The Santa Clarita Valley Chamber of Commerce held its “Master Your Money: Small Business Financials Made Simple” panel discussion on Thursday at the Dog Haus restaurant in Canyon Country.
Panelists Bronson Feuer of Vance Wealth, Catherine Grooms of College of the Canyons’ Small Business Development Center, Joel Peluffo of Hedman Partners, and Lucas Rowe of Koegle Law Group were featured during the discussion and provided advice and tips to small business owners.
Insights provided were aimed to help local business owners understand numbers and what they mean, identify risks within their business before they become a problem, improve cash flow awareness and build a blueprint that leads to confident decision making, according to a news release related to the event.
The conversation dived into different topics ranging from legal advice to how to create a plan for future hypothetical challenges so entrepreneurs are prepared.
Three financial metrics that all business owners should always think about, according to Grooms, are calculating business-related time, accurately capturing gross revenue and sales, and understanding how much is the hourly rate.
“Time is money,” she said.
Rowe echoed her remarks and added, “Those kinds of things are going to basically dictate a lot of what your business does or doesn’t do,” he said.
Another topic mentioned during the discussion is that business owners pay themselves last, prioritizing employees and other factors before themselves, and how it can pose risks.
“So, in an S corporation, the owners of the business have to pay themselves a reasonable salary. You get to the end of the year, and you haven’t been taking a payroll for yourself but there’s sufficient profits in the business, it’s a possible audit risk to not be paying yourself a salary,” Feuer said.
What separates businesses that stay financially healthy year after years versus those that continue to struggle comes to “reliable data you look at often enough. You can make decisions based on that. You have a good support team internally, and outside like people friends like that, that help you grow your business,” Peluffo said.
