In 2003 I was invited to a business seminar which I attended. I have always been interested in the subject so I went without reservation and knew that there would always be something to learn. At the end of the talk I found in the hotel lobby a table where they were selling business-themed books.
There was a particular book that caught my attention, its name was “Rich father poor father“And he had a catchphrase that shook my brain:”what the rich teach their children, that the poor and middle class DO NOT“.
I bought it instantly. He desperately needed to know what was on those pages.
I got home and that same night I started reading it. I could hardly stop myself and I think I read it in 2 or 3 days, I don’t remember it very well. If you have read it you will know that it is a fascinating book because of the way it can transform our way of seeing money, business and ourselves.
When I finished reading it, I discovered that there was another book by the same author, Robert Kiyosaki it was called “The Money Flow Quadrant“So I set out to get it as soon as possible.
To my surprise, I looked in several bookstores in my Guatemala City and couldn’t find it. In fact, it was amazing to me that at that time, they didn’t even know much about the author.
As I continued my search it seemed to me more and more incredible that no one had such an excellent series of books. Finally, after several days I managed to find only a couple of copies of “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” but in English in a sophisticated bookstore. There was no more than that.
So I decided to search the Internet and locate a publishing house called Time Money Network that had them, except that it did not sell by unit but would have to buy at least a dozen books. By then my obsession with acquiring the second book was such that I decided to bring a dozen and thought: “surely I can sell the rest of the books to my friends.”
So I contacted them, arranged for payment, and about 15 days later I had a dozen books in my office. I started offering them and managed to sell a few. To be exact, since nobody knew about the author, I managed to sell about 3 books. And it took me a few weeks to get a couple more sold. After a month and a half I think I had managed to sell about 10 books.
And since the “Flow Quadrant” was also an excellent book, I decided to place another order. So I requested another dozen. Again, the sale was not going so fast so I decided to go to the bookstore where I had seen the books in English and offer them at wholesale prices. I made a slight price adjustment and to my surprise they were blindly interested and within an hour I had sold a full dozen books. That caught my attention and I thought that perhaps the author was beginning to make himself known (without really imagining who Robert Kiyosaki was).
I made a third order. A dozen more and I started offering it. Again it was selling very slowly.
The opportunity
Weeks later, reading the local newspaper in my city, I discovered a column by a renowned opinion journalist that was titled “Rich dad“And it was an article referring to the extraordinary teachings of that book. I felt a bit of relief that someone had finally discovered the same treasure as me just a few weeks ago.
As I had some books available and I knew there was very little availability in local bookstores, I wrote an email to the journalist with my phone and let him know that if anyone was interested, I had some books available.
The call took only about 10 minutes to arrive. He spoke to me and said: “Hi, I read your email. I have many people asking about the book and they say that it is not available in Guatemala. How many can you sell me.” I told: “I have several and I can sell you the ones you need“(although he was only 12 but had the contact to bring more).
He told me: “Deal done, then I’ll give your number to those who call and you sell them.“
The calls began to come in. The book had a cost to me of about $ 7 dollars (including shipping) and I decided to sell them for $ 20 dollars, posted on the door of his house. Luckily for me, no one bargained for a penny of the price! I sold about 15 books in two days and offered to other interested parties that I could deliver their book to them in 2 weeks if they anticipated 50% of the value.
To sum up the end of the story, I sold about 150 books of “Rich father poor father“And I made about $ 1000 in 3 weeks. I still remember this story with pleasure because it was a moment of blessing in which I took advantage of an opportunity that came when I was ready.
Then I kept in touch with Time Money Net for several years, I kept bringing books of different kinds such as business and motivational themes and I kept distributing for several years until I decided to stick with Other businesses.
Maybe this is not the super business that changed my life. But if I can say with all certainty that people like me who have always been in search of opportunities to make extra money, these are true golden experiences.
Oh and by the way, I kept buying R. Kiyosaki’s books and have read them over and over again. It was the least I could do in gratitude 🙂
And you, are you ready for when your golden opportunities present themselves?
Other business stories:
