It's harder than most people realize/give it credit.

 

a small shop and 7 employees is not a really smart idea, especially if you are just starting out. you will not be able to make it. my suggestion is to start doing stuff on weekends for people in someones garage, you can then build up a reputation and a client base. you do good work people will talk about it. but just jumping into a shop and no customers is not the smartest idea imo. and its cool to just want to do performance stuff which is probably what you want to do, but that kind of stuff isn't sold as much as a 15 dollar oil change, or tire rotation, so the chance of people beating down your door to install cams and turbos is slim to none right off the bat, or even everyday. and the internet really kills small businesses because they cannot compete with the internet giants selling the products for a lower price, so unless you get competative and stock a lot of stuff and sell it cheap its also another opportunity to fail.

you also have to look at the location of the shop, and the people that live in the area. chances are there are not that many people that want performance stuff done to their car, so you need to figure out what the demand is for the services you will offer, and build your business plans from there.

in my opinion it seems like the most succesful shops inthe industry are the shops that do full service machine work for any engine, but they also sell products and install them as well. this way you have every aspect of the market covered, but this is also very expensive, and people really need to trust the work that you do, so expiriance is nessesary.