Getting Started

[Jay_Bunny]

This upcoming season will be the first that I am producing snakes (hopefully ) that I will actually sell. So what is the first step? At first I thought, get certified to ship your reptiles! But there are companies that ship your reptiles for you, so is getting certified to ship something I should still look into?

Also, a website. I want something professional looking but I don't have that much money to be pouring into a website. Does anyone know any affordable domains?

Payments. How would someone pay for the snakes other than cash in person? Checks are one thing, you can send those by mail and you simply cash the check. But we had some issues before with a check. We deposited it, and waited a week for it to clear. Once it cleared, we still waited a few days and the money was still there. So we started spending it and after a few days we checked the account and found the check had bounced and put us hundreds into the negative. What would you do if a customer sent you a check? How long do you wait? What about using cards? How do you set that up so customers can pay by card?

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Being certified is always a good thing just in case, it can always come handy even if you can ship using shipyourreptiles.com without needing to be certified.

Domains are usually $9.99/ year and hosting will run you less than $5 a month. The rest is up to you build your website yourself or have someone design it for you.

As for payment Money orders and cashier checks (both needing to clear before the animal ships which can take 7 to 10 days or more) just do not ship until the money is in the bank.

Paypal and Google Checkout.

The more payment types you will accept the better.

Processing credit cards other than through paypal and google check out will require a business bank account, and a merchant account (monthly fee + transaction fee) in other words not worth it if you only have a transaction here and there.

[Jay_Bunny]

So it would be best to accept cashiers checks instead of regular checks? And use paypal for cards? Thanks a lot .

My husband says he could code the website for me but we are both pretty inexperienced with graphics and I would need a logo.

Also how do I know if my business name hasn't already been taken. My last name is pretty common so there probably is someone out there with Clarke Reptiles. What do you do in that situation?

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Also how do I know if my business name hasn't already been taken. My last name is pretty common so there probably is someone out there with Clarke Reptiles. What do you do in that situation?

The Secretary of State maintains a master list of all businesses that have been registered in your state, so start there to see if your business has been registered.

As for registering the website, when are ready to purchase your domain the site you are purchasing your domain from will tell you if the domain is available or not.

[Jay_Bunny]

Thanks!

Hubby and I want to start looking at getting a website soon so it looks like I've got a lot of work to do.

[Freakie_frog]

There is one thing that hasn't been mentioned. Bank accounts if your going to do this as a business you'll need seperate a bank account from your personal one(s). Also you'll need to get with your CPA and figure out your taxs and what you will need to file your taxes every year.

As for bank accounts make sure that you have the business name. The reason for this is that if someone writes you a check even cashiers check to the business name and the account isn't styled that way they can't deposit it.

[Jay_Bunny]

Thank you for reminding me about that. I had actually forgotten. I have a lot to do this year.