The investors come bearing money and with promises of relevant expertise and a glide path to that elusive next level. Should entrepreneurs believe them?
At 21 Hats, we’re not going to tell you how to run your business. But we are going to publish news articles, Q&As, webinars, and podcasts that feature business owners speaking frankly about what it takes to build a business.
Like a lot of business owners, Laura is very good at a lot of things — but intimidated by her financials. It doesn’t have to be that way.
It’s easy to get excited thinking about geographic expansion. But for Citibin, at least for now, there’s no place like home.
This week, Laura Zander, Diana Lee, and Dana White all share big news. Laura tells us that she and her husband/co-founder Doug put in a bid to buy a building for their business in Reno—and she’s not sure how she feels about the fact that their offer was accepted. Diana explains why she’s decided to pay a fortune to take over space vacated by glitzy magazine company Conde Nast in Manhattan’s Freedom Tower, a move that required her to put down a $2 million security deposit. And Dana tells us that she’s had preliminary conversations about opening Paralee Boyd salons on U.S. military bases around the world, which prompted Diana to encourage Dana to start vetting investment banking firms: “I'd be like, ‘Here's the contract with the Army. Give me the money so I can scale this out.’”
Rob Dyrdek—high school dropout, professional skateboarder, reality TV star, founder of the Dyrdek Machine—has learned a lot of entrepreneurial lessons since getting scammed the first time he started a business. For example, he never starts a business unless he sees a clear path to the precise outcome he has in mind.
Both Jeff Taylor and Jim Kalb run companies with employee stock ownership plans. Jay Goltz is thinking about implementing one — but he’s got questions, such as: Where does the money to buy the company come from?
It’s not always about marketing. Sometimes, the real issues go deeper. Sometimes, before you can figure out how to sell, you have to figure out who you are.
Brent Beshore likes to say of the businesses he invests in, “Boring is beautiful.” It’s one of the things that sets him and his firm, Permanent Equity, apart. He runs a private equity fund with more than $300 million in capital, but he’s not really a private equity guy.
