Jay Sachetti joined Jeff O’Brien, partner at Husch Blackwell and Dyanne Ross-Hanson, president of Exit Planning Strategies talked about the market for mergers and acquisitions, exit planning opportunities for companies that don’t end up for sale and how companies can maximize their eventual sale price during an early October panel at the first Upsize on Tap event at Summit Brewing Co. in St. Paul.
When the state Legislature passed a law requiring employers to provide paid leave and safe time for employees, Justin Bieganek started hearing differing details from friends, colleagues and peers.
IT'S TIME for all business owners to stand up and thank their lifeline.
You know who I mean: that crucial person you call whenever a crisis or a triumph hits your business.
We’re proud to announce a call for nominations for the second annual Upsize Lifeline Awards. That’s the unique celebration designed to emphasize the role that mentors, advisers, confidantes and champions play in the life of every growing company.
Get a nomination form at dev.divistack.com; click on the Upsize Lifeline Awards logo. Tell us about your lifeline and the business lesson you learned. The nomination deadline is Dec. 10.
So who’s yours? And isn’t it time to publicly say thank you?
Maybe it’s your spouse, who kept a full-time job with corporate benefits while you launched your business.
Maybe it’s your boss, the company founder who’s grooming you to take over one day and helping you finance the buyout.
Maybe it’s your banker, who gave you a loan after 27 rejections and still takes your calls 10 years later.
Maybe it’s your board chair, who never fails to calm you down when today’s disaster hits.
At our debut event in January 2006, seven business owners, selected by a panel of judges, took the stage one by one to pay tribute to their lifeline and share their “best lesson learned” with the crowd.
Then we called up that special person for recognition, and enjoyed what had to be the most emotion-filled business event I’ve had the pleasure to witness.
I mean it: We laughed. We cried, and by “we” I’m including the hardest-boiled entrepreneurs in the audience. Even the president of Upsize Minnesota, the stoic Wes Bergstrom, admits to a surge of feeling if not to a teary eye.
Said one attendee: “It made me proud to be a small-business owner.”
Most business owners respond immediately when they’re asked who helped them along the way.
Many don’t need to be asked. I had a fun time interviewing Steve Schussler, the creator of Rainforest Café, who has now launched the even more enormous T-Rex restaurant and retail chain. His story is in this issue.
But he wasn’t always flush. In fact, his credibility was shot after he had to close his first venture, JukeBox Satuday Night, in 1992. He developed the model for Rainforest Café in his house, a wacky idea complete with dozens of live exotic birds and jungle foliage and tropical thunderstorms, to be mixed with food.
He says he was so broke he’d have to beg the city to turn his power back on every month so the birds wouldn’t die.
Then local business owner Lyle Berman backed him, and they ended up building a stupendous success. “Let me tell you, I am proud of Rainforest Café and proud of Lyle Berman. It’s really cool that we took an idea from St. Louis Park and it’s international,” Schussler says.
Many business owners also say they wish there was a way to recognize those trusted people who often stay in the background, unsung.
Here’s your chance. Show the love. Make ’em proud. Nominate that person your business can’t live without for the Upsize Lifeline Awards.
— Beth Ewen
editor and co-founder
Upsize Minnesota
be***@*******ag.com
