While you can draw money out either a Company or a Trust the way we treat that money for tax purposes is very different depending on which structure you are using.
Here’s a few concepts you’ll need a basic understanding of
Loan
If you’re looking to take money out of a Company or Trust (an entity), a loan account can be used to record the amounts taken.
When you draw the money out of a company (but not a trust) there are rules that are commonly referred to as ‘Division 7A’ or ‘Div 7A’. These rules require that you draw up a loan agreement between you and the company (or between a relative of the shareholder and the company if the funds were not withdrawn for the shareholder directly).
The Division 7A rules are a significant drawback when considering loaning money from a company to a shareholder and make this type of arrangement inappropriate as a long term strategy. In fact it is better to avoid loans from companies to shareholders at all wherever possible.
If you’ve got a trust and you draw money as a loan, this just sits on the balance sheet as money you owe to the trust. When the distributions are paid for the year, this reduces the balance owed back to the trust and you’re loan account is left at the net amount (cash withdrawn – Distribution).
Drawings
Drawings are simply another word for loans – and with Division 7A, it provides the same problems within a company, just with a different name… As with loans, you’re ok with a trust.
Wages or a Salary
This is a simple way of paying out money from an entity. You essentially become an employee of your own company or trust.
Paying a wage or salary while simple, also requires that superannuation is paid on the gross figure and also that PAYG withholding tax is taken out. This can be a disadvantage depending on your age and cash flow requirements.
Directors’ Fees
Like drawings are to loans, Directors’ Fees are to Wages or Salaries.
The superannuation laws had previously allowed Directors fees to be paid without the need to make a superannuation contribution on behalf of the director. This was changed quite a few years ago and now there is little difference between Directors’ Fees and a salary / wage apart from the name.
Dividends
Dividends are payments (or loan movements if not paid in cash) that are made from the balance of retained profits (aka retained earnings) in a company.
You may have also heard of the concept ‘franked dividends’. These are simply dividends where the company issuing them has paid the tax on them already. What happens then is that you can claim back these ‘franking credits’ when the dividends are paid to you.
Distributions
Distributions are to a trust what dividends are to a company. They’re the method by which we allocate the entity’s profits to the owners of the business. We can only ‘Distribute’ from a trust.
Distributions are also paid out of current year profits, as opposed to retained profits from prior years (when paid in the form of dividends from companies).
The owners of the business (the trustees) need to make decisions about the distributions for an income year before the 30th of June. It is important to ensure these decisions are consistent with the clauses in the trust deed.
How We Recommend Getting Money Out of a Company
The easiest way here is to pay a salary to the owners. If not paid in cash there’s no problems at all – it will simply sit on the balance sheet as owing to the owner.
What we would recommend too is considering a restructure to allow for a better flow of profits and cash from the entity.
It is also important to regularly ’empty out’ the retained earnings in a trading company, so that it does not become a juicy target to be sued by creditors or disgruntled employees.
How We Recommend Getting Money Out of a Trust
As the cash flow of the money coming out of a trust does not necessarily dictate where the tax is paid, you are fine to take money out of a trust and treat it as a loan from the trust.
We would then record the final balance owing to the trust, less any distribution of profits paid throughout the year – which would leave the net loan between yourself as an individual and the trust.
It is also extremely important to work with an adviser who has their finger on the pulse when it comes to distributions. You must work this out before the financial year ends, or you could be in all sorts of strife with the ATO when it comes tax time.
At the end of the day, you need to know you’re doing it right
Taking money out of entities is a fairly complex area. If done without advice, it could lead to mistakes that can cost tens of thousands in tax.
When talking with your adviser, make sure you understand exactly how you can take money out in your circumstances. Even play out the practical ‘to do’ as well – whether raising a pay slip, paying PAYG withholding etc.
Oh, and please ask clarifying questions below in the comments section too 🙂
Why you should eat a GST Free Diet with one of Anthill’s 30 under 30, Mr Ben Walker – Bond Appetit
Ben Walker is the Chief Inspiration Officer of Inspire CA (the accounting firm) and the Beer Development Manager of Inspire Cafe. Inspire CA’s mission is to inspire people to build phenomenal businesses. The dream for the cafe is create a place where you can enjoy a good coffee and something decent to eat with entrepreneurs and business people.
Ben is a qualified Chartered Accountant and his early years were spent learning the ropes at KPMG, a multinational, “Big 4″ accounting firm. He challenges the industry by the way he operates. His accounting business does not function like a normal accounting practice and it’s testament to his entrepreneurial spirit that he has managed to achieve that.
Ben’s mum and the most amazing feat she’s achieved
Nutrition and Meal Plans
What foods to avoid
Calorie dense foods
What foods to actively seek out
GST free foods
Ben’s fondest food memories
Ben realised that the food he got at home which his dad used to cook was just the best ever. But, growing up he used to be pretty fussy when it came to food. Ben’s favourite meal growing up was pizza.
Sir Richard Branson at some of the Brisbane Restaurants on Eagle Street Pier
Last meal on the planet?
A seafood buffet at George’s Paragon
Resources
Eat that Frog Book
Business Structuring Made Easy! Part 6: The Dangers – What if I Get it Wrong?
In order to reinforce the importance of selecting the right business structure, our final article in this series looks at the consequences of getting the choice wrong and the potential costs associated with the transition to a new structure.
Quite often clients start business operations with little to no thought about business structuring and are confronted with multiple complications a few years down the track when changes need to be made.
Income Tax
Any profits made on the transfer of items such as plant and equipment or trading stock between business entities is taxable income in the hands of the entity making the sale. These profits will be reported on the income tax return of the relevant entity and tax will be payable at the applicable tax rate.
Click Here to Download our eBook “Business Structures Made Easy”
If you are transferring out of a company structure, careful consideration must be given to any advances, loans, or intended debt forgiveness by the private company to shareholders and shareholders’ associates. These amounts could potentially trigger Division 7A and create unforeseen income tax consequences for the parties involved.
Capital Gains Tax
Capital Gains Tax (CGT) is a tax charged on capital gains that arise as the result of the sale or disposal of certain assets.
While we cannot hope to cover all of the potential CGT implications of transferring various business assets between business structures and the concessions available to manage the tax on these gains, it is important to highlight that Capital Gains Tax must be considered when changing your business structure.
Stamp Duty
Depending on the state you live in and the type of asset in question it may also be necessary to pay stamp duty on the transfer of assets between business entities.
While most states offer concessions, they do not apply in all cases so you must ensure you have given due consideration to the stamp duty implications on any asset transfers.
Administration Costs and Business Interruption
While not as costly as the other areas of discussion, there are some smaller considerations which may be overlooked in a “big picture” approach to changing your business structure.
The accounting and legal fees incurred in establishing your new business structure and to wind up the old structure can vary from a one thousand to tens of thousands depending on the structural choice and level of advice you require. This process will involve the creation of the new structure and all the associated registrations.
Your new structure will generally have its own Australian Business Number (ABN) and Tax File Number (TFN). This, in turn, means that you will need to establish new bank accounts, update all agreements with your current staff, customers, and suppliers as well as updating the ABN on your existing marketing material.
During the financial year in which you make the transition between business structures it may be necessary for your accountant to prepare financial statements and income tax returns for both business entities. This will increase the cost of your compliance work for the year.
Queensland Business Monthly
This article was originally published in the Queensland Business Monthly, a lift out in the Courier Mail, Friday 29th of August 2014. Written by Nicole Madigan.
Having worked in the accounting industry for just a few years, Ben Walker quickly found himself brainstorming new concepts, determined to make his industry of choice less dry.
“I wanted to create an accounting firm that was far from the typical and stereotypical,” says Walker, who dubs himself “chief inspiration officer”.
The result is an accounting firm that’s as non-typical as you’re going to get.
It’s central hub is an interlinked coffee hub, Inspire Cafe, which not only serves as a connection between Walker’s customers and his business, but has become a landmark in its own right.
“We have businesses from around Brisbane and even flying in from places such as Melbourne and Singapore to run their own workshops and events here,” Walker says.
The 25-year-old developed the idea after outgrowing his first office space, where he launched Inspire CA as the “non-accountants’ accountant”, aimed at helping creative agencies understand the numbers that drive their business.
Despite the success of the business, growing from one to four staff in four months, bringing the cafe from concept to reality would be an expensive process.
So, in addition to the traditional methods, Walker sought out crowd-funding, which essentially means financing a project through contributions of various size from a large group, typically via the internet.
“The crowd funding was an ambitious idea,” he says.
“We used crowd funding site Indiegogo and had available perks like ‘Coffee for Life’ where the funder received coffee for the rest of their life.”
With the cafe installed and ready for service, Walker went about positioning it as a networking venue for local business people and like-minded thinkers – a place that was linked and unlinked to the accounting firm.
“We ran an email campaign of video updates for the cafe. Every week or two, I’d shoot a short video of the build and fitout and upload it on to YouTube and send this out to our audience,” he says.
Citing innovation as paramount to success, even in the seemingly mundane industry of accounting, Walker says his aim is to lead the profession through cutting edge innovations such as online signing and cloud accounting.
And so far, it’s paying off.
“We’ve received plenty of commendations and encouragements from business owners, entrepreneurs and other accounting firms globally of what we’ve created here.
While it wasn’t easy, it was definitely worth it and I really look forward to developing the community even more.”
7 Impressive Marketing Blogs You Can Share With Your Clients
I’m sure that you can relate with your clients that developing engaging content takes an enormous, disciplined effort to get momentum.
So does everything that’s worth it.
Best of all? Like the promise of a flywheel, it gets easier as you go.
But what do you share with your clients during the time in between your own blog posts? There’s plenty of other blogs out there with exceptional content that you can share – and it is sure to add some serious value to your clients.
Moz is heavy into PR, SEO, websites and everything digital marketing. It also has some very impressive tools that you can use to monitor and better your websites.
The Moz Blog is sourced from a wide variety of contributors too, which I find gives you great variety of opinion and expertise.
This is a very impressive website, and I recommend registering for their free membership. There’s over a dozen content heavy eBooks that are available just for providing your name and email.
Seth’s insights are incredible. And I remember reading once that he even writes them daily at 4 something a.m.
Seth is also the author of 17 books, all with golden nuggets to help businesses skyrocket. He is a ‘must follow’ for any business looking for a marketing edge (which should be any business!).
The MailChimp Blog provides some great value for businesses that integrate email marketing into what they do. I would hope that email marketing should be a critical part in any business today.
The blog also doubles as an instruction manual or ‘best pratice’ reference guide to the MailChimp product itself.
If you’ve read a phenomenal marketing blog that I haven’t mentioned here, do share it in the comments section below!
Anthill Online 30under30 2014
Ben has been humbled to be named as one of the Anthill Online 30under30 for 2014.
30under30 is an Anthill initiative that was launched in early 2008 to encourage and promote entrepreneurship among young Australians.
The program provides recognition to 30 entrepreneurs under the age of 30 for their outstanding entrepreneurial endeavours.
To be eligible for this year’s program, the entrepreneur must be under 30 years of age on 1 August of this year and must be an Australian citizen. (In other words, if someone asks you, on 1 August this year, how old you are and you say, “30″, you’re no longer eligible.)
The excerpt from the original article is below.
Ben Walker, QLD (b. 1989)
Name: Ben Walker Age: 25 (born January 1989) Gender: Male State: QLD Known for: Inspire CA and Inspire Cafe
Forget time sheets; forget charging by the hour. Forget difficult to use software and glazing over in conversations with your accountant.
Inspire CA is for the business owner who wants to understand what drives their business, while partnering with an accounting firm who takes ownership of what we believe truly is the role of the business accountant.
“I started Inspire CA to head in the opposite direction to the traditional old way of the accounting industry,” Inspire Founder, Ben Walker, told us.
Ben’s activities are driven by a desire to completely shake up the accounting industry. This led Ben to open Inspire Cafe. As the name implies, Inspire Cafe is a coworking space, located in Newstead, Brisbane.
The company hosts a variety of entrepreneurial events — with a notable slant toward jazzing up otherwise blandish accounting topics – at the cafe each month. (One recent event was “Kill the Time Sheet — Value Pricing: Where to Begin.” Sounds cool).
And Ben is working toward wow factor in his business.
“I really want to build a business (or businesses) that create a “WOW” because of what they stand for and the way that it treats it’s clients – I want to put the ‘heart’ into accounting and lead as an example for other businesses,” he added.
Since its start in 2013, the Inspire family of businesses has been rapidly growing.
“I started with just me on my own, February 2013 with $30,000 in annual equivalent revenue from clients that I brought with me over the years.
We quickly grew to 4 people in 4 months – and in our first 12 months, we grew ten-times in annual equivalent revenue!” Ben told us.
Because of his business’ rocketing to fruition with such rapid growth, Ben Walker joins the ranks of the 2014 Anthill 30under30!
Anthill asks: Ben Walker, what’s your super power?
Haha… I got some feedback on this from the ol’ “peer group” and apparently the closest super hero is the Juggernaut from X-Men… for a variety of reasons, mainly because I’m unstoppable (or rather, I don’t stop).
Smashing Sales – How to Create a Winning Sales Process
We’re all masters at something. But never masters at everything.
Sales can be a nasty roadblock to an otherwise phenomenal business.
I’ve jotted down a few points below of how you can very simply streamline the sales in your business.
Have a Sales Process
Sometimes procrastination to follow up leads can come from a lack of understanding the next steps of sales. There’s plenty of great information out there on sales in general, but nothing very practical of how that should appear within an organisation.
A few key components I’ve found to make an effective sales process:
Have a ‘Vetting’ Step, Up Front
Whether it’s an online form, an application or a phone call, this is a great way to work out whether or not the prospect is a good fit for you.
We all get that gut feel when someone doesn’t sound quite right for your business, so what a great way to move them on, with the smallest drain on your time.
Ask some good questions up front, and you’ll know whether to take them further in the process.
Leverage Your Coffee Time
You as the principal are usually wearing many, many hats in the business. Why not create an effective way of learning about your clients, and them learning about you? It could knock off a good 30 – 45 minutes of time in the first coffee meeting of the usual ‘Getting to Know You’ time – and is a very effective way of directing a conversation.
Make sure you focus this meeting on the client’s needs and ask plenty of questions so you know exactly where you can help the client. Remember to keep digging through layers, as the first answer is not usually the problem, but a symptom.
Time to hit your proposal, but before you close the meeting…:
B.A.M.F.A.M.
A self explanatory acronym: “Book A Meeting From A Meeting”. This is an awesome discipline drummed into me by a good friend MC of Practice Paradox (and plenty of help with the above too!).
BAMFAM’ing helps to keep the sales process moving, in a mutually agreed fashion. Extraordinarily effective, and always alwaysalways book in the next meeting / phone call / follow up.
Pretty Up Your Proposals
If you’re a Creative Agency, surely you’re all over your own delicious marketing collateral. Don’t let the sales experience pull down the prospect’s expectations!
There’s some amazing, easy to set up and use, cloud based proposal tools available at ‘no-brainer’ prices. Some of them let you include video and images to support your proposals. Most have features such as options in your proposal, online acceptance and signing, custom domain & branding, and creating a proposal from a template or previous proposal.
Prettier proposals should also lead to a higher conversion rate too. And you don’t have to reinvent the wheel for each new client!
Track Your Leads in a CRM
You know what a CRM is, you may even have one, but take advantage of it. Use it!
A CRM used effectively can keep all your prospects’ records, touch points, the stage of where they are in your sales process, and even keep track of your chance of conversion. Some CRMs will allow you to run a ‘weighted sales funnel’ report, which calculates the dollar figure based on historical conversion rates at certain stages in the sales funnel. There’s some serious forecasting!
Again, there’s plenty of options out there, depending on what suits your business. We use InfusionSoft, but there are many others such as:
Even if you use Excel or a whiteboard, make sure you’re keeping track of it all!
Automatically Measure Sales KPI’s
Coming back to your business having a Strength in Numbers, most of the tools above allow you to run reports on your key sales numbers. Simple numbers like your conversion rate or average days from initial contact to becoming a client will allow you to forecast many other numbers in your business.
Implementing the tools and processes mentioned above will guarantee a smoother ride in your sales journey!
World’s first gluten free… accounting firm cafe? – bmag
The original article was published by bmag, written by Taylare Madden on Sunday 6th July, 2014.
Inspire Cafe has gone completely Gluten Free, and only accountants are invited.
An accounting firm has set up in a cafe… but not any old cafe, an entirely gluten free cafe where professionals are encouraged to come and share their ideas on the mathematical world over a soy latte and coconut flour cookie.
Inspire Cafe in Newstead has nabbed Jeff the Chef — a local caterer — as their head chef who’s now cooking an entirely gluten free menu for the local business community.
Apparently there is no other cafe in Brisbane where like minded people can meet up to network and drink coffee during business hours without being disturbed, so if that’s something you’ve been daydreaming about from your local Starbucks, this place is for you.
“‘Networking’ can feel artificial, but when you’re all in the same environment, drinking great coffee, it’s what you do naturally,” Inspire Cafe owner Ben Walker says.
If the gluten free situation is the only thing turning you off, Jeff the Chef says not to worry — the dishes were created with non-coeliacs in mind and do not compromise on taste.
The cafe also offers meeting rooms and co-working spaces for business to utilise while they’re enjoying their lunch. Coeliac Australia has even been invited to take part in the new initiative.
Inspire Cafe is located at 32 Doggett St, Newstead 4006.
Public Practice Innovation Case Study – Chartered Accountants Australia New Zealand
The original article was published by the Chartered Accountants Australia New Zealand. Written by Bernard Kellerman and photography by Marcus Bell.
A Brisbane CA has created a café where small business owners can network as the centrepiece of his accounting practice.
Benjamin Walker CA rejoices in the title of Chief Inspiration Officer at his fast-growing accounting practice, Inspire CA, near Brisbane’s CBD.
And inspiration was needed as Walker rode the steepest of learning curves to reshape his workspace, placing a café as its centrepiece, and enlisting crowd funding to make it happen. While plenty of commercial office premises have a café downstairs and professional offices above, the two operations run by Walker are not independent of each other. He’s set it up so each one makes the other business more valuable.
“It’s been a massive disruptor, especially in an industry like accounting,” Walker says.
“It’s become a hub for small business owners to network. Other firms are now asking if they can run sessions in our meeting rooms, too.”
The evolution from idea to execution was rapid. Walker left a big four firm to start up a one-man accounting business in February 2013. Others joined him, and the new firm rapidly outgrew its serviced offices, leading Walker to search six months later for a more permanent base with space to grow.
It was a throwaway line from his mentor Paul Dunn, an ex-Hewlett Packard engineer turned global marketing guru, which first planted the idea.
“You know, I’ve always thought an accountant’s office is boring, too dry. Why don’t you set up a café as the centrepiece of the office?” Dunn suggested.
“From the tone of his voice, I figured he wasn’t joking,” says Walker.
But then, rather than the small café Dunn most likely had in mind, Walker came across an empty shell, a warehouse that had once been a furniture store, where adding a few walls would create large meeting rooms and open spaces as well as a café on the ground floor, with an open plan office above for his accounting business.
Walker needed what he said was “a crash course on commercial leasing” before he signed in October last year.
The brick walls weren’t the biggest obstacle to Walker’s ambitions to launch the café business on 6 December. There was the small matter of funding, and other sticking points, such as getting a liquor licence and finding the right staff.
“It’s learning on-the-fly,” he says.“It’s been an interesting journey and it’s made me feel more resourceful.”
The building owner offered a lease incentive towards the fit-out, but more was needed.
“Given that we were a growing accounting firm, we couldn’t just lash out for the full cost of the fit-out. But we had to find a way to make it work, we had a launch date and we didn’t want to have to put back the opening night. That’s why I turned to crowd funding, through a website called Indiegogo,” says Walker.
The site tapped a large community, although it was mainly clients, former colleagues and mentors who pitched in with funding. To sweeten the deal, Walker offered incentives such as prepaid credit at the café.
“We matched contributions dollar for dollar with credit for food and coffee once we were up and running, and had other options such as a ticket to the launch party as incentives.”
This netted Inspire CA “just shy of” $5000 which Walker says did go quickly, but took the edge off the expenses and added to an already growing client base.
Advertising pays off
Walker, who has never worked in hospitality, also had to find key staff – and hiring a great barista was top of his list.
“One thing my mentor, Paul Dunn, taught me was the power of language,” says Walker. “Our ad called for an EXCEPTIONAL BARISTA. On the page, it just stood out.”
The person who met the brief also had the drive to be more than just a barista. He has become the café manager, now known as the firm’s Chief Espresso Officer.
The idea is catching on says Walker. One of his accounting colleagues in New Zealand has been inspired to clear space in the shopfront of his own office to make room for a café machine and a barista.
“There’s also another accountant I know in Jersey who is looking to do the same thing. We’ve also launched some co-working space upstairs, to let other businesses lease a hot desk or some permanent working space.”
Benjamin Walkers’s Tips for Business Owners who want to Embrace Disruptive Innovation
No excuses
Put yourself in a place where there’s no going back, no plan b. Think of Alexander the Great: when he landed on the foreign shore he burned his boats.
Embrace
Be quick to adopt new ways. I don’t see firms who aren’t embracing the newest technology and software being around in a few years.
Connect
In a connected economy, it’s all about nurturing relationships. Your biggest and most effective source of new business is via recommendations from existing customers and clients.
Differentiate
Think how you can genuinely stand out in ways that appeal to customers and staff, such as an accounting firm that has no timesheets, no hourly rates, no jargon, no office politics, and a café that accepts American Express and doesn’t make people pay extra for their allergies.
Community
Create a community of business owners and entrepreneurs that allows cross-pollination of ideas between like-minded people who can support each other and create synergies.
Giving
Do what you do with a positive impact. We’re a part of the global giving initiative, B1G1: Business for Good. For every planning session we run with a business client, 75 women in India are trained to run micro-businesses. For every coffee sold in the café, a child receives access to life-saving water.
Announcing The Live Your Legend ‘Unofficial’ Music Video! – LiveYourLegend.net
Believe it or not, Live Your Legend has a music video…
And it’s not the one of me pathetically trying to break dance (which, unfortunately, you can find on YouTube – in the interest of focus, I’m not linking to it.
But yes, we actually have a music video. In fact, we have a lot of them – dozens from cities and countries all over the world.
So today, I want to show off your work.
When we first launched Live Your Legend LOCAL, our in-person communities around the world, I threw down a 30-second dance contest challenge asking each group to film their own dance that embodied what it meant to do work that mattered, and to surround themselves with like-minded, inspiring (and kinda crazy) people. I promised the winner that we’d feature their group’s video and any related projects on LYL to share with all of you.
I shouldn’t have been surprised when the videos started to roll in, but I was.
From Australia to Dubai and everywhere in between, the show of vulnerability, creativity, passion – and dare I say talent – left me in awe. I expected some funny videos, but I did not expect music videos, trains and choreography. I should have known better!
It’s been a little while since our January 7th global meetup, and hundreds of groups have met since then, which is incredible. I thank you for your patience. We quickly realized choosing a winner was impossible, so instead we tried to base our choice on “most creative”, which left us with two standouts…
The winners of our 30-second dance contest are Ben Walker from Brisbane, Australia and Linda Buchner from Kansas City, Missouri!
Filming a video is not easy. Nor is dancing in front of strangers. Then try filming a dance video with people you just met in a bright room with little or no alcohol – for the world to see – and suddenly you’re on a totally different level.
We talk a lot about how authenticity and vulnerability are at the heart of genuine connection – both with those around you and those observing (i.e. your audience). That’s what I’ve loved most about seeing our communities around the world do their thing. Ben and Linda are star examples.
As for the other submissions, have no fear – we’ll be showing off your rhythm when we debut our LYL Local video montage at the World Domination Summit LYL pre-party and beer tasting we’re hosting in Portland on July 11th. Our first 150 spots filled up, but I just released a few more, so if you’re anywhere near Portland (you don’t have to be attending WDS), come join us for my favorite LYL and Connect With Anyone reunion of the year!
For now, let’s focus the well-deserved spotlight on Ben and Linda’s dance moves and passion projects as we get ready for the fun to come. Press play, then spend a little time with their work to see how you can help further the cause – because as we know, no one does anything alone…
Dance Party #1: Live Your Legend LOCAL Brisbane, Australia – Hosted by Ben Walker
Now here’s a little about what Ben’s working on, in his own words…
Inspire Cafe: An Entrepreneur’s Hideout & Coworking Cafe Built in the Office of an Accounting Firm!?
A few months into starting an accounting firm in the complete opposite direction to the industry’s norm, I wanted to create something really radical! What we came up with was a cafe at the centre of our accounting firm, which also acts as a coworking space and entrepreneur hideout for the business community.
Fitting with my vision of connecting and equipping entrepreneurs to grow, Inspire Cafe took form. Now we’re hosting a massive range of events, from meeting room and boardroom rentals to book launches of local authors, networking events for local business groups and LYL Local!
We’re a totally gluten free and organic cafe too – we know allergies, and don’t like it when people feel left out. We created Inspire Cafe just to be that hideout, where you know other entrepreneurs are in the same boat all together.
Our ideal accounting clients are entrepreneurs and business owners in creative industries and professional services, so the fit is perfect. And since launching in February of 2013, we’ve grown by over 10x!
How you can help:
If you’re ever floating through Brisbane and looking for a place to relax with your laptop, hook up to Wi-Fi and punch out a blog post or a few hours of work on the road, be sure to drop in!
Also, we’ve recently written a free guide to help entrepreneurs and business owners understand and manage their cash flow. You can download it on our homepage. Hope it’s helpful!
Learn more about our coworking space here:Inspire Cafe
Fun fact about Ben: My fiancé reckons that I do a really good impression of a goat!!
Now check out what Linda’s working on, in her own words…
At-Risk High School Students Build Efficient Electric Vehicles and Take Them on the Road Showing America that the Next Generation of Innovators Are Where We’d Least Likely Look
Four years ago, I co-founded MINDDRIVE, an after school program for at-risk high school students. Our model, which includes heavy involvement of volunteer mentors from all walks of life, involves approaching education from a hands-on, experiential way.
We encourage creativity, innovation, problem solving, teamwork and collaboration through projects specifically related to the environment. Our primary projects have been the design, restoration, and conversion of gas-powered cars to being fully electric.
To date, we’ve converted 2 Indy Champ cars, one Lotus Esprit and 5 vintage Volkswagon Karmann Ghias. To prove their efficiency and celebrate their success, we take the students on an annual trip where they share their story with their peers and the general public as we travel places they’ve never dreamed of going!
How you can help:
We’ve seen the impact that can happen when adults get involved in the education of the children of their community. It’s huge! Especially with the at-risk, lower income, minority communities where role models may not be prevalent, a strong voice of encouragement goes a long way.
So come join our Raise Your Hand Movement by signing up on our “Click to be Counted” campaign. We want to create a community of like-minded people who believe that together we can move the needle in education.
I used to be afraid of most inner city high school kids. I don’t have any kids of my own so I felt like a fish out of water – who am I to start such a program?! Seeing the lights come on in the eyes of these kids has changed my life and my heart!
Having worked in the accounting industry for just a few years, Ben Walker quickly found himself brainstorming new concepts, determined to make his industry of choice less dry.
A few months into starting an accounting firm in the complete opposite direction to the industry’s norm, I wanted to create something really radical! What we came up with was a cafe at the centre of our accounting firm, which also acts as a coworking space and entrepreneur hideout for the business community.
Four years ago, I co-founded MINDDRIVE, an after school program for at-risk high school students. Our model, which includes heavy involvement of volunteer mentors from all walks of life, involves approaching education from a hands-on, experiential way.
