Consider the next part of this post as an update to this one from two years ago where we first broke out a few pie-charts to generally illustrate how we spend our time and how we make money as bloggers (because even our parents get confused about that sometimes). Things have changed over the last couple of years – not dramatically – but enough that we felt it was time for an update. So let’s kick this charty goodness off. Behold, a very simplified / approximated breakdown (all the pie charts in this post are very general guesses, btw)…
First, we should point out that this is not a complete representation of our waking hours – it’s just our “work” time. So you can see yesterday’s “Day In The Life” post for a better sense of how things like parenting, cooking, and running errands fit into the mix. That being said, the interesting thing to note here is that the majority of our work time is spent running a website (blogging, interacting, and managing a business) not doing DIY projects, as some might assume.
We always describe our job as a mostly-desk job. We might get to paint or build something while Clara’s in bed for the night (which is when we used to do projects when we both had day-jobs anyway), but between the hours of 8am and 6pm we’re most likely found on the computer sizing photos, writing posts, organizing giveaways, emailing about our book or the showhouse, answering comments, doing our expenses, or coding something. But let’s dive in a bit deeper to get a closer look.
When we look at how some of these areas break out, there are two changes that are most notable to us:
- We’ve managed to streamline the managerial aspects of our business. Simple changes like using Rafflecopter to run giveaways (which also saves us from approving thousands of comments and allows us to accept more than 10,000 entries without the site crashing) along with hiring out more of our accounting have made small but significant impacts. But perhaps the biggest is a shift that we’re making in our advertising program. We’re currently transitioning our 4-year-old private sponsor system out (private sponsors = people that we manage directly, so I was manually uploading 30+ ads and invoicing 30+ people). We’re upgrading to a more auto-pilot system that is managed by a third party who can serve/place/bill automatically. The kinks of the new system aren’t all worked out, so I don’t have any other helpful details to share yet, but it promises to save us lots of time in ad renewal notices, invoices, and even writing sponsor shout out posts (which have been phased out as of this month). In addition to being more efficient for us, we’re aiming for a more pleasant experience for you guys (less sidebar clutter, for one!) and a more effective, flexible system for our advertisers (so they’re not one of 30 boxes blinking on our sidebar).
- Which enables us to give more time to side gigs. Freeing up some managerial time allows for things like book #2, the showhouse, and a secret project that has to stay secret for now (ARGH, SECRETS!) to take up more of the pie. It could be argued that this is a bad thing (doesn’t it take away from spending more time on projects or posts?) especially when side gigs don’t contribute to the majority of our income (more on that in a moment), but to us, they’re the opportunities that we can’t pass up: they keep us fresh, help us grow professionally, and stretch us in new ways. And because they’re still only about 19% of our total time, there’s still just as much room for projects and other blog stuff as there always has been, which still make up 80+ percent of the pie.
Obviously this isn’t a perfect model of time management or how to run a blog. We’re constantly trying to improve our processes so that we can put the most time into activities that invigorate us, help and entertain you, and – let’s be honest – put money in Clara’s college fund. One thing some people suggest is “why don’t you spend less time responding to comments?” or set them to auto approve for repeat commenters, but the reason we keep comments in moderation is so we don’t miss questions. If we auto approve some or all of them, questions will slip through (they not only roll in on current posts, but old ones as well). And since we believe connecting with you guys and offering additional info is a big part of what got us here, we’d never want to phase that out.
Speaking of which, I think it’s time for our next chart:
Unlike last time we did this chart, we’ve now collapsed all of our advertising – private sponsors, ad networks, and Google – into one chunk. That’s partially because those slices of the pie are rapidly shifting while we’re in this sponsor program transition (you may notice over 25 fewer ads on our sidebar by the time it’s done). But it’s also to make it crystal clear that the majority of our income comes straight from sidebar ads. Much like how magazines or newspapers keep their doors open thanks to advertisers, blogging seems to follow that model as well, at least for us – especially since we don’t do other things like sponsored posts to make additional income. Although that red affiliate slice of the pie is from sharing some things we love – usually on our sidebar or occasionally in a post (both clearly marked as affiliate links whenever they occur).
Another interesting distinction is that as much as things like writing a book and having a lighting line might sound like cash-cows, they’re not things that we have experienced as high earners, as demonstrated by our chart above. But they’re a really big deal for us personally and professionally, so they’re well worth the effort and the experience. For those wondering, we still haven’t reached our royalty point on the book (more on that here) but we did hear from a publisher in China who bought the book rights from our American publisher for a nominal fee and is re-publishing it there in Chinese (which is really exciting to see – the cover’s going to be different and everything). So since we get a small percent of that fee for being the authors, that’s what that sliver represents. Admittedly the proportions represented above are a bit rough, since the goal was just to generally illustrate the point. So as long as we’re talking non-specifics, let’s move on to our third graphic.
After a couple of attempts to make a useful pie-chart, I gave up (these fluctuate so much that trying to quantify them just wasn’t working). But the point we wanted to illustrate was that some people think that blogging is a “zero overhead” profession, but if your readership grows, your business costs definitely rise with them. Here are some of the notable places that our earnings go:
- Taxes & Accountant: As exciting as those auto-pilot ad network checks are sometimes, a big chunk of that goes right back to Uncle Sam (around 33% of our total income bounces right out of our checking account across four quarterly payments). We use an accountant to help keep it all straight, but it has definitely been the biggest adjustment for us (going from banking/spending all of our paychecks in our previous professions to having to hoard a big cushion to send back four times a year).
- Retirement: Since we don’t have a boss taking 401k money out of our paychecks anymore (or anyone doing any company matching), we have to stay on top of our own retirement planning. We each have a SEP IRA and after year-end taxes our accountant calculates what our maximum contribution could be for that tax year and we try to invest as much of that as possible (as well as contributing to Clara’s college fund then too).
- Web Hosting: The biggest unexpected cost for us in blogging was web hosting and other fees – everything from hosting our site and photos (which are stored separately on amazon.cloud to keep the site from crashing) to paying a monthly fee for Rafflecopter and Vanilla Forums. These expenses actually add up to almost double our mortgage payment each month!
- Health Insurance: Another “perk” of being a small business owner is that you get to pay for your own health insurance. It’s not fun, but it’s definitely one of those “now I can sleep at night” investments in your business and family.
- Business Insurance: While we’re on the topic, we also pay for business insurance. This helps to protect our business (and us personally) if we were ever to be affected by things like a lawsuit or the death/injury of one of us (knocking on so much wood over here right now).
- Legal: This is a new expense for us recently because over the past year we’ve engaged a trademark and licensing attorney. Since our book was going to be titled Young House Love as well, we needed to fully claim the name – and she also helps us navigate some of the contracts that we’ve received for some of our side gigs (like our lighting collection). Plus, now we’re officially Young House Love™. Holla!
- Projects: Last but not least… everyone knows home improvement isn’t free – and while most of the things that we blog about would be costs that we’d incur anyway, we certainly work at a faster pace (and therefore spend faster) than we did before we were blogging full time. We get asked all the time if these home purchases can be write offs since we’re blogging about them for a living, but the answer is no. Since we’re fixing up our primary residence (and not an office or investment property) we could never write a cent of it off (and if we attempted to, we’d owe a big ol’ chunk of money to the government if we ever sold our house since it would be partially theirs instead of all ours).
And now let’s lighten up this numberfest a bit, shall we? Like previous years we thought we’d throw some random stats and facts your way, but this year I’ve spiced things up a bit visually. You know I love a good infographic…
P.S. – You can check out our original pie charts from 2011 here, and look back at our past by-the-numbers posts for our last five blogiversaries here: 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009 and 2008.
Update – Some of the most frequent requests that we get are for info about professionally blogging (how we made our site, how we grew our following, how we make money, etc) so we shared all of the details about how we started a blog, grew our traffic, and turned it into a full time job.
Thanks for sharing this! So many people think blogging is a get rick quick plan. That is totally not the case!
Way to go, Amy!
Rick Rooooooooll!
HAHA love that, Amy!
279 days of writing posts. Amazing to think of it like that. Then again, I wouldn’t want to know how many days I’ve played Call of Duty.
The synchronized Barbie instagram is priceless.
Wow, the numbers are staggering to look at.
I’ve always wondered, and you don’t have to answer if you feel it’s too personal, but because your blog is about home improvements, do you get to write off some or all of the expenses involved in that as part of the business? It seems like you should be able to but then maybe that’s part of my “man, I hope that’s true because that would rock” part of my mind. :-)
We get that question a lot! Even though we’re blogging about these things for a living, the answer is no. Since we’re fixing up our primary residence (and not an office or investment property) we could never write a cent of it off (and if we attempted to, we’d owe a big ol’ chunk of money to the government if we ever sold our house since it would be partially theirs instead of all ours). But we can write off office-y things like printer paper and postage spent sending contracts back and forth! Usually comes to $10 a month, haha!
xo
s
Um, seriously? The answer to this question is right in the post… Poor Sherry could save some time answering questions if people would actually read the post before asking things where the info is already given…
Not to worry Nina, sometimes we’re wordy (ok, all the time we’re wordy) and stuff gets lost in posts, so it’s easy enough to cut and paste it when that happens.
xo
s
On a related note, did you claim capital improvements credit when you sold your last house? Can you claim hosting fees for your business?
No, we didn’t claim anything from selling our last house, but we can write off hosting fees since they’re monthly business expenses though!
xo
s
What a great post! I know this must have taken a lot of time just like projects!
Thanks for the update! I don’t think your sidebar is too distracting, actually. Yours is one of the websites where my vision tends to go directly to the post as soon as I open the page. Something about the white background next to the gray background of the sidebar makes it pop sufficiently. But that is really great that you are going to be able to lighten up some of the load of taking care of the ads and sponsors!
Oh, and I watched that synchronized swimming Barbies video about 30 times, that thing was hilarious.
Aw thanks Megan!
xo
s
I agree!
Totally agree.
I have to say this is interesting to read. I have often dabbled with the idea of blogging (how hard can it be? (in my head of course)) and it only takes me a few minutes to think in my head, what are you thinking, you don’t have the time or inclination to REALLY do it.
I do have to add as well that I’m so glad that you guys respond to comments. I get so tired of reading blogs and posting a question and it never gets answered. I really can’t stand the bloggers that can’t seem to take the time to connect with their readers. I love that about you guys; you answer every question and very often just respond to comments made. That makes you guys my favorite.
Aw thanks Katie! I think it’s just innately something we like! Ever since we got one comment we were excited to chat with people, especially on a subject we both enjoy so much!
xo
s
Katie, you are so right! Love that they answer us, so irritating when a blog can’t be bothered.
We all owe you a HUGE thank you/pat on the back/bear hug for working so hard to bring this to us 7 times a week :-) My parents were small business owners for 20+ years. My mom says to tell you to take more vacations!
Haha, I love your mom!
xo
s
Hi there!
I’d love to know how you envision your business and Young House Love growing/evolving. Where do you see yourselves and your career 10-20 years down the road? Do you think you’ll ever have to remove “Young” from your name ;)
Just curious! Love you guys!
Oh yeah, we’ll be Old House Love someday! Haha! Honestly, we have no idea. We always say we never could have guessed we’d be here 6 years ago, so we have no clue where we’ll be even a few years down the road. I mean who knows, blogging might not even be a thing anymore, or we could find ourselves doing one of our side gigs full time!
xo
s
I am super curious to see how blogging progresses in the next 15-20 years. I mean 15-20 years ago it wasn’t even an option. I know without a doubt my mom would have gotten into it when I was younger she is a super crafty person and was always doing super cool things around the house and making cool things for me when I was little (I remember the world’s most awesome Lion King bedroom complete with sheets she turned into curtains with toy Simba/Nala tie backs!). I think it is great that you guys are getting paid to do something you love, and get to be home with Clara as she grows up. That is priceless to me. You guys really are an inspiration to thousands of people out there.
Aw thanks Manda! We completely agree that it’ll be really interesting to see where blogging will go in 15-20 years! We’ve always thought “this isn’t forever” so I think our guess would be that the game would change a lot by then and we might be in a completely different industry, but it’ll be interesting to see how it goes!
xo
s
Thanks for the detailed info. This is actually really helpful as my husband and I are working out plans for starting a website-based blog-ish business. A couple of questions – what type of legal structure is your business? and at what point did you register/incorporate it? And you’re just now trademarking, after 6 years, correct?
Yes, trademarking took a while, so we started the process last year, about 6 months before our book came out. As for our business structure, it has been an LLC since I was doing it full time alone without John, so that seems to work for us.
xo
s
thank you!!!
Wow, as someone who enjoys your blog & reads it daily, I am prompted to send in a first time comment & ‘thank you’ note for putting this together–I love these behind the scenes notes that you guys post for us from time to time, they are great!
Happy to do it, Jen. I love writing posts like these.
-John (Number Lover) Petersik
–>I admire your dedication and leap of faith to be small business owners that relies on advertising on your website. I live in Virginia Beach and work once a week in Richmond so you especially feel “local” to me. I love that put so much time into your writing and photos to really take us step by step through your projects and life. I know it takes a lot of time and it’s appreciated.
(I visit your site often but don’t usually comment.)
deb
http://www.websavvymom.com
Thanks so much Deb!
xo
s
John really knows how to rock an infographic!
Mah man!
xo
s
Wow! Love the stats. I think the amount of time you spend writing the posts is the neatest stat. Do you occasionally time yourselves? Or did you just estimate?
Thanks for sharing!
We’ve timed ourselves a bunch of times, just out of curiosity and when we’re wondering about efficiency (sometimes we time our whole day and how it breaks out to make sure we’re not wasting time on things that shouldn’t be in there). Basically… we’re nerds with stopwatches.
xo
s
Sounds to me like Garmin could have a new market if they changed the features. Photo editing, post writing, and comment responding modes- to name a few.
Haha!
xo
s
*snort laugh* The synchronized swimming Barbies Instagram was fantastic!
Love the infographics, as always! Am I crazy, though, or was the Q&A video up for a while this morning and then disappeared?
Huh? It was? On youtube or on our site? We’re working on getting it uploaded for tomorrow’s post, but so funny if it popped up somehow!
xo
s
I also saw (watched) the video. I thought it was weird that two posts went up (on Facebook) back to back!
Oh yes, today you did! We just published the video post this morning and put it on FB, but also realized that yesterday’s post (this one) somehow didn’t get on FB so we put that up there too. Sorry for the confusion!
xo
s
I’ve always enjoyed these posts! You guys can rock a pie chart like none other.
I love seeing all the numbers! Thanks for sharing :)
Wow, so impressed with how much you put into your blog. I am so glad that the hard work pays off for you guys. It shows you care and that is why I will always check you out with my cup of coffee in the morning. So excited to see what your surprise is. You guys do this to us EVERY year! :)
I know, right? What’s with all of these cats sneaking into bags? Hopefully in a few more months we get to reveal this next project. It has been tons of fun to work on!
xo
s
Love the infographics! The numbers, the colors, the organization…be still my heart. :)
Quick question, I know y’all haven’t reached your royalty point for the book yet, but out of curiosity, do y’all know how many copies have sold? Did you find out you hit a certain number (ie going Platinum) and high five each other because you were giddy with excitement?
Honestly, the book is sort of an enigma to us. We have no idea how many have sold, although we do get “reprint notices” every once in a while that say “we’re doing another printing of Young House Love!” which is definitely a high five moment for us. Overall, we’re just grateful that our first book didn’t bomb (there were sleepless nights about that – it’s just hard to put something so permanent out there since blog posts are so easy to just pop an update into if there’s confusing info or something missing). We’re thankful it seems to have been well received and our publisher is happy with how it’s all going.
xo
s
I am clueless about the book business and not even sure what “royalty point” means, however it still surprised me to hear that when you were on the best seller list, right?
Yup! We did make the bestseller list when the book came out, but apparently a lot of other authors have publicly chatted about how that doesn’t really correlate with making money since you still have to hit a certain point where the publisher agrees to pay you (once they’re out of the red for all the initial costs involved in photographing/binding/printing the book, etc). We probably won’t hit ours for years if we ever do at all. Here’s a post all about how a royalty point works for ya!
xo
s
I keep breaking out into a cold sweat when I think there might be a day when you finish your house and there’s nothing left to blog about. I’ve noticed a few times you’ve said your current house is one you plan to be in for a long time, but you make improvements so quickly I can’t help but think you’ll be done in no time! And in response to that, I say “noooooooooooooo!”. What will you guys do once you finish everything? Rip out and re-do so we don’t all collectively cry??!
I think we’ll probably keep doing side projects like the showhouse and other makeovers for other people (like John’s Granny, etc) to break things up, since it’s more fun for us and also gives us a break on our own house stuff sometimes. We also think we might try to buy an investment property if we ever finish our house (John’s dad sent four kids through college that way, so it has always been a fun idea for us) so we could share how we make that over and continue to do other side projects too!
xo
s
Sherry/John: Why not a 2nd home or a beach/vacation house for you guys?!?
We have talked about how cool that would be, but we just don’t think it would work with Clara in school now. It would be a lot of travel/car time for us if it weren’t nearby, and if it was nearby it would make more sense as a rental since we only need one house in Richmond!
xo
s
First off, Happy Blogiversary 6, John and Sherry!
Speaking of what CE (11:05AM) said, have you ever been to a blog called SoPo Cottage (www.sopocottage.com)? It’s one of those blogs I subscribe to and follow. Laurel and Richard did a lot of “YHL-ing” (tm? ;)) to their own houses in the past, and they just cannot get enough of joy doing so, so they’ve extended their love beyond their own. What they are doing, technically speaking, may be called flipping, but if you read about their projects and how they work on them, it’s far from what the word “flip” generally connotes (just too much love and commitment there to call their work that name).
And it feels like I’m seeing possible future you whenever I read their blog (and when the same question as CE’s crosses my mind :))
Anyway, if it is new to you, I’d recommend to stop by at their place!
Thanks so much Eri! Sounds like an awesome site! Off to check it out!
xo
s
Oh those info graphics! I have to fight the urge to go make some after reading those! Way to go John!
Also I love all the information you guys give about your blog! I love seeing the back end of it! #nerdalert
You guys are so cool – thanks for sharing these stats every year–it’s absolutely fascinating!
I can’t wait to hear what the next big surprise is!
Nice breakdown. One thing that stands out to me is the number of times you’ve replied to comments. Personally, I’ve only left two comments, both being in the past month. You’ve replied to both. I have to say how much that is appreciated. Your blog is about one of four that I follow and check up on on a daily basis. I’ve commented on all of them, but yours and one other(who is small potatoes compared to you guys)are the only ones to reply back. I really appreciate you guys taking the time out to reply when you can! LOVE YOUR BLOG!!
Thanks so much Angie! We appreciate you guys so much for dropping in on us!
xo
s
Love seeing how your blog works behind the scenes. Thanks for sharing!
love these infographics! and it’s definitely not surprising that very little money comes from the book! kind of like music royalties — the money really comes from the touring aspect not selling albums!
So interesting! I can totally see how paid concerts would be how musicians make their money!
xo
s
Can’t you take a deduction for your office space based on square footage?
We have been advised not to do that by multiple accountants since the government would then own part of our house, which means if we sold we’d owe a chunk back to the government. Everyone says it’s not worth those minimal write offs not to own your house outright, so we are happy to keep this as our 100% primary residence.
xo
s
http://www.houseofturquoise.com/2013/09/gina-cristine-photography.html
just saw your book on another coffee table
Aw thanks Erin. Brings a tear to my proud-momma eye.
xo
s
The geek in me is totally loving this! I love reading about the business side of blogs, I find it facinating. Thanks so much for sharing and HAPPY BLOGIVERSARY 6!
It’s interesting to see how it all breaks down behind the scenes. When did you first decide to accept advertising and see if you could make some money from the blog?
Oh and PS, your book is “titled,” not “entitled”-unless you have a very bossy book :)
Thanks for the hilarious typo tip! As for the ads, I think about a year or so into things we just put up a little box on the sidebar that said “want your ad here? Email us! We’re cheap!” – haha!
xo
s
It is obvious you guys are spending a lot less time doing DIY stuff. I think there have only been 2 DIY posts in the last ten days. I’ve been following a long time and I’m happy for your success but sad at how much the content has changed. I guess by the time you’re on your third house all the small projects have lost their appeal. Small project posts were not only fun to read about but gave actual inspiration for people who don’t have thousands or even hundreds of dollars to spend and demonstrated your creativity and style much more effectively.
Agreed! We were just saying that we miss small projects! Very often when we’re doing big things (ex: a bathroom makeover or building a deck) those take a lot more time so the smaller projects fall by the wayside during that time (for example, we did 5 days of work on the sunroom ceiling just to get one post last week). But once they wrap up, smaller updates pop back in! After three years of doing this full time and looking at every post in our archives of those years, our average project rate is actually 2 per week (most weeks in the first year of doing this full time it was only 1 project) so sharing two projects last week was definitely a normal average (blogiversary week has no projects every year, but it’s just one week out of 52 like that). All of that is to say, small projects are coming! We hear you and we miss them too!
xo
s
I feel like the book is golden cornucopia of inspiring DIY projects that are small enough and affordable enough for any of us to manage. 243 to be exact :) You should check that out!
I get that you love responding to comments, and we love the interaction.
I just wonder whether implementing a plugin that will allow people to “like” someone else’s comment or question (see the systems on the Offbeat Empire or A Practical Wedding) would help keep down repeat questions that you would have to respond to with the same answers over and over again…
We have tried more complicated comment plug-ins like that, but unfortunately they slow down/crash our site. We can’t even get the “email me when there’s a comment response” function to work over here without crashing. Boo! But we did get it to work on Young House Life since there’s less traffic over there.
xo
s
You are an infographic king!
I loved that instavideo!!! So freaking funny :)
I love blogiversary week! Fingers crossed for a video!! We love seeing John and Sherry move around haha
Thanks Evelina! That’s on the agenda for tomorrow!
xo
s
Happy Blogiversary! You two are so professional and so brilliant at what you do. Your family must be so proud. Clara will be too one day. Thanks for sharing these stats with us, they are fascinating.
You’re so sweet FD! Thanks!
xo
s
I just wanted to add my thanks to the pile and say that I’ve been reading your blog for years and love every minute of it. I think we all appreciate the amount of time you guys spend connecting with your readers. And of course the infographics rock.
Thanks Janine!
-John
I really appreciate how you guys treat your blog as a serious job–that there’s always a new post up at 10, always the same number of posts a week, and most of all, that you respond so consistently to questions in the comments.
It’s something that truly sets you apart from other bloggers as far as I’m concerned. Beyond creating great content (which you do!), you guys just have this blogging thing DOWN. You’re the best!
Thanks so much Izzy! Sometimes I wish we were more flexible and less type-A, but I guess it’s just who we are. Haha!
xo
s
I’m not sure if this is what you were alluding to with switching over the advertising, but will you be getting rid of the blinking ads on the sidebar? I personally find them very distracting, to the point where I usually have to minimize the page to avoid them.
Also, who do you host with? I’m looking for a good one and there are just so many out there!
We’re just going to have our ads hosted by a third party site, so instead of 30 boxes that we put in and manage ourselves, there might be 7 boxes that are managed by a third party (ex: Google ads are 3rd party ads, they serve them and invoice so bloggers don’t have to and just paypal the money each month). So there might still be some ads that move, but just 7 or so instead of dozens! As for who we host with, we use LiquidWeb. They’re expensive but so helpful in a pinch (like when we crash), so to us they’re worth the extra money to get the site up faster and help with bugs.
xo
s
Happy to see it takes you guys an average of 2.5 hours to write a post… I now know that I am not alone, haha. I haven’t blogged in a while because of the time it takes, yet my husband can bang out a post in no time and wonders what takes me so long. I just have serious OCD with each post :)
Yikes….Those are some staggering numbers!!! 107.5k responses? Wow….calloused fingers anyone? lol That truly is one of the special things about you guys. We do appreciate the time you take to connect with your readers on a regular basis. Oh, and on the most-liked stats? Gotta admit…your “Sychro Barbies” post had me in a laughing fit. Definitely a good one that still makes me smie just thinking about it. :0)
I love the charts :) Thanks for sharing with us again!
(oh and the barbies were great)
I’m really curious about how you insure this type of business. Is the business insurance you have professional or general liability insurance or is it a Business Owner’s Policy that covers ‘equipment’ such as your tools, cameras, computers, etc.?
Mainly, I’m wondering which policy covers you for ‘business interruption.’ For example, if gosh forbid a hurricane or flood destroyed the first floor of your home and it prevented you from operating your blog for a few months, is that covered under business insurance or under your home insurance? And is it for a short term period (i.e. days or weeks) or more on the scale of months?
Best,
Jackie
I think ours is general liability (doesn’t cover equipment – it’s just for catastrophic stuff like someone getting really injured or killed) so we don’t know what type of policy would cover business interruption or equipment. Maybe just call a local insurance vendor and get some quotes/info?
xo,
s
Ah, I think you answered my question – you’re self-insuring that aspect of your business. It would be interesting to hear about what they quote you for in a future post if you ever inquire.
Thinking out loud, your home is kind of like equipment in itself since it’s an integral part of your content (which is your business product)- it’s also the office/retailer for how you operate and distribute your product. It’s kind of like how a dentist can insure their hands. If something like a hurricane (or another earthquake in VA like the one two years ago) were to destroy your home, it would effectively destroy your ability to run your business as well – or do you have the ability to run things from another location?
Unless it’s too personal – I’d definitely enjoy reading a future post on what kind of premium you would need to pay for that kind of insurance.
Thanks for the post today – interesting stuff.
Thanks Jackie! I think we’d have to learn more on that subject to really talk authoritatively, but since our business can be mobilized (as long as we have internet) I think we worry less about something happening to our house. Of course we have homeowner’s insurance and we’d hate for a tree to fall on it or be damaged by a hurricane or something, but it’s part of life and I’m sure we’d just document that happening and how we pick up the pieces. At least I hope it would work out that way!
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I work in commerical insurance (for healthcare businesses but still) business interruption falls under the Commerical Property policy generally. And when it kicks in/how long it lasts depends on your policy. Most require a 24 business hour (aka 3 days) waiting period before the coverage can kick in.
Since you work from home and won’t have your house/property under a commercial policy, it would definitely be a unqiue situation. I am sure with the way that businesses are changing that there are botique insurance companies that write just for bloggers/internet based businesses though!
So interesting Amanda!
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I can’t even imagine the attention to detail it took to calculate all of this information! Clearly, this is your livelihood, so you keep track of it, but it’s almost overwhelming to me. More power to you guys.
http://jax-and-jewels.blogspot.com
Hats off to both of you for having the creativity and discipline to do all that you do.
Love the infographics! Such a neat way to represent your story visually. Great job, John! This would also be a cool way to do your project breakdowns–although I imagine it would take up more time than just typing it up. :-)
That would be fun!
-John
I love how thorough you guys always are with your info. I actually just launched a blog this week and I hope to one day be as busy as you guys! Congratulations on all of your success. P.S. I’m also in Virginia so big ups to VA!
Your book in Chinese?? Please oh please let us know when that happens! I am an American expat living in China and have been enjoying your blog from over here for a few years now!
Will do! We can’t wait to see what cover they come up with! We just get to see it when it’s done, so we’re waiting with bated breath! It’s going to be so trippy to see our book in a completely different language!
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I love how thorough you guys always are with your info. I actually just launched a blog this week and I hope to one day be as busy as you guys! Congratulations on all of your success. P.S. I’m also in Virginia so big ups to VA!
I think John has another business opportunity in infographics if he ever needs some more side gigs! You guys are such an inspiration–it’s so cool how you took your advertising and art/(non-interior) design world knowledge and created a business from it that’s totally unique. You’re an ad for going with your gut and taking chances on what feels right for yourselves and your family. I’m about 5 years younger than you and watching you guys grow has definitely helped encourage me to take risks and go after what I love to do. Congrats on 6 years! Looking forward to continuing to read and grow with you!
Thanks Sarah! I totally want to be a professional info-graphic-izer when I grow up.
-John
Love those infographics! And thanks for letting us into your lives so personally during blogsiversary. It’s so interesting – especially with the Instragram Barbie likes. That’s hilarious. But the video was quite superb! :)
Nice work John!
Why aren’t you an “R” with a circle instead of TM? (I hate when readers get picky about weirdo things, but this is what I did in a past life and I’m totally curious!)
Good point! We should totally start breaking out that R!
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