If you have ever been through a natural disaster such as a hurricane, a tornado or a bad Noreaster Winter storm that ravaged your home and garden, you know the hassle of claiming losses with your insurance company. After all who keeps receipts of pricy items or collectibles? How to prove that everything you claim is really in your possesion, and how to remember every single piece? If you have pictures of your home's interior they probably got lost in the fire or flood, and if not, they were taking 5 years earlier before you bought that expensive Grandfather clock in Switzerland. Many people in coastal areas, where I live, keep their insurance active and up to date, but forget to qualify the new purchases, remodeling, or the expensive re-landscaping project they just finished. Especially when there is some real money involved in insuring their possessions, they don't mind spending $250 annually for a video disc showing all their possessions in detail.

This now is a perfect homebased business for someone with a digital camera, some editing knowledge and a computer with the proper software and a CD burner. Cost about $1,200-$1,500.

With a little practice the total time and cost involvement for such a video (duration 10 min.) is half a day and the cost of a tape and 3 CD's.(one for the insurance company, one for the customer and one for your archive).

How to go about it? Well why don't you practice on yourself. Shoot a video of your belongings including outdoors, practice a simple edit, if you want to be fancy put a piece of music under the video, give it a title AND a date and burn it to a CD. You may also want to include Digital photographs of prized items, antiques and jewelry - again with a date in the camera pre-set, and load this separately onto the CD.

How to market your services? The easiest market is always where you provide a solution to a problem. Most elderly people have little experience in computers or digital cameras and often a house full of mementos of a life. They would love a service like this. Advertising in the classifieds, a simple leaflet describing your services and a little research on where to offer your services will usually get you the first clients quickly. From there it's usually a matter of "word of mouth".

Do you need to be Bonded? If you request for the owner(s) client to be present when filming, there is no need for bonding. As your business grows it may be wise to ask for a letter of recommendation of testimonial from customers that will help in further acquisition.

If you are interested in this "Business in a Box" idea, you may want to contact us at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it for a completely packaged Business Plan with many marketing angles.  

Write comment

Name: Email:  do not notifynotify Website: Title: UBBCode:         -color-aquablackbluefuchsiagraygreenlimemaroonnavyolivepurpleredsilvertealwhiteyellow -size-tinysmallmediumlargehuge     Please input the anti-spam code that you can read in the image.

Comments

Add New Search

Powered by !JoomlaComment 3.25

3.25 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."