Tag: Second Stage

Anyone who craves predictability probably shouldn’t become an entrepreneur. Besides the inherent risk of failure that any business carries, running a company offers many opportunities to be blindsided by even the seemingly most astute decisions.

These are decisions that seemed perfectly reasonable at the time, and perhaps more than reasonable. They were the mature, responsible thing to do, appropriate for the company’s growth. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com.

Lesson for lawyer: Don’t give up too much control

Acquisition to save money became costly rabbit hole

With the recession well in the rearview, many companies are bracing for problems that occur when the economy is healthy, such as the big decision to increase pay.

Duke University‘s Fuqua School of Business and CFO Magazine recently published results of an outlook survey of 547 U.S. companies, and it showed that 70 percent as of March expected to increase wages at least 3 percent in the next 12 months. Tech, services and consulting, manufacturing and health care led the way. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com.

Silence on job postings told Southfield phone service company it was time for raises

For Warren streetlight maker, it paid to plan for raises

Real estate business compensates to fend off auto firms

 8 things to think about before giving employees a raise

Michael Ansley’s first taste of the restaurant business wasn’t a pleasant one. At his first Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant in Ypsilanti, Workers at General Motors Corp.’s Willow Run factory provided business but formed a rowdy crowd, as did people from the bus station across the street. Fights broke out, customers were surly. Ansley once walked in on a crack deal in his bathroom. On other occasions, he got jumped and chased with a pipe wrench.

“We had federal agents dressed in Buffalo Wild Wings uniforms for a while, it got so bad,” Ansley said. “That was three years of hell.”

Read more at crainsdetroit.com.

The No. 1 mistake family-owned businesses make in succession planning is a basic one. They don’t bother with it.

This is surprisingly common. Specialists say it’s more likely that a family business will not have a plan than have one.

The Family Owned Business Institute at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids surveyed family businesses in its database last year and found that 80 percent of them said they plan to pass the business to the next generation. But only 19 percent had a formal, written plan to do so. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Kevin Schnieders says he’s had only four arguments with his dad in his whole life, and they all came while working for him.

“He and I had four arguments in 13 years working together. I formally resigned in two, and he offered me a buyout in two,” Schnieders said. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

There’s succession planning, which handles all the big-picture questions of who will own and lead a company someday. And then there’s “traumatic succession planning.” … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Mistakes will happen. Let them.

Even if you see new managers stepping right into a mistake you once made, resist the urge to hold their hand — also known as micromanaging. Instead, let them learn it on their own.

The emotional toll will ensure they don’t forget the lesson while creating a sense of ownership to the business.

“Trust them. As they make mistakes, they’ll get it worked out through experience, as long as they have the passion. I made mistakes, too,” said Monique Sasser, owner of Nikki’s Ginger Tea. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Salvia never disputed that he owed his employees the money; he disputed the contention that he willfully avoided paying them. A determination that he willfully wronged his employees would mean paying damages.

“What I did was illegal, not willful,” he said. “I will pay what I should pay, but not triple damages.” … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Dino Signore speaks to hundreds of second-stage business owners a year. During his seminars, he likes to ask how many of them signed up to be managers when they launched their businesses? How many attended a business class?

Not many hands go up for either question.

Signore is manager of entrepreneurial education at the Edward Lowe Foundation in Cassopolis, where he helps owners of second-stage businesses — defined as those with annual revenue of $1 million to $50 million and 10 to 99 employees — evolve from the seat-of-the-pants startup days to the more bloodless manager role. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Something unexpected always happens when starting a business. For Mandisa Smith and Najma Wilson, it was the weather.

The owners of retailer Detroit Fiber Works signed a lease on Livernois Avenue, in the strip north Seven Mile Road once known as the Avenue of Fashion, on Jan. 1, 2014 — just in time for the polar vortex. Few souls walked through the doors during the first two months of business.

“We had no idea. We thought, ‘People love us; it’s going to work.’ Then January comes and nobody comes in here. We end the month with $500 in sales, and rent is a lot more than that,” Smith said. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

In 2011, Scott Owens went with his wife, Suzi, to a bank seeking a loan to start a business making hot sauce.

“They basically laughed at us,” said Scott Owens. “The bank said, ‘We can’t even give you a $10,000 loan.’ ”

Owens had been laid off from the auto industry in 2008, and the family’s Dearborn home was underwater after a third of his neighbors walked away from their mortgages. But he and Suzi didn’t put their idea for a food business on the shelf. Instead, they cashed out their 401(k)s and formed Owens Family Foods LLC, which makes “Scotty O’Hotty” brand hot sauces.

… Read more at crainsdetroit.com

When husband-and-wife team Rachel and Tarek Kanaan opened their specialty beer and tea business, Unity Vibration Living Kombucha Tea LLC, in 2009, they quickly racked up debt, to the point of short-selling their house.

But it wasn’t because the Ypsilanti-based business wasn’t successful. Quite the opposite: Distributors were asking for more product, and the Kanaans were trying to build out their brewing operations and add a tasting room to keep up with demand.

They already had burned through their line of credit getting open, and they said that banks weren’t willing to offer any expansion capital.

So the pair turned to crowd investing, a form of crowdfunding that allows people to actually invest in a business rather than just giving donations the way Kickstarter and other platforms are structured. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Leon Richardson, head of Southfield-based ChemicoMays LLC, said the past year was a solid one with no surprises — almost.

The company spent 2013 preparing for the launch of a new line of business last January when it moved into the high-precision cleaning of engines being built at automotive plants. ChemicoMays takes the new engines, ships them to another location, cleans the mill grease and stamping oils off them and ships them back.

Sounds simple enough. But in the high-intensity world of automotive manufacturing — with its tight margins, lean inventories and breakneck deadlines — small missteps are expensive. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

When 2014 dawned, Jim Marinoff had no idea he would spend part of it at Pavel Datsyuk’s house.

But at one point during the year, that’s exactly what he was doing.

Marinoff runs Fast Hands Hockey LLC, a business based on a patented tool he invented to help hockey players practice their puck-handling skills. The strength and conditioning coach for St. Mary’s Preparatory high school in Orchard Lake had younger people in mind when he came up with it.

But then in October, the agent for the Detroit Red Wings star called to ask whether his client could get his hands on one. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

The weather got things off to a bad start this year for bra-maker Essential Bodywear LLC.

The company has an army of sales representatives, affectionately known as “bra ladies,” who buy the products to sell through parties at homes and offices, where women also get fitted. The polar vortex didn’t put people into a partying mood, however. With everyone hunkered down for the duration, sales plunged.

The year wasn’t all bad, though. The company’s quirky way of selling bras caught national media attention one week in September, with commentary on the “Today” show and “Late Night with Seth Meyers” following a feature on Essential Bodywear’s office parties that week in the New York Post.

“Companies have started setting up bra-fitting events in offices called bra parties,” Meyers riffed. “Meanwhile, in offices in China and India, people are working.”

Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb, hosts of “Today,” wrinkled their noses at the idea of walking around in a bra at work. But Charlick said that’s not quite the way it works. “It’s done in restrooms,” she said. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Scott Foster had one of those “be careful what you wish for” years.

His company, Royal Oak-based Wellco Corp., was featured in Crain’s Stage 2 Strategies in July for its work in turning the company’s business model on its head.

Wellco moved away from its traditional business of setting up employer wellness programs to using software to analyze employers’ entire health care programs. The move created more consulting business and turned former competitors into customers.

That grew revenue and customers. But it also grew demand for time with Foster, who spent much of the year learning how to reconfigure work-life balance. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

Once upon a time, it seemed as if every business was touting the latest in information technology it used to be more efficient and gain a competitive edge.

Nowadays, businesses are more likely to groan when faced with investment decisions for their back-office management systems and IT infrastructure. Bothering with these things seems more akin to changing the carpet than anything having to do with improving operations. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

If you’re the owner of a small business, or even one not so small, and don’t know the value of your business, don’t feel bad. It’s not a figure most business presidents can pull out of their pockets.

“Some business owners hear their friends at the country club say they sold their company at eight times EBITDA, so they think, ‘My company must be worth at least as much as that because my company is better,’ ” said Christopher Sheeren, partner at Huron Capital Partners LLC, a Detroit-based private equity firm. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

How easy is it to overlook diversity in the heat of raising a growing business?

Shockingly easy, Leon Richardson can tell you.

Richardson spent 15 years building his Southfield-based chemical management company, ChemicoMays LLC, only to realize he had a very homogenous staff.

“Even though we’re a minority-owned business, I didn’t have it on the forefront of my mind,” Richardson said. “I had survival on the forefront of my mind. … Read more at crainsdetroit.com

The world is a big place. So it’s hard to picture how to enter an entirely different country, with its unknown idiosyncrasies and expectations, on limited resources. Do you jump on a plane, stack of business cards in your pocket, and hope for the best? Attack the Internet and prepare to send awkward emails? Hire a consultant? … Read more at crainsdetroit.com