There are the 2 aspects of a business. 1. The structure and surrounding support processes – accounting, finance, and the like. and 2. The operations part – what and how are you going to do every day to make money.
You can make money without much of a formal business structure. A Sole Proprietorship is what you are right now, and is the most common way small businesses start out. With a business name DBA (Doing Business As) which you register that with the State, you are good to go for most anything any wholesaler would need. With a DBA, you can get a business bank account (highly recommended to keep your business and personal monies separate), and can produce a Reseller’s or Tax ID form for the wholesalers.
Don’t let this simple set of steps stop you from making progress.
The most important ONE thing for you to do is to learn how to find products that will sell at a profit. Without this skill, instead of buying one item that’s a dud-seller, with wholesale, you’ll have a full case or more of a dud-seller. Not to mention Private Label imports with MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity) perhaps in the thousands. Your limited capital will be tied up in boxes of bad buying decisions.
And the goal is to go wide, not deep in your product offerings. That means having dozens of items with a few of each rather than a few items with dozens of each. Spread your risk and spread your learning.
Put all your eggs in many baskets…
So, hang out with Amazon’s Best Sellers pages to see what’s selling in the categories you have knowledge or interest in. Read the descriptions and reviews of those Best Sellers to learn which features are most desirable. Use the Amazon Seller app on your phone to scan and scan products at closeout sections of local stores. Make a few judicious buys to learn how to list and ship.
Your business success is simple – Find It, List It, Ship It, Repeat. You have to get good at all 4 steps – especially the Repeat… But Finding It is the most elusive, and wholesale will give you access to better pricing, but won’t help at all with knowing what will sell at a profit.
John L