My name is Scott Shell, and I am the owner of Shell Bookkeeping Services LLC, a boutique bookkeeping company that specializes in providing quality service. I do not outsource work and I have no employees. All work is done by me, remotely from home. Home is currenty in Patagonia AZ, an hour southeast of Tucson. I am married and we have a pet parrot (African Grey named Sophie) who is 25 years old. My wife raised her since birth.
As my bookkeeping workload is pretty full, I have been moving into training and consulting. As a small business owner and entrepreneur, with several business ventures since the 1990’s, I have a wide range of experience and understanding, applicable to assist others attempting to start their own business. I offer consulting services as well as bookkeeping training and set up.
I am not a classically trained accountant, but learned these skills out of necessity as the owner of my own businesses. I totally understand the struggles of learning to keep books, since it was always something I put off. There were so many other priorities, and bookkeeping was put to the bottom of the priority list. It wasn’t until I was hired by other small business owners to keep their books, that I finally honed my craft, and discovered that I really enjoy bookkeeping!
I am a lifelong musician, and earned a BM in music composition from DePaul University in Chicago. I have continued to compose music on and off over the years. My contemporary classical music can be heard at www.ScottAnthonyShell.com. For several years, I was the lead singer / guitarist / songwriter for the garage rock band Cats & Jammers. Lately, I have been teaching myself classical piano.
Here is a list of my past business ventures.
Belden Carolers – a seasonal caroling group I started in college. We performed for four seasons. YouTube “Belden Carolers” for our appearance on WGN TV. If we look tired, it’s because we had to be there at 4am.
Beluga Records – an indie rock record label that released 25 recordings from 1995-2001.
BelugaWorks (Digital MediaWorks) – a CD and print brokerage service 1996-2001
LiveBand Karaoke – the first of its kind, with many imitators since. I played bass guitar and served as host. 2001-2005 (it continues to this day without me)
I Am Beautiful Superfoods – online sales of superfood products 2009-10
Teaching Yourself Spanish (Advanced Language Learning Systems) – Original content Spanish learning programs that I created, produced and (occasionally) sold online. 2010 to present but not very active.
SCNMF LLC (Spontaneous Combustion New Music Festival) – This was a touring music festival that had one prototype season but lost too much money to continue.
Shell Bookkeeping Services LLC – 2018 to present.
Besides this, I have worked a variety of odd jobs such as a bike delivery person for Potbelly’s (original location in Chicago), shipping / receiving clerk at a college bookstore, small mom/pop record store clerk, check processor for Bank of America (night shift!), loan processor for a small bank, shipping manager for a small indie record distributor and label, live music booking agent for a variet of rock clubs in Chicago, office manager for a small real estate law firm, smoothie / juice maker for a small juice bar in Hollywood, managed online Shopify / Amazon stores for a food company.
I share all this to help show the variety of experience I have had working for small business owners besides being one myself. For the most part, I either worked for myself, or for other small business owners directly. The BoA job, which lasted about a year, was the only real corporate job I have had, which was used to help finance the record label.