Zero experience. Two founders. One crazy idea. Here's how
@colealyon and I built a profitable Christmas light business from scratch at the end of 2024:
💡 The Numbers That Lit Up Our Season (Oct 8 - Dec 11):
- $52.5K Revenue
- $27.3K Profit
- 43 Properties Decorated
- 169 Leads (25.4% close rate!)
- 1,125 total hours
🤯 The Sprint: $49,106.47 revenue in just 30 days (Nov 11 - Dec 11)
- Working 75-95 hours/week.
- Absolutely exhausted
- Genuinely fun and 100% worth it
🎯 Most Surprising Discovery:
Our best lead source? Not SEO. Not social media. Simple yard signs! Or as we like to call them, money bushes.
💰 Behind The Scenes:
- $17.5K - Materials
- $4.8K - Marketing (lesson learned: could cut $3K next year)
- $1.8K - Transaction fees (Hopefully we pay less than 2.9% next year)
- $1.1K - Misc expenses
🔁 Next Season's Game Plan:
- Hiring team members
- Streamlining SOP for team members
- Place 3-5x more yard signs
- Work van and storage unit
We're just getting started. With systems in place and lessons learned, next season is going to be HUGE.