[hluska]

That was my theory - people don't feel secure, surveillance equipment can be complicated and so people would gladly pay for someone to come in and set everything up for them. It worked out fairly well for me, but I feel that it only worked well for me because I got lucky and had some good strategic options:

a) Someone I knew opened up a store that sold surveillance equipment. I aligned myself with his store, trained his staff and booked my appointments out of it.

b) After a few months, I started to focus on small business instead of residential installs.

c) I have a combination of strong technical and writing skills. Whenever I finished an install, I would give the client a customized report where I explained what I did, documented what types of cameras we installed, documented the lines of sight that we covered, went step by step through everything she would need to do, and gave my contact information. Those reports became biz dev.

Having a location was especially valuable to me because the surveillance industry is all about trust. Without a storefront, I would have been some guy in his late 20s who worked out of his apartment and knew quite a lot about breaking into places.

I moved into the small business market because there were unexpected quirks with the residential market. To put it gently, there are really three kinds of people who need surveillance cameras. The majority (I hope) own a home and are scared of being taken advantage of. They may own some collectible cars, or they may have a valuable baseball card collection and they want some additional security. Some people have in-home child care and want to be able to check up on the child care provider. Those people are excellent. Another group of possible clients are drug dealers/miscellaneous criminals who have property they want to protect. And, a third group lives in a different reality than I do.

One particular customer wanted to hire me to install hidden cameras in his ex-wife's house. He thought that she was cheating on him and wanted to catch her in the act. And yes, this was his ex-wife. Or, another fellow wanted cameras because he was convinced that the RCMP broke into his house at night and injected him with mind control drugs to keep him addicted to drugs. And several men came in wanting hidden cameras installed in their bedrooms, pointed at their beds. There must have been a rash of pillow thefts going on or something....?? ;)

Long story short, sometimes the residential side just felt really dodgy and I was always very concerned that people were lying to me. And, since the kinds of people who need security are often paranoid (they have a reason), it was very hard to read residential customers. Consequently, I left a massive amount of money on the table. But, it didn't seem worth the risk to me because the storefront and the fact that I had an inventory of security cameras to work with gave me access to the small business market.

Small business is all the fun of residential with some added bonuses.

a) Small business setups are significantly easier to plan than in-house setups. For example, how would you set up hidden cameras in a two storey, 1950 square foot house when a client is concerned that her babysitter is abusing her children? Do you put hidden cameras in every room? If so, do you use all wireless and risk getting into interference/interception problems? Does the customer have the budget for a 16 channel DVR? On and on...

b) Small business owners are significantly easier to deal with. For the most part, they're either pissed off with shoplifters or they're scared one of their employees is stealing from them. This is easier to work through than someone who is concerned about gangsters breaking into his grow op.

c) Small business owners tend to know other small business owners, so if you can get six setups on your own, those six people will help you line up your next projects.

The biggest downside to small business is that if you don't have a storefront to work out of, they can be a very hard group of people to market to.

Long story short, I had some success, but I feel like my particular circumstances had more to do with the success than any particular strength of the market. This is a strong market, but it's a strong market with some problems that can make it somewhere between dangerous and stressful to serve.

[jgiger2014]

Thanks for the in-depth answer, I appreciate it. While this is exactly what I am looking for, I want to know what is the minimum amount of equipment needed to get any jobs. For example the most important are the cameras, but to mount them you would need a ladder. To be able to bring a ladder to sites you need a long van. Then you need experience as an electrician if the house in question does not have the Ethernet cables installed. All these expenses add up to 100k plus 100k for a storefront at a minimum, correct?

[fencepost]

The ladder isn't really that big an issue, you can get a decent collapsible or telescoping ladder that will travel pretty easily in a hatchback, small wagon or minivan. Something that will work in most offices with 8-10' suspended ceilings will probably set you back ~$100, for higher ceilings you're going to pay more and probably need a minivan, as well as some muscles to wrangle it around (e.g. Werner MT-26 or Little Giant 12026 which collapsed are ~6ft and $300-500). Having 2 ladders will often make a huge difference in your productivity.

You don't really need that much electrical experience for running low-voltage Ethernet, but you will need some and you need common sense, some basic construction skills, more common sense, some planning skills, and a bit more common sense. Keep in mind that you're going to be putting holes in walls, putting up new faceplates, etc. and you don't want to put them in crooked or leave a mess. Keep in mind that it's one thing for your friends to wonder "What was he thinking?" and a completely different thing for your customers / referral sources to wonder the same.

You'll need a vehicle, but it probably doesn't need to be new. Ladders, call it $1k. Cable fishing equipment, drills, saws, etc. maybe another $1k. Consumable supplies (boxes of cable, jacks, patch cables, wall plates, low-voltage mounting brackets, patch panels, etc.) will easily take another few thousand (particularly using plenum cable). You'll want to keep some quantity of equipment (cameras, etc.) on hand to do immediate fixes/replacements for your customers unless you have a good local supplier, but you may be able to avoid keeping a large stock as long as your orders have enough lead time (and you have the ability to purchase as needed). Insurance, licensing, etc. will chew some, but even so I'd say you're still looking at well under $100k to start, and certainly not $200k unless you're in a very expensive market.

With questions like those, though, I'd recommend spending at least some time working for someone already in the business.

[tomcam]

That was a generous and fascinating answer. You're a force to be reckoned with. What are you doing now? Have you finished your studies?