Our culture saved our business. Part 1

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According to the latest information I could find on the internet there are 11.6 million women owned businesses in the US- a 54% growth in the last 15 years. With the total number of overall businesses increasing by 9% during that time…it makes the growth in women owned businesses significant in comparison.  They generate $1.7 Trillion in sales and women owned businesses employ 9 million people. (Way to go, ladies.)

Can't win without them in business, either.


You can tell from the stats, that almost all businesses owned by women are small businesses.  Of course, the definition of ‘small’ here, may not completely agree with yours.  ‘Small’ business in governmental statistics is any business that employees 1 to 500 people. 

500 People!  That’s like a small, hungry army that you have to pay every week.  Yikes.  But the facts show small, women owned businesses are an economic engine in the economy and labor force.

My first advice, horrible as it was.
Speaking of employees, when she started the business, I gave my lovely entrepreneurial wife my first sage advice: “Whatever you do, DO NOT hire an employee!” 

Naturally, she immediately hired two, and has since pretty much ignored every bit of sage advice I have given her.  And probably rightfully so.

After the first blush of this turn of events wore off and we got use to the idea of having people around all the time, my wife and I thought we had reached the pinnacle of business!  Look!  We have employees! And they actually show up to the garage EVERYDAY.  Simply amazing.  

But what is new becomes very old, very quickly in the business world.  We were up to nine in no time and we were wondering just how we were going to pay them, keep them, fire them, hire some more, and manage them.

After a few years or so, we figured out that ‘managing’ them was fruitless and decided to try to hire people we didn’t have to manage.  That worked out a whole lot better (but of course, not perfectly) and helped us focus on important aspects like sales, quality control and the back office.

There had to be rules.
Naturally with more people congregating in our garage, there had to be rules.  Rules like, job descriptions, how to store and share hard drives effectively, job ticket transfers, who gets to use what work station for what job, and the labeling your stuff in the refrigerator.  These rules began our journey to find our ‘culture’.

Dear Steve Ferrante- you rock.

Actually, it began when a business associate asked, “So, you have people!  What is your culture like?” Kelly and I looked at each other.  “Well, we try not to drink before 4:30, most of the time..?”  was about all we could come up with.  This started us down the path to answer what turns out to be a very serious question:  Just what is our culture, and is that even important?

Not but two years later, it turns out the carefully thought-out culture we created for ourselves and our team saved our business from going under.  But that’s in the next edition.

More soon.




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