Alpaca Business Plan Part 3 - Mission Statement

A mission statement is a concise statement about your business' reason for being. Why did you start raising alpacas? What made you think that raising alpacas would be a good business to get into? What are you doing differently from the other farms? What makes your alpacas the "ones"? What are the values or beliefs that guide you raising alpacas? What kind of relationship do you want with your customers and alpacas?

Answer any, all or none of these questions as it suits you.

It should be short and memorable. If you can spell it out in that infamous elevator speech, then you have done well. If you can print it on the back of your business cards, you get the gold star.

Think of it as a tag line with some explanation. Leave out buzz words and fluff. State your goal and what makes you unique. Tell the world why they should do business with you.

I have listed some websites that have good ideas on how to write mission statements if you are stuck.

http://nonprofit.about.com/od/nonprofitbasics/a/mission.htm

http://www.tgci.com/magazine/How%20to%20Write%20a%20Mission%20Statement.pdf

http://www.entrepreneur.com/management/leadership/businessstrategies/article65230.html

Here is the first draft of my mission statement. I think it lacks some pizazz, so will be working on it as we go through the other steps

HomeSpun Alpacas' Mission Statement

HomeSpun Alpacas provides well-rounded support to its customers, from herd health to shearing to business plans, we are there for the customer. Our goal is to breed healthy, quality alpacas and develop a practical program of alpaca education.

For Thursday, think about your short term goals and next Tuesday we will work on long term goals.