About Brendon Sinclair
Brendon Sinclair commenced his business career in 1976 at the tender age of 10 years old. As a semi-professional pool shark, he played his four older brothers with his pocket money as stakes. His first business quickly went bust, when his brothers revealed themselves as hustlers.
After retiring from the game of pool, he joined the mighty Campbell St Primary football team.
Brendon kicks – no word if he scored
Around age 12 he commenced work for his father, and was quickly promoting to “Leading Hand Cleaner”, assisting in the evening job cleaning the Dept. of Main Road offices in Hobart. This position lasted 3 years, after which he learned he had only been granted this impressive job title to keep him working at 20 cents for a 3 hour shift ($1 per week for 15 hours work).
Brendon’s four older brothers had abandoned their positions after a single night of hard work and low pay.
Says Brendon, “I like to think I persevere. My brothers, for some reason, just kept calling me the sucker. In truth, I loved it. Dad would buy me a chocolate milkshake at the end of the Friday night shift, which is where some of my fondest memories come from.”
Brendon’s First Real Job
Brendon’s first “real” job came at age 18, when he commenced his 3 year training to become a Nursing Sister. His brothers & friends saw this career move with much hilarity – until they saw the Nurses parties!
These parties would usually have 100 girls and only two guys, so Brendon again demonstrated his entrepreneurial spirit by charging his brothers & friends for invitations. This recouped a significant portion of his earlier pool playing losses.
Neither Snow Nor Rain…
Brendon later went on to start a courier business and was awarded a contract with Australia Post. This turned out be very successful, until Christmas.
Says Brendon, “Ever tried delivering 1,124,715 parcels in 2 weeks, with a small van over an area of 25 square miles? Sorry if Santa didn’t visit you in Hobart in 1986!”
Brendon sold that business soon after, and returned to Nursing. He worked Monday-Friday at one hospital, and worked weekends at another. This helped him earn enough to feed his rapidly growing family, but also proved exhausting.
Finding the Right Career
Brendon soon made the move to a marketing career. Says Brendon, “Looking for the easiest possible career, I saw ‘Marketing’ – all drinking, golf, and schmoozing. That had my name written all over it!”
After working on the hospital’s marketing efforts, he was seconded (he says “dragged, kicking and screaming”) to head up the Marketing Division at the company’s largest hospital acquisition in Queensland. After some restructuring within the company, Brendon struck out on his own.
Starting his Own business
Deciding it was time to put his money where his mouth is, Brendon founded Tailored Consulting. He started out doing general marketing and creative work, but sound found himself drawn to a new niche – web development! 12 years later, Tailored Web Services now does web work almost exclusively.
Along the way, Brendon has written his own book, called the Web Design Business Kit. He also wrote the SitePoint Tribune for more than 5 years, which had a following of around 300,000 readers. His kit has been wildly successful, and he keeps a big box containing thank-you letters from readers who swear by it.
Cheers Big Ears.