What to do next?

[Littlefatfroggy]

I feel this is a rather cheeky ask but I'm in my mid 40s and I'm really stuck as to what to do next in life. Changed username for this as its so identifying.

I live in France and have just closed down my company which was like a small Able & Cole/ Riverford selling and delivering local food online. Sadly we weren't able to make a profit.

So I have an amazing network of over 100 local producers. l created, set up and ran a fairly complicated website with over 2000 products and a database but without any formal skills so I know a bit of CSS, PHP, SQL, web design etc. Accounting not my thing sadly. But dealt with admin and bureaucracy. I'm good at marketing and community management.

Previously a couple of decades as an English teacher and head of international section at a business school.

Currently on sabbatical until September 2017.

We are moving area, 4 kids (7-11) and DP work/school from September in a fairly large city so practical to work there.

I know I don't want to go back to my old job although it's the safe choice, longer term it's in the wrong town and I stopped teaching because I stopped being good at it. Students had become clients.

I could teach something different like in the field of entrepreneurship. But I've no qualification only experience.

I could go back and do a masters but in what? MBA or something computer based?
What area of study has real prospects?

I would like to utilize the network of producers I've built up because in part it was quite a feat and in part because a lot of them aren't good at the public face part of producing.

I quite fancy working from home but I like people.

So if you've got to the bottom of this please help me think about what to do next. All ideas welcome.

Software development?

Something to do with travel and tourism? Organise guided tours round your part of France, visit producers, vineyards etc?

Which element of your business wasn't profitable? It sounds like the network and the website were successful, so is there another way you could use them? Could you sell in bulk to shops instead of to individuals? could you organise a food festival that celebrates and markets your suppliers? Could you work as a buyer for a supermarket chain or similar?

I don't think tourism would be workable with the kids/holidays. I do have a Gite business which pretty much runs itself with a few hours a week from me.

Thanks so much for replying.

Software development is quite appealing but is there work available. I'm concerned that I'd be going into a saturated market.

A lot of my suppliers don't want to work with supermarkets because the conditions are so shit. Small margins are squeezed to a point where it is loss making. Most small producers have no idea of their real costs of production. In reality we don't pay enough for our food. Quality production and animal welfare is not cheap to put in place.

I have a friend who was going to import configure du lait into waitrose from one of our suppliers but the project fell at the bottling stage because they wanted it shipped in bulk tankers but it has to be bottled boiling.

Thanks so much for replying.

Software development is quite appealing but is there work available. I'm concerned that I'd be going into a saturated market.

A lot of my suppliers don't want to work with supermarkets because the conditions are so shit. Small margins are squeezed to a point where it is loss making. Most small producers have no idea of their real costs of production. In reality we don't pay enough for our food. Quality production and animal welfare is not cheap to put in place.

I have a friend who was going to import configure du lait into waitrose from one of our suppliers but the project fell at the bottling stage because they wanted it shipped in bulk tankers but it has to be bottled boiling.

It depends what level. If you want a job for about 30k I think there's plenty around. Or contract type work whixh i know yourw not as keen on. Also likely that you could work from home so less likely to be tied to a location.

Honestly contract work might be perfect. How do I go about it though?

Well you'd need to retrain, and presumably could access careers advice through that institution. It's been quite a long time since I did software development