When I think of entrepreneurs, I think: independence, passion, love, visionaries, family, struggle, success, failures, multi-tasking, time management (or lack thereof), pain and elation.
BizImpresairo is where we will have a conversation about these attributes and the highs and lows, the struggles and successes that come along entrepreneurship and most certainly learn a few things along the way.
I'm a writer by profession, and believe every conversation is fueled by a story. So here’s mine. Note: to shorten the copy I've skipped the story about me getting thrown out of Disneyland and how my controller embezzled $250,000 from my previous company.
The Dawn
My 7th grade my junior high had a little shop that would sell a very limited amount of supplies (pens, notebooks, etc.) and Ludens cough drops -– yeah you know the ones. Cherry tasting yummy drops -– pretty much candy. Well there was a rule that you could only buy one box a day. Being the sugar addicts that we all were, we the people of Virginia Beach's Cox Middle School, would get in line each day for our daily ration. Looking at that line sparked my capitalist entrepreneurial mind. I thought, "What the heck, it's 80 degrees out and no one has a cough, it's obvious we're buying them for mind-altering pleasure." So I put forth a plan to sell these and other stuff from my own locker without the one-day limit rule set by "The Man". There was clearly a market here. So I took my money to the original discount store –- the Little Creek Naval Base Commissary –- and bought bulk supplies of HubbaBubba, Big League Chew, Fruit Stripe, BubbleYum and Ludens and began a grass roots marketing campaign to sell these at school.
It worked like magic. I was making at least 50 percent on my inventory, earning a good living and subsequently dropping in vast amounts of quarters into the Frogger game at the front of the Commissary. Needless to say I was hooked. But like all good things temptation creeped in and one day a 9th grader asked if I had cigarettes to buy. Immediately my mind created a picture of the bottom drawer of my mom's dining room hutch that was packed full of cartons of my father's Pall Mall reds. I told him to come back tomorrow and began selling the Pall Malls by the pack from my locker the next day. Now I was making some serious dough. I started getting pretty freaked out as the line formed by my locker between class was dead give away that something is going on here.
"The Man" launched a sting operation and captured me in my lawlessness and I was temporarily suspended from school and faced with the reality of having to face the Real Man, my father. He was in port during this time and called away from duty to come with my mother to pick me up at the principal's office. On the desk were piles of candy, bubble gum and my dad's Pall Mall cigarettes. Not a good scene, visions of switching were running through my mind.
The following ride home in our yellow wood-paneled Ford Country Squire wagon (my dad hates Chevy) was like that out of a movie. In the front, my mom and dad were fighting about what had just happened. My mom being appalled and my dad kind of laughing, glancing back at me with a smirk and telling me I'm in serious trouble, but I could tell he was impressed. It was in this moment that I knew all I had to do was find the right opportunity, influence the right people and take risks and things will be all right.
Since that fateful ride home, I’ve started five companies, sold two and am currently a founder and operator of two companies Room 214, an online search communications company, and Vital Sourcing, a China sourcing company. A previous company of mine was recognized as one of America’s Fastest Growing Companies making into the Inc. 500. That was truly and honor and an accomplishment I bestow upon all of the Rock Star employees that fueled the success. I’m also a certified business coach, which I got not to coach, but to be the best possible mentor to my employees.
The Real Important Stuff - I'm married and work and live in Boulder, Colorado. I have a beautiful and supportive wife and two kids Josie (5) and Grady (2.5).
Love fantasy novels, new music, geeked out on the Lord of the Rings movies and will never pass up a day to go skiing – so please don’t tempt me.
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James,
We are thrilled to have you on board. I had to laugh as I read your early experiences. I think you will fit in well around here. We like to think we are a fairly entrepreneurial bunch (we certainly have the spelling problem!) and it sounds like we could learn a thing or two from you. We have also taken a few gut punches, so hopefully we have our optimism and vision somewhat grounded in reality.
I am really looking forward to reading what you have to say.
Tim Stay
Posted by: Tim Stay | January 2, 2006 12:04 AM | Permalink to Comment