Starting a Home Business

Hello. My name is Heather and I live on my family's small farm in North Dakota. I raise sheep and goats and other various animals, plus a large vegetable and herb garden.

My family struggles financially and we have several health issues in our family. I myself have Lymes Disease and that makes it hard for me to hold down a steady job as an employee. My dream and goal is to start a home business so that I can support myself, and also help my family financially. The business I am trying to start is that of making and selling natural skin care products, such as goat milk soap and lotions, creams, lip balms, etc. I have experience making these products (and also have experience in helping run a business, website maintenance, etc.) and it's something I am passionate about.

I'm calling my business Free Spirit Farm and it will start out with its main focus being soaps and lotions, and eventually I would like to expand to more body care products, plus more products from the farm, such as natural fibers from my sheep and angora rabbits. I also plan to start making natural soy candles.

One of my passions in life is to live as naturally and self-sustaining as possible, living in harmony with nature. I also love sharing "the good life' with others, and would love to make some of the things from it available to others, those who desire to use natural, healthy products but don't have the resources or time to do it themselves.

Due to health and family issues I am personally not able to finance such a venture by myself. I am hoping that through donations I will be able to make this dream a reality.

I will be starting the business mostly from scratch, and will need such necessities as a laptop and internet access to successfully run the business (Website creation and maintenance, online sales, advertising, etc.) The rest of the money will be used to purchase the ingredients and other supplies needed to make the soaps and lotions. Other misc. include the cost of business cards, labels, and packaging.

I've carefully researched and calculated the cost of all this and I believe that $600 would get this business up and running, and maintain it for a couple months as the business gets established and starts bringing in a profit.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my story and letting me share my dream with you!!

If you have any questions please let me know!

God bless!