Tonight I attended a seminar hosted by AIGA of which I am a member. I went into this event with pretty high expectations. Usually when I do this I come away dissapointed–like the many movies I watch.
However, I was pleasantly surprised. The speaker for the evening, Errol Gerson, was knowledgeable, intelligent and fun. Errol has been teaching at the Art Center for over 30 years with a solid education in business (MBA, CPA, etc.). So, needless to say he knows design AND he knows business. He spoke to a room of about 40-50 graphic designers who are considering going into business for themselves or are already in the early stages of business, like me.
Errol covered the forms a business can take, sole proprietorship, LLC, and corporations. He spoke about the forms of insurance that are needed, what type of accounting method, accrual vs. cash, you should use, how to read profit and loss statements, how to perform a break even analysis, and the list goes on. There were some things I was aware of because of my own expereince in starting up my own design business in California, but when he covered the aspects of the financial side I was all ears. It also made me think, especially during the question and answer period, that there are organizations, like AIGA, that run these types of seminars to help educate design professionals about doing business, but there are not very many centralized resources for this type of information.
I began my business just about 19 months ago and have figured out how to get things done. How to incorporate, how to get a business licence, a loan, insurance, accountants, etc. There are a TON of things you need to do to get your business setup legitamately. I think I will cover some of those things in some posts.
It really was an invaluable evening.
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