Standing Room Only & Hot Fudge Sundaes at CBI Pitch Night!

Pitchers

Pictured left to right: Holly Hanson (Director Cumberland Business Incubator), Kimberly Williams (Spa Escapes), Ben Ford (Dendrophilia Landscapes), Cathy Kimmerly (OH Fudge!), Stuart Sitton (Select Auto Sales), Allison Crawford (Momentum Behavior Analysis), Jody Franks (Franksarousa Farms), and Facilitator Diane Morey (A to Z Printing)

Congratulations to the entrepreneurs who made their Pitch to the standing-room-only assembled crowd at the Cumberland Business Incubator (CBI) on Monday May 4th. Seven business owners worked on their business concepts for nine weeks utilizing a business model canvas approach called CO.STARTERS in preparation for Pitch Night. Five of the entrepreneurs were intent on growing existing businesses while two were developing brand new businesses. Continue reading

Big Small Business

Small-Vs-Big-Businesses

You are in a group called “big, small business” if you employ at least five people (other than yourself), do over $500,000 per year in annual sales, and have been in business for at least two years. That’s the smallest of the “big, small businesses”. The “large, small businesses” employ 15 or more people (all the way to 500), with annual sales between $2 million and $25 million. That’s a huge range, but according to the Small Business Administration anything under 500 employees is a small business. Continue reading

Where Are You When It Comes to Effort vs. Success?

effort

Every now and then it’s a good idea to take a step back from your day to day focus and take a look at where you are in terms of the success you’re trying to achieve. For business owners, the definition of Success is very personal, but usually it’s going to be measured by how much money and freedom your business generates for you.

“The road to success runs uphill.”  – Willie Davis

Mr. Davis makes a great point – you can’t achieve long term success without effort.  In a lot of things you do, your success is directly tied to the amount of effort you put into it.  The more effort you put in, the more success you’ll get. Continue reading

Striking e-Commerce Gold

e-commerce

I visited Arkansas over the holiday weekend recently and picked up some interesting information from small business owners there.  As we all know, new businesses face daunting odds:  only half of all businesses launched annually will survive five years, and only one-third will survive past 10 years, according to the SBA. Arkansas has more than 241,000 small businesses, some quite successful.  Business owners everywhere who succeed do more than build it and hope buyers will come.  They stick to a written business plan vetted by a professional. They spend judiciously and reinvest in their business, and many effectively use the power of social media. Continue reading