a long road made longer

I wish I could go back to retell all the stories of chaos and craziness that have occurred over the last year since we first got the idea to open a frozen yogurt store on the North Shore of Oahu where we live. It started on a trip to California, where I'm from, last summer.

I grew up eating frozen yogurt at TCBY, but in Hawaii, they had yet to discover its goodness. We noticed how many self-serve frozen yogurt stores have opened there and thought Hawaii would fall in love with them. While we hatched our initial ideas, stores began opening all over the island and Yelp was full of people proclaiming their love for this frozen treat. The market still had yet to reach the North Shore and we knew we had something good.

When anyone starts a venture, she often has no idea exactly what she's getting herself into until she's so far in she has no choice but to see it to the end. That's about how it went with simply "starting a business." No one just "starts a business." I knew it would be complicated, but my husband really was under the impression that you just rent a store, build it out, open your doors, and watch the money start a flowin' (he is Brazilian; maybe that has something to do with it?). As I said, I'm from California, and I get that anything you try to do that involves money will always be a bureaucratic nightmare. Granted, the laws and restrictions in Hawaii aren't as strict as they are in California (it was scarily easy), but there are certainly issues that come up one doesn't expect. I have a new one- never assume it's too easy to be true, because it probably is.

This blog will go back to recall the many challenges we faced including writing a business plan and having to totally rethink our original business idea. It's over a year later and we still haven't sold our first cup of yogurt. Why? I'll tell you all about here. I'll also dive into how it has affected our first years of marriage, the good and bad aspects of that added pressure. Hopefully you'll find some advice or at least another sympathetic soul to the many setbacks life throws at us whether we're trying to start a business or just journeying through life. Come join me-it's quite a ride!