In this issue
	Kutztown SBDC News For the Love of Food and Art The Trend is Your Friend - by Merra Lee Moffitt The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About it by Michael E Gerber Insights to Success

For the Love of Food and Art

Heidi Vandevere, Owner of Vandy's Grill, LLS in Chester County, sure is a busy lady. Not only is she raising two boys, ages eight and twelve, and running a multimedia design company, but she's also pursuing her passion for food and art in an entrepreneurial venture called Vandy's Grill. Vandevere was laid off in 2004 after fifteen years as a senior art director, she decided to attend SEA classes presented by the KU SBDC to help her with a business plan for her multimedia design company, Vandevere Multimedia. She says the SEA classes helped participants get over the bitterness of being laid off. It gave her a chance to talk to other people who had gone through the same thing, and "get over it." The classes also gave her the confidence and knowledge to start her own businesses. Although Vandevere Multimedia takes up most of her time and pays the bills, she says it isn't her real passion. Vandevere's mother is a chef, and Vandevere has been cooking her whole life. In the back of her mind she continued to think of a way to combine her two loves - food and art. She says there is "a lot of art in food." That opportunity started to take shape at a neighborhood barbecue when she agreed to make ribs. She started with salt and brown sugar, which she says really brings out the flavor in foods, and added various spices. Everyone loved them! Click here for the complete article. »

The Trend is Your Friend - by Merra Lee Moffitt

Numbers tell a story if you'll listen carefully. Your business depends on it. Week to week, month to month you can see your business results through tracking the numbers. You track sales, expenses, profits, clients visited, units sold, average selling price, or whatever metrics developed. Some weeks you make a little more profit, some weeks less. Other measures too may frustratingly seem up one month and down the next. But how do you tell if you are on the right track and picking up speed? Compare the trends. By mapping the numbers along a trend line you begin to see the story your numbers have to show. The up and down, zigzag numbers become a trend line that has a flat, increasing, or decreasing slope telling you what progress you're making. This may seem very basic, but the story goes deeper. The trend line also displays whether your profits are increasing faster or beginning to slow down. You can also find confirming evidence as to when your seasonal effects begin and end. Click here for the complete story. Interest Rates and Economic Development Lending What is Available to the Small Business Owner? - Chuck Evans Where is the prime rate going? How can I protect my capital in these times when interest rates are fluctuating? These are questions, the small business owner asks and many times without answers. There are, however, some solutions. The State and U.S. Government have developed loan programs that help create jobs and stimulate economic activity. These loan programs are usually long-term, fixed asset financing vehicles that offer attractive long term fixed rates from 3.25% to 6.25%, fixed for 10, 15 and 20 years. Click here for the complete story. »

The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About it by Michael E Gerber

Reviewed by Dawn Wivell -The E-Myth Revisited is considered, by many of the KU SBDC consultants, to be the best book ever written for small business owners. Gerber, the author, takes the reader along with him as he works through the challenges of Sarah, the owner of All About Pies. He explains to Sarah and the reader how many of the commonplace assumptions actually get in the way of running a successful small business. Gerber begins by discussing the three roles every small business owner must play - the entrepreneur, the manager, and the technician. He contends that many new small business owners get stuck in the technician role, because that's what they know how to do. He calls it the fatal assumption - "If you understand the technical work of a business, you understand a business that does that technical work." Sarah, for instance, spends all her time baking pies - the technician role, neglecting the other two roles because baking is what she knows. Click here for the complete story. »

Insights to Success

Insights to Success is a monthly article sharing challenges/learning opportunities encountered by our clients every month relative to their day-to-day business activities. All Insights to Success articles come from our clients' submittals. The format for the piece consists of a brief introduction, the respective challenge, and the solution. It's Not Just About the Cheese Dealing with change should be more than a reaction -By Dan Goldberg Ok, I read it, me and at least a million other people, maybe even you. Who Moved My Cheese? by Spencer Johnson is a wildly successful little book about change in life and in business. It's a parable about two mice and two little people whose cheese is no longer in the usual place and how they handle the enormous adjustments it brings. Hmmm-interesting. How many of us have had our cheese moved right in the middle of enjoying it? Well, if you have than you know that perhaps you should have seen it coming. Change can be a lot easier to deal with if you take time to check out the landscape on a continuous basis before the change actually occurs. Years ago, American automobile manufacturers had this country all to themselves. I'm sure, as the corporate organizations they were, they had no inkling that over the horizon the Japanese and Germans were getting ready to take over a major share of the market. Certainly, some individuals within the "Big Three" knew something was up, but the entities as a whole felt that they were secure. Click here for the complete insight. Please Email your Insight to Success articles to the Success Connection Editor Dawn Wivell at dwive093@kutztown.edu. »