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Beth Ewen:
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by Beth Ewen

JUST WHEN the economic news was getting too glum to bear, I started in early January calling dozens of local small-business owners, to prepare stories for this print edition and our March edition of Upsize Online.

I started perking up right away, and I hope you do, too, as you read their stories and gain ideas to apply to your own businesses.

Motorola and Best Buy and Andersen and Ecolab are announcing mass layoffs, it’s true, along with many more. But dozens and dozens of smaller businesses are making plans, predicting growth, looking for opportunities.

You could say some of them are in denial, like the Wayzata boat dealer who characterized a staff reduction from 40 to 18 as a motivating boost to productivity for those remaining. But I prefer to say they are in “entrepreneurial.” They just never, ever give up.

That in fact was the credo of the late Curt Carlson, the legendary Minnesota entrepreneur whom Marilyn Carlson Nelson recalls in an uplifting interview excerpted in this issue. (Hear the full interview, in her gentle and distinctive voice, at dev.divistack.com.)

She brings some perspective to today’s economic woes. Curt Carlson, after all, started his company in the 1930s, at the height of the Great Depression. He nearly lost the company several times, she says, and built it through the second World War, the turbulence of the 1960s.

He then handed it over to her, his daughter, who went on to shepherd Carlson through the disaster of 9/11/2001, what she calls a defining moment for her hospitality empire that tested the culture and proved it to be an inspiration.

“People were creative, people were imaginative, people were empowered. And after that there was a certain pride,” she says. We can make it through this economic slump, too, she figures.

Jeff Fritz sees opportunity in all the bad news. He’s on his fourth startup, Storyworks Media, having succeeded in the previous three, most recently selling

Lighthouse1 to an independent bank holding company in Fargo. In January he brought on Mike Bingham as CEO. Bingham is famous for starting eBenX and eventually selling it for $100 million.

“I lean more toward seeing this as a time of opportunity for guys like me,” Fritz says. “When others are playing defense, I can play offense, because I can go faster.”

Capital markets have changed, he admits, and he figures there will be fewer people on the periphery of his industry willing to invest in his new venture. But the flip side is those who understand his business have likely pulled their money from the rollercoaster Wall Street and would rather bet on two known local entrepreneurs.

Bonnie Harris, who owns Wax Marketing, a public relations firm, offered her take on why she’s just enjoyed her firm’s best year yet, which she attributes in part to two things that she sometimes feared would put her out of business.

She charges 60-70 percent of what others charge, she says, making her the go-to firm when customers cut budgets. And, she donates 10 percent of her firm’s time to pro bono projects, always, in good times and bad.

I like her philosophy, even though it’s corny. “Every morning when I go to work I try to remember two things. I remind myself how grateful I am for the work we have, and I make a re-commitment to doing the absolute best job I can for our clients on a daily basis. That’s my little morning mantra in the car.”

Don’t you feel better already? Keep reading Upsize to continue your recovery.

– Beth Ewen
Editor and co-founder
Upsize Minnesota