work at home

Lawrence Lugar didn’t want to work for someone else, in a so-called traditional business 9 to 5 career. Lawrence wanted from the get-go to do his own thing, on his hours, from home.

Lawrence never really had a traditional job, so to speak. During college and after, he was dabbling in online sales — from home. In the beginning, Lawrence took odds and ends that he could find locally — via thrift stores, garage and estate sales, swap meets, etc. — and then sold them in online auctions for a profit. Lawrence was so ecstatic to sell basically anything for a profit. That was his first, genuine real taste of business. The odds and ends gradually escalated to specialty goods, where Lawrence would have specialized wholesalers he’d have dealt with.

Lawrence’s recent home-based venture, ItsBusinessBaby.com, is an offbeat wacky concept — but yet serves a genuine, real purpose. It’s a local business resource site, accomplished via the business card images of local city businesses. City-specific forums are included for citizens to discuss their local cities’ happenings, along with an overall loose graphical structure.

His marketing/promotion efforts for ItsBusinessBaby.com are truly ground-roots, small, and slow but sure. Lawrence contacts the local businesses via email, posts in related and complimentary sites, and creates profiles in popular sites, press releases, etc. He hasn’t spent a dime on marketing and promotion — just his time and effort.

The primary customers for his site are basically all small businesses across the United States that have business cards — and locals who are seeking something locally.

According to Lawrence, the launch of ItsBusinessBaby.com is his biggest business achievement without a doubt. “The conceptualization and development periods were significant — it’s been a long road, to say the least,” says Lawrence.

For Lawrence, the primary advantages to working from home are the avoidances of traffic headaches and office politics. In three years, he see himself, if things go as planned, running ItsBusinessBaby.com with employees to help him carry the weight — or being acquired by a larger company. For more information, visit ItsBusinessBaby.com.