From Welfare to Wealth

From rags to riches and from welfare to wealth, the life of entrepreneur Dani Johnson is not the average start-up story. After a troubled and turbulent childhood, Johnson found herself pregnant at just 17 with a poor education. To make ends meet, she started her first business at 19 when she realized that her only way out of poverty was not to continue working as a cocktail waitress, but to start her own business in the environmental industry.

She enjoyed short term success, only to be left with just $2.03 in the bank and $35,000 in debt when her first company, and her first marriage, failed. Homeless and jobless at 21, Johnson started marketing a weight loss product, which made her $2,000 profit in four days. By age 23, she was a millionaire.

Two decades later, Johnson has held on to her million dollars and earned even more as the owner of five companies and author of several books. Johnson’s latest book, First Steps to Wealth, features step-by-step guidelines on how to increase your income and achieve your goals in both your business and personal lives. Johnson, who recently appeared on ABC’s Secret Millionaire now speaks at various business seminars and workshops as well as hosts a weekly radio show. Johnson is focused on sharing what she has learned about growing her personal wealth while growing her business.

How did she change her life course? She realized she had to take charge of all of her finances. “The wealthiest people know where every dime is, but the middle class haven’t got a clue, let alone the impoverished. They don’t have a clue of where their money goes,” she says.

Johnson’s experience, not only as a business owner herself, but as a speaker who is often works with fellow entrepreneurs, has taught her for that most business owners the financial health of the company is too often a bigger priority than the health of their personal finances. “You have to start pulling money off the table and start learning to invest,” she says.

“I am 42 stinking years old. I’ve been wealthy for years. There are lots of people who’ve made millions, but they have no wealth because they spend all they make.”