I nearly shut down the HobbyScool Shopify store because it felt optional. This experiment explains why I didn’t — and how seeing it as a long-term business asset changed everything.

We ran cold LinkedIn outreach at HR directors and chased sponsors for a year of summits. The interest was real. The revenue wasn't, at least not on any timeline we could work with. Here's what killed it, and the three things that would have to change before I try again.

HobbyScool didn’t start with a master plan. It started with a domain name, a lot of curiosity, and a slow realization that I wanted to build something that could live beyond me. This is a candid look at how that evolved into a public $1M experiment — and what thinking about sellability actually changes.