How Small Expenses Can Really Hurt Your Business

Many small businesses run things on a pretty tight budget to make sure they stay in the black, and to maintain that budget, they will naturally start thinking about cutting costs, to save large chunks of money where they can.

A safer and more interesting cost-saving strategy, however, is to find the small expenses that can be more painlessly cut, eventually adding up to significant sums. The following little expenses are a great start to cutting costs.

Ordering Too Much Product

Depending on what your product is, this may have a lesser or greater impact on your business. For example, if you run a plant that manufactures building materials which do not deteriorate, then you can order more raw materials than is immediately needed without worrying about it too much.

If your shop sells perishable products such as food items, on the other hand, then you can easily waste a lot of money on too much product that you’ll end up throwing away.

Leaving the Lights On

Remember when your mom and dad used to yell at you for forgetting to turn off the light when you left a room? As it turns out to be many times, Mom and Dad were right—well, they were half right.

It depends on the cost of electricity in your region and what type of light bulbs you’re using. When using conventional incandescent bulbs, you’ll probably save some money on the power bill if you turn them off when you don’t need them.

Although, if your building is outfitted with the more efficient CFL bulbs, then the energy used to turn the bulb on and off repeatedly might actually cost slightly more than just leaving them on… go figure.

Poor Building Insulation

It’s something that we all tend to put off because it seems like a huge undertaking without much of a payoff, but on the contrary, inadequate insulation in a building causes significant and costly energy loss.

The $300 or $400 you’ll spend on an energy audit to check your insulation situation pales in comparison to the amount of money you’ll save on heating and cooling costs, even if it takes you a few days of labor, or a hired contractor to fix it.

DIY Tax Estimation

It may seem like you’re saving yourself a few bucks to do your small business taxes yourself, but there are numerous opportunities that you can easily miss, including tax loopholes, credits, and write-offs. You’re much better off hiring a professional you trust to handle your business taxes so that you can get the maximum financial benefit.