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Besides the traditional, local, competitive landscape small business retailers must navigate every day, they also feel pressure from two other fronts to which they’re typically less adept at responding:

1. The Big Boxes, anchored around the corner.
2. Cyber-competitors, untethered in the Internet.

And pressure from the second one is increasing every day.

Here are a few ideas on how Main Street businesses can minimize the pressure from these two:

Big Box competitors
Let’s begin with these two...

For 172 years, communication technologies have sought relevance in an increasingly noisy universe.

Now, well into the 21st century, there is actual management pain from an embarrassment of riches of communication innovations. And this discomfort is especially keen when staying connecting with customers: Should you call? Email? Text? How about IM?

And when should you use social media platforms? I’ve had customers who want me to connect with them on Twitter. Others send me notes on LinkedIn.

Bu...

Besides the traditional, local competitive landscape small business retailers must navigate every day, they also feel pressure from two other fronts to which they’re typically less adept at responding:

1. The Big Boxes, anchored around the corner.
2. Cyber-competitors, untethered in the Internet.

And pressure from the second one is increasing every day.

Here are a few ideas on how Main Street businesses can minimize the pressure from these two:

Big Box competitors
Let’s begin with these two t...

This is Jim’s traditional Memorial Day column.

Reasonable people disagree on the origins of Memorial Day, but most accept that the practice of decorating the graves of Americans who died in military service began in earnest during the Civil War.

On May 5, 1868, General John A. Logan, Commander of the Army of the Republic, made Memorial Day official with General Order No. 11, which stated in part, “�� the 30th day of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise...

You may think you’re too cool for “Old School,�� but there’s one thing it produced that you can’t be successful without: the fundamentals. Here are ten essential operating fundamentals that are timelessly, beautifully, definitively, non-negotiably, Old School.

Financial statements: Become an expert at understanding your financial statements. Spend more time with the numbers below the sales line on your operating statement. Non-negotiable.

Budgets: Yuck, right? But operations work best with a t...

“Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun.��

You may know this line as the commercial jingle describing the Big Mac that McDonald’s created to compete with the Hardee’s Husky, which came with essentially the same condiments, including Hardee’s own special sauce.

Over the years, the term “special sauce�� has been re-deployed beyond the burger wars, from condiment to handy metaphor. Management and organizational commentators, like me, have co-opte...

Last week I introduced you to a list of mistakes businesses make when searching for investment capital. The list came from a book by my friend, Andrew Sherman, titled, Raising Capital. As we learned, there’s more to acquiring capital than a business plan.

So now let’s take a look at the rest of Andrew’s list, and, like last time, each one is followed by my thoughts.

Mistake: Not understanding the investor selection process.
Don’t deliver information with a fire hose when a pitcher is preferre...

Small business capital comes from three primary sources:

1. Profits left in the business;
2. Debt, like a bank loan;
3. Equity investment.

For most small businesses the third source is, and has been the founder’s investment.

In recent years, this option has become more robust and multi-faceted in the form of outside investors, whether venture capital, angel investors, and even with crowdfunding. The challenge is developing a capitalization strategy that matches the right sources with the sho...

This is a story about three small business owners who had one thing in common: a wise man named Luther. Oh, by the way, Luther is their janitor.

On Mondays, Luther cleans the offices at National Supply Co., Inc. Sometimes he talks with the founder, Mr. Gilbert.

One Monday afternoon Mr. Gilbert said, “Luther, I don’t know how long I can survive.��

“What’s wrong, Mr. G?�� Luther asked.

“It’s those big-box competitors,�� Mr. Gilbert said. “I’ve looked under every rock for ways to lower our prices...

Spend time in the marketplace and you’ll have many close encounters of the third kind with the most interesting species in all of nature: the human being. And as we have learned, the nature of humans isn’t much different from other animals: All need to breathe, eat, drink, procreate and survive.

But there is something that clearly sets humans apart from other fauna: sentience. And one of the manifestations of being self-aware is that beyond what humans need, they also want.

Every human who o...