I have this idea, I want you to be honest because away with the fairies is where I spend most of my life.
I want to start another business, a not for profit business called floating point, what makes it special?
Floating point will purchase a number of floating canal boats in harbor cities such as Bristol, the boats will be open office spaces for around 5 developers to work. It's special because who wants to work on a boat and rent a space?
Thoughts?
Top comments (4)
I like the name! In setting up the business model I suppose you would approach it like you would a cafe or more regular office spaces. I, for one, love civil areas that have more novel designations, like cat cafes and such. I think a boat would have more appeal as a community tech hub - where people could hang out, get a drink, and attend a variety of small tech talks, as opposed to just somewhere to plug away at the keyboard. (Not sure if this is what you had in mind anyway!)
Actually it probably was what I had in mind, I have no idea how to get started. It's going to be though to:
Get a moring
Get funding
Make enough to break even that's all I want a boat to code.
I imagine it would be hard to run that kind of a business. I think you'd have to be brimming with ideas of how to get people to attend the premises and then part with their money. This is particularly the case in such a big city. For that reason, it would probably be hard to get someone to front you a loan too.
I mean, in my opinion, I don't think it would be enough novelty to just have a boat you can code on. I think the decor would have to be rad, the cake would need to be moist, there would need to be hackathons, guest talkers and an eclectic library of coding books. I think that when running a public venue, large or small, you gotta throw all kinds of mud in all kinds of directions to get it to consistently stick, and keep things ticking over.
I've always secretly (until now) thought it would be really fulfilling to own a pub, bar soup-kitchen or late-night hard-rock party bus, so I can relate to the ambition. But in my limited understanding of the idea, it seems like it would be very challenging to say the least!
Maybe a good starting point would be to try and have a coffee with someone in the business who is keen on banks and loans. If not, I suppose you could just talk to your bank manager to test the water. They might decide that your current situation (job, house, etc) makes you eligible. But then again...I don't know...big risk if it doesn't take off! You need all your fingers to write code!!
If you have any idea of the best way to buy a 50 grand boat with grants etc let me know!