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My last corporate job was at American Express, where I worked almost exclusively on products and services for small businesses. It was there that I developed a serious case of entrepreneur envy.
The investors come bearing money and with promises of relevant expertise and a glide path to that elusive next level. Should entrepreneurs believe them?
It’s easy to get excited thinking about geographic expansion. But for Citibin, at least for now, there’s no place like home.
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.
My COO would say that I have a bad history when it comes to purchasing inventory. And he would be right. In one of the reports he created upon joining the business last year, he showed 26 “months of supply” for a particular product for which I had had high hopes. I called it “planning for success.” My COO called it “overstock.”
As I look to scale, I’ve become curious again about selling in Costco. But it does raise some questions: Should I knock off my own product with a lower-priced version? What exactly would I have to do to get into Costco? And how would this help or hurt my brand?
I once hired a publicist who got some nibbles from target publications but was never able to close the deal. Eventually, he reluctantly shared with me his back-and-forth emails with those publications, and to my dismay, I saw that his pitches were weak and definitely not worth the $5,000 a month I was paying him.
Early on, Stack learned to see recessions as opportunities, using each one since 1983 to buy assets, shift strategies, and transform the business. And now he's doing it again.
