How My Friends And I Built A Company And How It Turned Into Shambles.
So before I start this article, I want to ask you a question: Do you ever have decisions that you deeply regret? Because I do.
It was 2020 when I quit my job, around October I passed my resignation and for two weeks I have HR on my tail begging me not to quit. But no one was stopping my stubborn self by then. And on the second week of October, HR declared defeat and permitted my resignation. I rendered a month of turnover but mostly it was for formality. There was a heated issue in our plant at that time and I was basically at my free will that last month. So finally on the second week of November 2020, I was officially unemployed.
Honestly, that resignation wasn’t planned, I had no backups at that time. I didn’t even think of applying. I was totally burnt out at that time and the only thing on my mind back then was rest. I need to have some rest like hibernate.
If you are wondering what was my job, I was then a Quality Supervisor. But because we were underman in our plant (the company has seven plants) I was also the Process Engineer. And because the owner of the company was so fond of me, every time a new project will come to every plant, it goes to me first, and I study it. I make the assembly process, and quality assurance process and trial it down the line before I pass it to mass production. Mind you, it takes months before I can pass it to the main production. And I wasn’t even part of R&D. And I was a one-man team!
So enough of my nonsensical ramblings about my old job. Let’s fast forward, it was the second week of January, two months after I quit my job. My savings were running low at that time but I am still making money through my online novels so I was still fine. I was thinking of applying the next month but when my coworkers and I met, I joked about putting up a company. And unknowingly, they thought I was being serious. So the next day (yes the next day) we were up and running making the company official. In less than two weeks we already have a full pledge company. Do you know how easy it was?
Before I continue my story, let’s call my business partners; Boy and Girl. They were both my coworkers in my old job but we were assigned to different plants. Girl also quit the same year as I have but Boy was still in the company. And boy was like a ghost partner in this business. His name was put out of every legal paper we have to avoid issues.
The basic input about the company is, that it’s like getting a contract to build houses but instead of houses, it’s AUB and Trucks we do. If you are familiar with Traviz, L200, H100, L300, Aluminium Vans, Modern Jeep, and Trucks, those are what we do (only the body of the vehicle). We render services for consultation on how to maximize production lines. We provide designs for said vehicles above. And we also provide manpower. I was assigned on the technical aspect, Boy was on the design and Girl was on administrative and marketing.
And so we have a company by then. Yay! Right? But NO because after putting up the company we need clients. We rummage our area for every possible client. We go to companies without a single penny in our pockets only our wits saying we have the mind to do it please give us a chance to perform. Mind you the company were we came from was the leading body manufacturer for the said vehicles. And we were sought after. We won every one by our background.
In the third week of February, we have our first client. We were so happy, I was on the moon back then. And to think that our client has a big name in the industry. Then after the first client, we easily gained two more clients. It was surprisingly doing great really. It was like not working, I was happy though I was more exhausted in our business than in my last job.
So what’s the reason it crumbled? Money. We agreed that we will get money from our income if and only we have our return on investment. We invested a lot from the legal papers to our fairs when seeking clients to our allowances and salaries of our contractors. So it came a time when my savings were all used up. And I wasn’t able to write my novels anymore because I have my full attention to our company. We have clients in San Pablo, Bulacan, Balintawak, and Bulacan and we were just two managing those clients because Boy was solely assigned to design. I have my plate full and the only money I have is the allowance to travel from one client to another.
I was desperately in need of money at that time (that’s when I discovered noise!) and so I was thinking of laying off but I didn’t. We got a consultation work and the payment with that sustained my needs for a while. The payment was divided between Girl and Me though it was mostly I who did the consultation and I was okay with that. We also divided our area of management so we can fully cater to our clients. I was assigned in San Pablo and Girl in Bulacan. While Dasma and Balintawak were also handled by me because they were off-site jobs for designs and consultations only. So it was then okay for me again.
Then the Bulacan project went to poof! Girl made some bad choices and we lost a great deal of money. The consultation works also ended. By August 2020 we have two projects in San Pablo and one in Balintawak. By that time also my boyfriend and I decided to move out of the apartment we rented with Boy and Girl. And yes Boy and Girl are in a relationship.
The sharing in the apartment was getting a little out of hand and there were changes in the demeanor of Boy and Girl so I decided to move out to save our partnership. And because of that I also asked Girl to give me time off from the company for even a month for me to adjust and earn money. I still have my novels online.
She said yes though with a lot of convincing. And yet on the very first day of my absence, she bombarded me with questions after questions that I didn’t really get the time off. I handled the finances in Balintawak and San Pablo, I also talk to our clients about their queries, and all she had to do was to supervise our people in San Pablo.
Now out of frustration, after less than a month of break, I came back to the company. I learned that we were not passing quality standards in our work in one of our clients in San Pablo because of Girl's leadership. I took over everything again and we were doing great, we were back on track and were paying the losses we had from Bulacan. But then one day Girl stop sharing workloads with me and all the directions she gave to our workers were wrong. The welding point, the assembly process, and the painting process were all wrong.
I asked the workers if they know the directions were wrong, and they said yes. Then I asked why did they still do it despite knowing it was wrong? They answered that Girl would be angry if they didn’t.
That pissed me off but I still let it slide. And at this point, I still don’t get money from the company. All our earnings were taken by Girl and Boy because they manage the finances. So I came up with a way to earn; Girl and I accepted consultation work in one of our projects in San Pablo. Now we were earning good and our company is doing okay. But then again Girl came up with a hundred excuses for not going to San Pablo. She would go there maybe once a week sometimes once in two weeks always in time for payroll. But I again let it slide. And she still gets paid half from the consultation work. Also because of some issues we lost our clients in Balintawak and the other one in San Pablo. Now we only have one client. It would be a lot easier, right? But No because I manage everything alone.
And when December came and it was my birthday I need to go home. It was the 22nd of December when I went home to Cavite and Girl was left in San Pablo to manage. But I found out that she didn’t do a Payroll for our workers and the Client was very pissed because he doesn’t know where he would get money. The banks were all closed! And Girl blamed me, she said the payroll was my fault. Though she didn’t tell it on my face only to our client.
So because of that issue about the payroll, the client and Girl went into an argument with lots of shouting. Girl said she would never say sorry to the client and would never go back to San Pablo.
Now here’s the real problem came, she wanted to get her salary from her share of the consultation work though she wouldn’t be in San Pablo anymore. She also wanted me to manage everything alone and I need to report to her every penny we earn. I know we were earning and yet I don’t get any from that. I know too that maybe we haven’t paid our losses from our other projects however I was paying the price of someone’s mistakes.
I later found out that Girl was rumbling about my break from the company and that she does everything alone. So instead of confronting her, I stopped all communications with her.
And you would ask why I didn’t confront her? Girl has the attitude of being mighty and high, for her she would never be on the wrong side. And so why would I waste energy on someone like that? I didn’t say a single bad word about her even if I wanted so and yet she did it. I had to end before it gets out of hand. And there were also time that I voiced out my issues but it was put aside because Boy would always take Girl's side no matter what.
That was when I made the decision, I spoke with our client. I said I will turn over my people to him. I also told him that I would be leaving but I will give him three months to recuperate before I go.
So last April 2022 our company went into Shambles. Though I still have San Pablo as a client, I do menial work for him sometime. And some clients call me and ask for our services. I refer them to my old contractors and return get a percentage from the contract.
I wanted the work actually but not the drama. I omitted a lot from this story but basically you couldn’t trust anyone at the face of money, right?
So with the question, I do regret forming a company with my friend. It ruined our friendship for sure. But I don’t regret having the company. It was fun, I get to learn a lot. I learned that I am good at negotiation. That I can make good choices at the most critical time. I also learned about engines and trucks. And talking with the company owner boosted my self-confidence. And I would do it again for all the learnings I got.
So if you ever plan to build a company, do it alone.
I am invested on the story because it is in San Pablo haha San Pabluy. Anyhow same as what Adam had pointed out, there are friends that can be left as friends and not as business partners.
Owning a business is nice and you have a sense of accomplishment that hey I am now a CEO etc but after that highs the paperwork and the legwork will remind you that it takes a LOT to run it and an undivided attention is needed especially if this is a startup.
With those learnings you can make a better decision in the future. Looking forward to your new investments and projects. ( Pabulong nang project sa San Pablo daanan ko minsan pag namalengke) . !PIZZA
Wahahhaha malapit sa may Franklin tho di na ako napunta ng site... But yeah sobrang laking tulong naman ng experience and I always put into account Yung mga learnings ko before anything else naman.
Uyyy miss ko na Yung San Pablo...Dami nagbibigay sakin ng fruits dun e.
Don't know their side of the story or any records that are publicly verified to fact check this claim but if I learned something about doing business with friends and family, it's best to just nope out if you can. Some friends are best left as friends than actual business partners. The problem with this setup is an internal cause which is more toxic than external causes. In hindsight, I think the lesson you can pick up is quitting while you're still ahead instead of going into a cost sunk fallacy.
Yeah I learned that the hard way
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