Posted on 08/08/2005 6:19:03 AM PDT by robowombat
Teen forced to close fair booth Wednesday, August 03, 2005 - Bangor Daily News
Entrepreneur couldn't afford $5,000 for liability insurance
BANGOR - Sometimes an early start can help, but it doesn't always make the first part of the road toward success any less bumpy.
Ben Bustard, 17, found that out this week when he tried his hand at selling homemade toys at the Bangor State Fair.
The budding entrepreneur from Bucksport came up with the $100 he initially was told he needed for $1 million worth of liability insurance, but he shut his booth down Tuesday after the projected cost rose to several thousand dollars.
"It's frustrating because it's a product that I know sells really well," Bustard said Tuesday afternoon.
Bustard was selling Marshmallow Shooters, a type of blowgun made from PVC pipe that shoots small marshmallows, similar to the way a cork flies out of the end of a popgun.
He said that last Friday, the first day of the fair, he made about $700 by selling 70 of the toys for $9.95 apiece.
Fair officials initially let Bustard sell the homemade items while he was waiting for insurance approval.
After failing to get insurance through a rider on the city's policy, and then finding out his business could not be insured through his parents' homeowner policy, Bustard was faced with either paying a $5,000 premium for his own policy or having to close his booth. He chose the cheaper option.
"As a high school kid, I can't afford a $5,000 premium," he said.
Mike Dyer, director of the city-owned Bass Park, where the fair is held, said Tuesday that the shooters were not on the city's "do not insure" list, so he sent it to the city's insurer for approval.
The insurer, however, determined that a rider for Ben's business on the city's policy was not acceptable.
"It's the ultimate business lesson," Dyer said of the experience.
According to Bustard's father, Ken Bustard, the insurance cost was aggravated by the type of device his son was selling. Benjamin came across the shooter design on the Internet and, after building one, decided it would be a popular thing to sell, the father said.
"The challenge is that it is not an established product," Ken Bustard said. "The insurance thing made the whole thing impractical."
Benjamin bought the PVC piping in bulk, went through the necessary licensing paperwork, and invested $2,000 in making 500 of the toys, according to his father. He hoped to gross $5,000 over the nine days of the fair.
"He would have done well," Ken said. "He would have averaged 100 or so [sales] a day."
Benjamin said that "99 percent" of the response to his product was positive. After shutting his booth down Tuesday, he took a shooter with him when he visited a friend at a local hospital, where again the device proved to be a hit.
"Now I have nurses asking to buy some," he said.
The young businessman plans to do more research on insurance companies to see if he can find one with a cheaper premium.
He also plans to sell his remaining inventory by word-of-mouth and maybe at other upcoming fairs.
"It was difficult [to shut the booth down]," Ken Bustard said. "People really liked it."
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
It's unfortunate that government regulations and trail lawyers hassled this young entrepreneur's efforts. But in this particular case the publicity generated will likely make up for any lost time at this fair.
My husband & I are self-employed, our business is our only source of income. We are trying to sell it now, because insurance & taxes eat up every bit of profit we make. Every time we make a little extra money, the city comes up with another "fee" to charge us & our insurance company keeps raising rates every year. Not to mention how are utility costs are soaring.
We give up.
Well thank the nice lawyers. Some stupid kid mighta sucked the marshmallow back through the pipe and choked on it. Then his parents would have sued the city (probably not much to be gained from suing the kid).
Marshmellow Shooters! Of course these must be bad, they shoot!
Well, folks, the lawyers and busy-body do-gooders screw up another kid's life.
"(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".) "
It's a great quote- So get the original text, get it right, and do not post hundreds of variations of it. A quote (in quotation marks) is supposed to be the EXACT WORDING.
And if I remember the quote correctly it said looking for TRUTH (not answers)
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
This is weird. My wife and I have been selling handmade beaded jewelry at craft shows and fairs for six years now (though never at a state fair), and we've NEVER had to pay for insurance. The worst we've had to do is pay for local jurisdiction business licenses, in addition to the booth fee for the space itself (and remitting local/state sales taxes, of course). And we've been around several people selling those marshmallow blowguns at various shows, they're popular items with kids, cheap in materials and easy to make so they're profitable.
Is this a Maine thing, or just particular to this fair perhaps, I wonder.
}:-)4
there is something just plain wrong about a small business making less than $5000 being required to insure for $5000
Unfortunately, there are people that probably would shoot themselves in the eye, then sue everyone involved...
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
You got that right. Our standard of living keeps slipping every year, we're tired. Lately, I've been having fantasies of getting a "real" job, with "real" benefits & "real" hours.
It was good while it lasted.
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
I sell short term even insurance here in Georgia. Instead of getting an annual policy that costs ALOT, he should look into short term trade event coverage. $1200 max.
That's probably the reasoning behind requiring the insurance.
>Well, folks, the lawyers and busy-body do-gooders screw up another kid's life.<
I doubt the Kid's life is is screwed up by this.The problem is he put the fair and by exension the city on the hook for the potential liability because he had no insurance.He can sell them from his front yard,door to door or mail order without insurance.The problem comes when someone with deeper pockets gets involved.
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
We have half a dozen of these things around the house, that my husband and sons have made. The real danger is that one of the kids will whomp the other upside the head with the blowgun, after he runs out of marshmallows.
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