Great Ideas for your Small Business: Turn Your Passion into Profits Geoffrey berliner is a tinkerer. he began tinkering with old watches, pens, and lighters when he was at Harvard Divinity School in the late 1980s. “I like to bring things back to life,” he explained. As a student in Cambridge, he frequented a pipe … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Set Up a Cart in a Mall Veteran silversmith kent mCcustion used to travel to about fifty craft shows a year, often driving hundreds of miles to shows around Illinois. In 1997 he cut back to six or seven shows because of the Colorado Silversmith’s kiosk he opened in … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Turn Your Anger into Energy Carmen muñoz knows how tough it is to make it in a man’s world. She’s been in the automotive parts business for more than thirty-five years, starting out as the sole saleswoman for a small firm in the Detroit area. In 1984, when the … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Open Your Store in a Farmer’s Market Americans have loved shopping in markets since before there was America. The first farmer’s market opened in Alexandria, Virginia, in the 1750s. Today the U.S. Department of Agriculture reports there are about 35,000 farmer’s markets across the country. In addition, thousands of … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Find a Need and Fill It When nellie may sutton was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 1985, her son Joseph began searching for a place where she could live safely and comfortably. After checking out nursing homes and elder care services, Sutton decided to rent a ranch-style house and … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Have Your Product Mandated for Use by an Official Group In 1988, miami radio salesman eduardo Barea read about a mandatory uniform policy about to be implemented in local public schools. That day a great idea took hold: He would get into the school uniform business. This father of … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Do a Deal with a Big Company For a small business owner, doing a deal with a giant corporation is thrilling, intimidating, and scary. But the opportunities are out there. Big companies of all kinds are hungry for the nimble thinking and new products created by entrepreneurs. The first … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Launch New Products with a Media Blitz Avi sivan, a former israeli commando and stuntman, gives new meaning to the expression “media blitz.” Through an aggressive and expensive combination of magazine advertising, infomercials, and direct mail, Sivan has created a marketing machine for his personal care products sold under … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Serve the Market’s High and Low Ends One of the most successful and creative entrepreneurs I know built an incredibly lucrative frozen-pizza manufacturing business by serving all ends of the pizza market with specific products. A former potato saleswoman, Kathy Taggares cashed-in her condo, jewelry, and insurance policies in … Read more
Great Ideas for your Small Business: Build a Working Model You may have the most brilliant concept in the world, but raising money to manufacture and market your baby is almost impossible without a working model. The problem is that too many entrepreneurs fall prey to invention scam artists who promise to introduce them to … Read more
