Let me remind us all that this is the premise of the essay.

Let's say you were given 1 million naira to set up a profitable chain of shops where the great books, especially non-fiction books, can be borrowed by paying customers.  I'd like you to write an essay on how you would start such a business with just 1 million naira, and make it grow to a predominant position in Nigeria with no additional funding.


I would want to believe that that winner and runner-up of the competition included all these seemingly important details.   


Can Seun confirm this?

@Dyabman.

Islam will need to prove himself at U18s before he makes it to the reserves. It is only when he makes it to the reserves can he be invited to train with the senior team. Usually that could take around two years. However, players like Kakuta and Joshua in recent times have made that transition in just about a year. I am quite confident he can make that transition quickly because his talent is undeniable. He has to blow away the competition though and the competition includes Jhon Pirez, Lucaz Piazon and Romelu Lukaku.

El Guapo:
[color=#0066ff]What El Nino Said could be taken as a Wake UP Call for the Sloppy, Sleeping Midfielders we parade.

AVB Saw a need in what Torres was Moaning for that he had Frank benched for a game, obviously to Spur him UP and alas he got a Hat-trick and it looks like the Famous SW6 No8 Is back to his best again.[/color]

This!

Hmmmm. . .


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Meanwhile, how come Dayo is not asking for pass stats?

What will you consider as good money then? Paying N65,000 to MTN for 1M DSL service?

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Reasonably speaking, N15k per month for a decent 1Mbps connection with unlimited data plan is very ideal. I pay £25 for a 9Mbps DSL connection and an unlimited data plan on. More people around the world pay even less for a better speed. Considering the fact that this is new to Nigeria and infrastructural deficiencies prevent world class access, N15k would be ideal.

This is the prime reason Internet is expensive in Nigeria. Everyone wants to download a movie. . .