People who gave up their 9-5 and steady salary to start a high-street business, do you regret it?

The high street is dead. Sainsbury's just cut another 3000 jobs. Most high-streets are carbon copies of the same dozen franchises. Those franchises are dying off - remember Maplins, C&A, BHS, 99p Stores, Allied Carpets, Army & Navy, Barratts, Bon Marche, Borders, Carphone Warehouse, Comet, Debenhams, Dillons, Dixons, Do It All, Freeman Hardy and Willis, Gadget Shop, Gamestation, Hawkin's Bazaar, Index, Jessops, JJB Sports, Land of Leather, Littlewoods, McColls, MFI, PC World, Percy Ingle, Pollards, Powerhouse, Rumbelows, Safeway, Toys R Us, Virgin Megstore, Woolworths.... They're all gone. Every week or so another one that you've heard of dies, gets bought out, merges, downscales, etc. (I know, because I like to post about it on Facebook to show people how the high street is dying). It's not anything I would recommend. I spent 10 years self-employed... it was great. It had drawbacks but it was great just getting money for doing what YOU want to do. But I stopped because it's harder, the money isn't always as good, and the risk is huge... you can go under with just one accusation (e.g. selling a dodgy sausage roll, or a member of staff does something, or you fight a court case that's completely without merit but it bankrupts you to do so, etc.). But a high-street business? No. They don't last. You only need to watch any one high-street for a year to realise that. Sure, there are a few shops that seem to cling on forever - and they're mostly family businesses that make just enough to top up some old fella's state pension because he owns the premises and he only needs to make enough to put the heater behind the counter on, and if nobody comes in all day, he's had a good relaxing day. But the smaller shops just can't afford the rents, the utilities, the taxes, the staff, etc. All the high-streets in the last few towns I lived in became hives for betting shops, pharmacies (once there were four competing pharmacies within 100 yards of each other!), estate agents and things like that. Barely any actual *shops*. No independent businesses. Lots of closed shops that were abandoned for often years at a time because nobody could afford to rent them. Even the big chains started to downsize and move into other roads. I wouldn't start a bricks-and-mortar business in this day and age. Not without huge funding behind me to guarantee SOME longevity. It would be a uphill struggle from the start. Think about how much it costs to run your house, pay your rent/mortgage, bills, etc. and how much salary you need to take home. You need to earn that much FROM THE SHOP almost from day one just to pay for the shop itself. Not counting things like taxes and insurance and complying with regulations and hiring staff. Just to have you sitting in a cafe that you run yourself, you have to earn a wage comparable to you going to work 9-5 BEFORE YOU EVEN PAY YOURSELF. Just to keep the business open. How many cups of coffee sold is that every day just to break even? How many more to make a profit? How many more for that profit to be enough for you to take home and pay YOUR mortgage, not just the rent on the shop? How many more for you to actually pay for the business, pay your personal expenses and take home a salary comparable to what you earn while working for someone else? It's not impossible - hundreds of thousands of people up and down the country do it. But it's far more difficult than people expect, especially if they haven't planned and budgeted it out. And if you're going to start self-employment... a bricks-and-mortar business is a horrendous proposition. Start online, or even a mobile business (vehicle expenses are less than rent) and go from there. Because that's what some of your competitors are doing. But a high-street shop? No. You need a loan, a business plan, business acumen and be reasonably assured that you can quickly get 2-3 salaries out of it without much risk, just to get started. There's a reason your hairdresser charges a small fortune for a simple haircut.