Business model/structure:
Accounting CPA - recommendations? Use ai? Online systems Godaddy for LLC, TurboTax? Amanda Han (discuss their services)
Company/corporate structure - outline, requirements, benchmarks, activation
Business names/domains:
We definitely want to continue to work on and brainstorm more potential names that have available domains.
Right now, we have Loyalty123.com which is simple and straight to the point. More importantly we have the domain.
But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a better name and available domain or that we could get additional domains to be used for specific aspects of the business. So please keep thinking and looking and see what we can come up with.
I don’t know if you had a chance to look at the comments that Gemini had, but I think you all agree it was reasonable. Not the greatest, but functional.
I think we can all agree that there's two really important components that we have to look at:
First a domain name needs to closely match the name of the business.
Second it needs to have some reasonable association to what we're trying to accomplish in the business.
Google worked for google but for those of us who are around when it first came out it was pretty confusing and we had no idea what it meant. And I sure didn't associate it with a search engine.
Today we have the huge challenge in 2026 almost every good domain name is already been taken. I also think that we strongly agree that we have to have a .com domain. Now I do think that we could have a primary .com domain and then have a .net or a .org or even a .AI with more specialized names.
We could definitely consider having a name that is specifically for a restaurant services.
We could have another name with another website that specific to other types of small businesses that we support.
And of course even a third or fourth name and our website for things like what Logan brought up with the event program or possibly for a nonprofit operation.
So at this point I think it's just really important that we continue to look and I'll start putting up more names on the website as I find them and please share any names that you think should be considered through our group thread.
How we bill our clients:
Online payment systems - for our clients to pay us and for them to you with their customers. Compare Stripe, Squarespace payment systems with their current systems.
Note: Stripe has been the payment program Squarespace has used for years, however, recently Squarespace launched their own payment program which is reported to be very competitive with other forms of credit payment. We should definitely look into the possibility that if restaurant patrons pay through our system with Squarespace it might be less costly to our restaurant clients. Not to mention a whole lot more convenient.
What we need as soon as possible:
Portfolios- Wednesday, Logan, Steve, Terry
Bio’s - Terry, Steve, Logan, Wednesday - these will be connected through a link for each one of us in the About section. For those who want to know more.
Interns & initial associates - person Terry and Logan mentioned - individuals under consideration
Intern and new hire onboarding
Business advisors/partners - folks we would like to invite in, etc. and process for their involvement.
Company Structure:
LLC - current plan is for each of us to own 25% - now there's another approach that we might want to use in order to create the potential being able to get additional grants and/or low interest loans from the small business administration local counties or state governmental funding. This would be creating the company in such a way that it is a woman owned business. The requirements for most government grants and other programs including the small business administration is that a woman or women own at least 51% of the company. So we're thinking at this point of having Wednesday on 25.5% and Logan owning 25.5% Terry and I would split the balance.
Keep in mind of course that the primary function of the board and the owners of stock this would be the prime stock is to vote on the officers of the corporation not to run the corporation. So each of us would have effectively an equal vote for who's gonna be the CEO the CFO etc. Right now it's not a terrifically important thing. However hopefully and not too many years to come it could be extremely important. Let's be very thoughtful about how we put things together cause once we put it together and then it's put together it's a whole lot harder to change at that point.
Another consideration is whether or not we each want to participate at that level being a 25% owner is really gonna require significant commitment.
With any small business you can anticipate that everything is going to take more time, cost more money, than you anticipated. Having you had the opportunity to start an operate six or seven different small businesses over the last 40 something years I can definitely tell you that there's good parts and bad parts. The very best part is you are the owner and you can do things that make a difference and build for your future. The very worst part is you are the owner and what you do matters and if you don't do things well and consistently it can cost you a lot of time and money. I totally understand even at this point if somebody doesn't want to proceed because it is a significant commitment.
Cost of creating the Corp or LLC - Godaddy, has a pretty low-cost operation that's very generic. Pretty sure we need to do some evaluation to make sure what our best choice is. Wednesday and I have been aware of an accountant in Southern California who is licensed to offer services throughout all 50 states. And has a long history providing services for real estate operations and investments. Her name is Amanda Han. If you have someone you'd like to recommend definitely do so and we can figure out an interview. We also need to do some research probably using Gemini to determine what the best approaches as far as our corporate structure in the past LLC is made a lot of sense but there may be reasons why we may not want to do an LLC at this time. The other thing we have to consider somewhat is whether or not we want to establish an Indiana corporation. The one thing I know for sure as we definitely do not want to do a California corporation as the costs are gonna be too high at this point. However once we actually established California operations which is a primary focus of mine and I'm pretty sure Logan then we will have to address working in California as a foreign corporation and paying California what they require.
Non-profit - to be established for acceptance of donations for: helping special needs, severely burned, hearing impaired, physical limitations with hands or walking, etc.
The idea is to promote extremely high quality employment - chat operations - that allow people who would otherwise either not be able to participate or it would be very difficult or uncomfortable to be able to have a real career and develop real expertise that would be appreciated and rewarded.
Roles and Responsibilities:
Setting up a service-based business for the restaurant industry with four partners requires a balance between capital (cash), credit (risk), and sweat equity (labor). Since service businesses are often less capital-intensive than the restaurants they serve, your focus should be on ensuring long-term commitment and operational stability.
Here are the reasonable contributions you should consider requiring from your initial partners:
Financial Contributions (Capital)
Even if the business is "lean," initial cash is necessary for legal formation, marketing, and software/tools.
Buy-in Amount: It is common to require a minimum cash contribution (e.g., $5,000–$25,000 per partner) to ensure everyone has "skin in the game."
Operating Reserve: Partners should contribute enough to cover at least 6 months of fixed overhead (insurance, CRM subscriptions, etc.) before the business turns a profit.
Equal vs. Pro-Rata: If one partner contributes significantly more cash, they may receive "Preferred" shares or a "Preferred Return," meaning they get paid back their initial investment before other partners take a share of the profits.
Credit and Liability Contributions
In the early stages, your business likely won't have its own credit score. The burden falls on the partners.
Personal Guarantees (PGs): If the business needs a loan or an office lease, landlords and banks will often require all partners with >20% ownership to sign a personal guarantee. You should require all four partners to be willing to use their personal credit for these foundational needs.
Credit Score Minimums: To qualify for SBA 7(a) loans or business credit cards, it is reasonable to require partners to maintain a personal credit score (typically 630–680+).
Direct Loans: If a partner doesn't want to give cash for equity, they can provide a "Shareholder Loan" to the company at a reasonable interest rate, which is paid back as a debt rather than rewarded with more stock.
"Sweat Equity" and Operational Roles
In a service business, the work is often more valuable than the cash. You must define what each partner "brings to the table" to justify their shares.
Vesting Schedule: This is critical. Do not give 25% of the stock on day one. A standard "4-year vest with a 1-year cliff" means if a partner leaves in month 11, they get 0% of their shares. This protects the remaining three partners.
Specific Deliverables: Assign each partner a "Contribution Domain":
Partner A (Sales): Responsible for the first 10 restaurant contracts.
Partner B (Operations): Responsible for service delivery and hiring.
Partner C (Tech/Product): Responsible for the digital platform or service tools.
Partner D (Finance/Admin): Responsible for billing, legal, and compliance.
Summary of Reasonable Requirements
Contribution TypeExpectationWhy?Cash$X,000 Initial InvestmentValidates commitment and funds early growth.CreditWillingness to sign Personal GuaranteesNecessary for leases and bank financing.TimeMinimum 20–40 hours per weekPrevents "passive" partners from diluting the workers.LegalSigning a Shareholders' AgreementOutlines "Bad Leaver" provisions and buy-out rules.
A Note on "The 25% Trap"
Avoid splitting the equity exactly 25/25/25/25 unless the contributions are truly identical. If one person is the "Visionary" and another is just "Helpful," a split like 40/20/20/20 often works better to ensure there is a clear tie-breaker for major decisions.
Employees and contractors:
When people are employed for specific times to do specific things under supervision they are routinely going to need to be employees. Pretty much no matter what state you're in. California has hyper controls in this area. Indiana is a little bit more forgiving, but we want to make sure that we don't call people contractors who are in fact employees because that can create a huge liability For the organization and it's just not right to do.
With our chat operations we should be planning on having a number of employees and thinking about how they're going to be managed in supervised. Right now I'm thinking that Wednesday will be handling the supervision of the supervisors. Hopefully if we can establish a sufficient business we're gonna have a large number of employees who will mostly be working from their home and we talked about working with people who have various disabilities and other in limitations on their ability to work and utilizing them as primary players in this very important aspect of our work.
Contractors will be doing specific things for us - printing, software development, etc.
In short, contractors control when they do their work where they do their work routinely provide their own equipment to do their work and are not immediately supervised. They take on a project they get it done and then they let whoever know that it's done and they're paid to do that specific project
Equipment and software inventory for all phases.