From the Publisher:
When my first child was born, it was the most remarkable thing I had ever witnessed. It was a miracle. It was beyond comprehension.
For a very brief moment (I was very, very tired) I actually wondered if anyone else on the planet had experienced such a thing. That thought lasted a nano second. Turns out every parent on the planet equaled my feat.
The exceptional can be commonplace. We all know how hard it must be to write a book. Then you walk into Barnes & Noble and see thousands upon thousands of titles. At Amazon.com you see what must be millions of titles. You have to wonder if it’s really that difficult. Am I the only one who hasn't written a book?
When I started my own business that is a newspaper for people starting businesses. I saw entrepreneurs as a rare breed: One-in-a-million sorts of people.
When doing my research on entrepreneurs and new business formation, it became clear that there is something in our human makeup that leads us to try new things, to improve on old ideas, create new solutions, find a better way or just plain break out on or own.
I think it has to do with freedom. We are free to think, imagine and create. We can see a future we want to pursue. “What a unique gift I must have,” I said to myself, “to be able to imagine something and then make it happen.” Whenever I get full of myself like that, something usually straightens me out pretty quick. This time the National Panel Study of U.S. Business Start-Ups (Babson College, 1999) did the straightening.
Entrepreneurs are still exceptional. But as far as gifts go, it’s not all that rare.
According to the study there were 202 million individuals in the U.S. 18 years of age or older at the time the research was conducted. 3.8% of those contacted qualified as “nascent entrepreneurs.” That means 7,700,000 people were involved in trying to start a business.
More than 44,000 new businesses registered with the State of Minnesota in 2006. More than 26,000 of that number were new businesses in the Twin Cities area. When I share these numbers with other people, there is universal surprise at the sheer number of new businesses sprouting up.
According to one study, Twin Cities startups alone will spend more than $200 million a year just doing things companies do in getting launched: print business cards, find a bank, meet with a lawyer and CPA, talk with a payroll company, get a web site, find a leasing company, set up an office, get their computer and software setup and subscribe to broadband access, etc.
We are all doing something remarkable. And something remarkably common as well.
It's a good thing to keep in mind when you start wondering if you'll survive the experience. It's been done before.
Patrick Boulay
President / Publisher
