8 Super Cool Business Ideas (with key insights) in Karachi

Okay after quite a long break, am back with yet another super sizzling post for my readers from Pakistan especially Karachi!

Although this article title mentions Karachi but this post is relevant to everyone anywhere in Pakistan, be it Islamabad, Faisalabad, Peshawar, Lahore etc so if you are from Pakistan and want to start your own business you have came to the right spot 😉.

Okay before going for the business ideas in Karachi, in other words the main topic of this post I think I need to clarify few important things.

First I could have gone for writing some really out of the box, new business ideas but I think such business ideas carry great risk, have too many unknowns and thus failure likelihood is quite substantial, so I am not going to do that here.

Second, I have already shared around one hundred business ideas (relevant to all over Pakistan) on this website of mine in different articles, so if you are looking for like extensively detailed business ideas articles then you should dig out this site further, for instance check out this post 30 business Ideas in Pakistan with Incredible ROI.

Now in this post I am not going to give you guys those detailed business ideas!

What?!!! 😓😒

Hang on, just let me finish! 😔😉

In this article I am going to actually provide some practical insights about business success along with examples of few businesses (business ideas!), so once you read this article, you will know for sure how to achieve success in almost any business (yes!, guaranteed!).

This is something that has been lacking on internet until this post, everyone has a website up with bunch of same old, repeated business ideas but with no practical insight as to how turn those or any other idea into a great success.

In other words selecting a business idea is the 5% job done while converting that business idea into a success story is the remaining 95% (this remaining 95% is surprisingly related to nothing but sales) that no one is talking about, I am sure you guys will agree with me on this one! 😉

The truth is most of those guys who search internet to find business ideas, when end up starting working on a particular business idea, find themselves in a lot of trouble that they never thought they would face, consequently they give up on their entrepreneurial dreams plus loosing quite a healthy sum and tons of regret!

So in this post I am going to help you with the remaining 95% job, now that doesn’t mean there will be no business ideas being discussed here, off course I’ll, so cheers! 😈

But it won’t carry the same details as it does on other articles uploaded on this site because I’ll be focusing on the 95% part which is actually all about sales, I mean how else can you deem a business successful or otherwise without setting sales situation of that business as its benchmark for success.

Now this doesn’t mean, I will be giving you guys some obvious, cliché tips, suggestions on sales, no I won’t do that, rather what I am about to share with you guys is something that if you learn, focus on, will convert any business into a success, yes, ANY BUSINESS!

So learning and knowing about the 95% part in my humble opinion should be your priority now before going for a specific business idea, which is the 5% part.

For knowing in details about the initial five percent like business idea type, investment required, return on investment, how many people you should hire for a particular job in a given business idea, how much should you pay in salaries or commissions, how should you develop your sales plans, route plans, how much credit you are supposed to do in a given business idea, what legal requirements you may need to fulfill in a particular business idea, when will you achieve break-even etc etc, for details answers to these questions you should dig the site up!

And if you don’t have any clue, totally new to this business thingy, want to learn and understand the whole business thing from very basic to expert level, then read this article, Howto launch & manage any business efficiently & effectively?!

Okay now let’s get back to the 95% part!

I am going present the most common type of problems, issues that any new business faces in the remaining 95% and how to fix them plus that will also include tips, strategies (that concerns the same 95%), so for instance I discuss a specific business idea and therein I discuss certain things in certain situations, the same things will applicable to any other business idea.

Okay now let’s get to it!

Business Ideas: Fast Food Business

Profit margin in this business model varies between 35% to 75%, majority of people start this business and quite often close it down after sometime simply due to not having enough sales or due to not being able to offer good food at cheap or affordable prices.

Healthy sales make up the backbone of any successful business, not having enough sales mean even if you offer quality food, service you’ll eventually fail.

To know more about the 5% in this business niche, do check the above (first one I mentioned) article and dig out this site.

Not having enough sales in this business or in any other business type could be due to the following reasons.

      1.      Lack of variety
2.      Insufficient target market penetration
3.      Lack of Skills/Experience
4.      High risk aversion
5.      Lack of knowledge, insight about target market buying behavior, purchasing power.
6.      Self-delusions/Ignorance
7.      Lack of investment
8.      Focusing on short term benefits instead of long term.
9.      Multi tasking, not having a reasonable plan as to how target market.
10.  Decreasing zeal for hard work, success over time
11.  Lack of patience
12.  Lack of having vision
13.  Over investment

The above thirteen things make up the rest of 95% of any business. I will be discussing each of the above point in terms of a new business idea, that way you will not only understand the rest of 95% but also get some business ideas to work on.

Now let’s discuss each thing a bit detail

Lack of variety:

Well let me give you a simple example, imagine you are a samosa/pakora dealer, will you be able to make far more money in net profit then the one dealing not only in samosa’s, pakora’s but also burgers, pizzas, biryani etc.

Of course not and so variety counts, now that doesn’t mean you offer variety that is too much for you to manage, because that again will impact customer satisfaction as you won’t be able to provide quality, efficient service, excess of everything is bad and that is true for too much variety.

Plus too much variety means too much money needed to make it happen and you may not have that much money and even if you manage it somehow, you will have hard time managing other things of your business which too may require money and in early days of any new business that is always the case.

You often need to put more and more money into your business after initial investment for paying rent, for paying labors, administration, covering fixed costs, buying stuff that is necessary for efficient running of your business on daily basis.

Business Idea: Cloth Business

Insufficient target market penetration:

Means you have not covered the entire market in terms presenting and testing your product/service on each and every potential buyer.

For any new business, making this happen takes quite a lot of effort, time and for this reason you don’t see your sales grow in the short term, short term here means 1-3 years after launching.

For instance you do cloth distribution/wholesale/retail, you will need to focus on touching each and every potential customer, initial contacts here may not convert into solid sales but with constant efforts, reasonable, competitive pricing you will see things taking off slowly, once you reach the bottom of the pyramid target customers and they buy and find your product satisfactory, that’s when you will see some serious sales coming in and that can take anywhere from 1-3 years.

Note: In cloth business, your business success depends on reasonable pricing for end user with reasonable quality and also on your pricing for the wholesalers, retailers if you are doing distribution or franchise.

Getting to almost each and every potential buyer of your product/service in a given market region is very effort consuming, time consuming process and that’s why most people give up on their business, believing they have failed.

Warren Buffet the famous American business magnate, investor, speaker and philanthropist rightly said: “No matter how great the talent or efforts, some things just take time. You can't produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant.”

Business Idea: Private School

Lack of Skills/Experience:

Running a quality school means good and easy net return (30-65% in net profit) but that doesn’t mean if you start a school today because you can, you will see money rolling in, running a school or any other business model type requires quite a number of skills, experience and that experience come with time, you can’t get it by getting a degree rather you get it by making mistakes and then learning from it consequently becoming expert in it.

I didn’t add private college etc simply because running that efficiently and effectively requires even greater skills, experience.

Experience is something that one get’s the hard way and it’s okay to make errors, mistakes because that is what every expert has been through before becoming an expert and because that is human nature.

What actually is bad, is, when you make a mistake, error while running your business and you don’t learn from it or try to fix rather give up on the entire business, believing that this particular business has turned out to be unsuccessful due to such and such, so and so problems.

And this happens a lot!

So successfully running a private school will take time and you’ll be making a lot of errors, mistakes along the way which will eventually lead to success.

Business Idea: Medicine Whole Sale

High risk aversion:

Medicine business is perhaps the most successful business in Pakistan (with net return between 20-100% plus for retailers, 4-15% for wholesalers, 2-10% for distributors), there is nothing that comes close to it, simply due to poor hygiene, health, food, living conditions in the country for majority of the population.

Talking about high risk aversion, you may have opened a wholesale medicine outlet at a certain location but you are not keeping much of the essential, different variety of medicine simply because you think that is too risky or you are not pursuing flexible credit policy with your buyers simply because you believe that is too risky.

Not keeping much of the essential, different variety of medicine or not having a flexible credit policy means lesser sales opportunities consequently lesser profit.

Similarly not keeping the big brands medicine because they don’t offer higher return, is again a risk that will keep away more potential buyers from you and so you will have lesser sales.

Talking about the first business idea, having done a little bit different in samosa/pakora’s like putting in a little mutton, making mutton samosa’s and offering it at reasonable price or even at the price that only covers costs will not only earn your business a name but will also make your business stand out which will convert into more sales in the end.

And that may seem risky but that risk is worth to take!

You don’t need to earn in everything you offer, sometimes you need to offer certain thing at cost price, just to attract more customers.

Now this doesn’t mean you should always take risk or become high risk taker, like I said, excess of everything is bad.

Business Idea: Portable Mini Drones!

Lack of knowledge, insight about target market buying behavior, purchasing power:

Okay I personally find mini portable drones for selfie’s, videos etc quite intriguing and they do sell well in developed regions, countries like US, Canada, Europe, Japan etc with quite good net return.

But ordering a mini drone’s container from china and trying to sell it in Pakistan is a bit of a stretch, involving too much risk plus I don’t see majority of Pakistanis having any interest in mini drones unless they cost below 500 pkr which is next to impossible.

What most businesses that fail in Pakistan have in common is, they will start quality pizza business in rural area, will start a high end auto dealing business in a rural area or will try to sell potato chips similar to Lays chips in the same quantity, with almost the same taste and the same price and they fail big time!

Like who would want to buy a pizza in rural area or who would want to buy a high end car in a rural area, people simply don’t have the purchasing power, so that business will fail in rural setting.

While packing quality potato chips in quality packaging, same to Lays chips and for the same price as that of Lays doesn’t mean you will get that level of sales (similar to Lays chips) in few months after you launch your business.

Lays chips has few things which Oye-Hoye or Spuddy didn’t have, huge customer mindshare, brand leverage of Pepsi, Strong and widespread advertising campaign going on for years etc.

That’s why we don’t see these other chips lasting longer in the market and add to that these other chips pricing which was no different than Lays, while Pakistanis are price conscious people, majority are and so you should be offering it at a price that is notably different to make your potential buyers/target market actually buy it.

All of the above points signify lack of insight about target market buying behaviors, purchasing power on part of the entrepreneur.

And this is another reason that leads to low sales consequently business failure!

Business Idea: Poultry Farm

Self-delusions/Ignorance:

Okay we all know how successful poultry business is (30-60% in net profit when you own poultry farm), yet sh*t happens!

And it happens simply due to self-deluding ideas or ignorance, you think starting this business in this particular location will yield great return but you don’t have experience or necessary skills to run this business but yet you think you can and later on you realize it’s not working and the reason was your ignorance or delusion.

Like you thought about particular location for your poultry business, but when you started it there, you found out that you need an extra guy to keep watch on poultry because its out in the middle of nowhere, like in place where there nothing but unpopulated land, fields etc.

And thus you need security and the guy you thought you can trust, turns out to be a Murghi Choor in your absence and not only that, that location proved to be a lot harder to maintain for healthy poultry because there was too much load shedding going on in that region thus killing almost all of your chickens or there is load shedding because nobody lives there and who care if you get electricity in middle of nowhere, in dry land, fields and so you plan to use electric generator and all of sudden fuel prices jump due currency devaluation, inflation and so your maintenance cost increases two folds and that means higher production costs and thus you can’t compete in the market and so sales hit rock bottom and you close it down!

Or you fed your poultry the best, natural feed, thinking that you prefer healthy clean food instead of chemicals and so will other people and once you fed them healthy feed, it made your chickens a lot costlier than what is being grown on chemically modified feed and so you couldn’t offer it at competitive price thus losing a lot of market share!

And this delusion led you to closing your business.

Perhaps you didn’t know (ignorance) how to manage your sales, like you thought you could sell it without offering any credit or without offering any damages in case of loss, which resulted in your business loosing major number of your potential buyers.

This is something I have learned the hard way too, sticking to your delusions will cost you a lot and you will eventually learn it the hard way that this is not how it works, therefore giving up on your delusions and acquiring as much knowledge, experience as you can to minimize your ignorance will definitely result in a successful business.

Business Idea: Property Dealing

Lack of investment:

While starting your business, you may believe in those early days that you had put sufficient investment in there and therefore you don’t need to put anything more in it but after few years you will realize that you need more to earn even more but the problem is you don’t have more!

For instance you bought a property in specific location and you earned good in it and then again you bought another property around the same location and you earned good in it, now there are many other places in the same region that can give you great return because the govt is planning to announced sui gas there or planning to open up a hospital or university there, which will sky rocket prices of land, property in that place.

So while other property dealers will make huge money out of such an opportunity you won’t be able to do it and that may either lead to a very slow growth in your business or you may just give up on it simply because you don’t have money.

So for any business success constant investment is key, now that doesn’t mean you should always use external money to finance your business rather your can do that with internal financing too, like if you are offering 10 products, you keep net return of two products in your business account for nothing but reinvesting in your business to grow it further.

Business idea: Chewing Gum Manufacturing

Focusing on short term benefits instead of long term:

I have already shared how to manufacture quality chewing gum from home/hostel in different flavors check out this article Business Ideas For Students in India.

Now for instance you are manufacturing chewing gum and you offer it at a fixed price because it earns you quite a healthy return and thus you don’t offer a flexible price, although this type of strategy will give you good return in a given market region but it won’t give you maximum return that, that particular market region can offer in the long term because you don’t offer flexible pricing, this means in initial days you will be quite content with your business but sooner you will find it being not enough due increase in market competition, competitive pricing by the rest of your competitors, it is more likely that in the long run your business won’t see even a slow growth but actually decline.

Multi tasking, not having a reasonable plan as to how target market:

So you are busy in making availability of raw materials for your chewing gum, managing daily administration tasks, managing your business accounts, managing your business dealers, have involved in developing new packaging for a new chew gum flavor, in other words you multitasking like hell.

This type of approach to your business actually makes you a lot busy while making your focus on key, essential aspects of your business short, thus eventually all of this leads to failure.

Secondly not having a clear cut market plan, like route plan, pricing flexibility, supplying routine, engaging more and more potential buyers in new regions etc will also either result in slow growth or business failure.

Decreasing zeal for hard work, success over time:

It is normal for an entrepreneur to feel lower zeal for hard work, success compared to initial or early days of business, any and every routine becomes boring after a while especially if you have been following it for over an year.

But it’s not normal for a successful entrepreneur to give up on trying or doing hard work just because he/she doesn’t have the energy anymore or that he/she has face so many problems (although fixed over time) that one more problem or trouble will just be too much thus giving up on hard working, giving up on success.

There are no shortcuts to success, every big success requires even bigger efforts, success is just the peak of all those efforts, you need to climb mountain of efforts, hard work to reach the peak!

So you must never give up, must always have that zeal for hard work, success!

Lack of patience:

Starting a new business and making it one big success requires ton’s of patience, if you don’t have that, you shouldn’t get into entrepreneurship and even if you have that but you don’t have financial means to sustain, manage yourself, your family for at least 3 years you better not do it.

Lack of Vision:

Like where you want your business to be in next 5 to 10 years, if you don’t have that kind of vision, that means you don’t even dream of being successful, this what differentiate a businessman from a successful businessman, one just focuses on daily earnings to just get through one more day of his/her life with ease while other focuses on making it big, leaving a legacy for his generation, becoming a symbol of success.

Lack of vision doesn’t mean you won’t earn in business it just means not having it, will make you just another businessman no different from any other ordinary businessman.

Over investment:

This happens a lot, especially with people with almost no experience in business just invest too much money in it and then regret it later on.

Investing too much money in a business earlier not only make one having very high hope in terms of net return but also puts a lot pressure on one and since majority of businesses tend to be having a slow growth in introductory phases lasting from 1 year to 3 years, over investing not only bring a lot of pressure which becomes unbearable but also makes the entrepreneur too hopeless (in face of slow growth) which results in not only business failure but a lot many other problems.

You should only invest too much when you have at least 4 years experience in the business or if you are supported by an individual having at least that much practical experience in that business.

That’s it, over to you guys!

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Got anything to add ?! let me know in the comments down below!