Reporter’s Notebook

My favorite blog these days (other than this one, of course) is Get Rich Slowly http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/ written by an “average guy” who used careful research and a lot of honesty to scrape himself out of $35,000 in debt. The blog looks at the psychology of spending and investing and has thousands of readers.

This Sunday’s post by guest writer Tim Clark http://www.soulshelter.com/ makes an interesting point about success in entrepreneurship – it’s not about the entrepreneur.

“It’s about helping others achieve goals you care about,” Clark wrote.
It’s not about the entrepreneur getting rich or overcoming the odds, but about helping people (e.g., customers, clients and employees) achieve their goals. Those goals can be big – helping a neighborhood blossom with a real estate development – or small – protecting one person at a time from the elements with a leather jacket.

A local example of this is Wendy Love, who owns Wendy Love’s Co. – formerly Love’s Leathers – in Ridgefield. She started the company selling duffle bags from the trunk of her car and now has an 8,500-square-foot motorcycle accessories store that’s already close to $1 million in sales this year.

She told me that the business grew as she simply responded to requests for merchandise. She listens to what people want, and she gives it to them. And she takes care of them.

“We position ourselves as their friends … and sales naturally follow as a result of that,” Love told me.

Wendy Love is in a niche market, but I know this idea must be playing out with other entrepreneurs. How has helping people helped your business?


-Charity Thompson can be reached at cthompson@vbjusa.com