Helping Businesses Grow & Succeed
In Florida, 60,000 Florida companies are exporting $55 billion in goods and services overseas. Small businesses account for 66 percent of all those exports. The exporting process may seem daunting but if you have a product or service with a proven track record in the domestic market, you may be […]
Last year, the Category 5 Hurricane Michael caused $18.4 billion in estimated losses in Florida and severe devastation for thousands of small businesses. Listen to Panhandle business owner Ben Kaempfer, general manager of Cottondale-based Register’s Meat Company: “We lost $35,000 worth of inventory because we weren’t able to refrigerate it. Our employees […]
Before he opened his retail store, Eric Wooden designed his own line of urban graphic t-shirts on nights and weekends and sold them from the trunk of his car. On weekends, Wooden attended trade shows and knocked on a lot of doors of Miami retailers, finally winning his first wholesaling […]
When Corina Jimenez’s doctor in Venezuela urged her to cut dairy from her diet, she explored options for satisfying her sweet tooth. She didn’t like what she found out there – eating healthy shouldn’t mean sacrificing taste, she believed. So Jimenez did what others in her entrepreneurial family would do: […]
Siri, find me a story about voice searches for small businesses. This year, the chatter in small business marketing circles is moving from SEO its VSO (voice-search optimization), as it should be. By next year, more than half of all internet searches will likely be voice searches, using AI-enabled assistants […]
An interesting young company offering franchises for the first time might sound like a sexy opportunity, but buyer beware. With franchising, you are buying into a proven business model – it’s one of the key benefits of franchising. Because 70% of startup companies fail, your risk rises fast with younger […]
It’s a growing problem: Small businesses are getting in over their heads with debt, often brought on by the use of online lenders that typically charge higher rates and can require shorter payback periods than banks and other alternatives. Because traditional bank loans are difficult for many small businesses to […]
Sometimes there is nothing better than learning from the stories of entrepreneurs in the trenches. Suneera Madhani did not set out to build a fast-growing financial technology company. She was working at a merchant payment processor and was surprised by all the complaints in the industry. After doing a lot […]
Think your business is too small for “HR” processes? Think again. It’s understandable that your growing small business is sharply focused on accelerating sales, managing cash flow and, of course, serving your customers. But with growth comes the need to hire, and with that comes the burden of complying with […]
Small business owners, what keeps you up at night? If it is finding workers or managing your debt, you’re not alone. Finding qualified workers to fill open positions continues to be the top worry of Florida’s small business, according to a Florida Chamber of Commerce’s Third Quarter Small Business Index […]