maryshepherd

What do you do when you are ready to grow or change your business model but aren’t exactly sure how?

This is the question that Laurie Hall found herself asking in 2019.

As one of the founding members of Southwest Farm Fresh (SWFF), she had seen the cooperative grow and change over the years. However, five years after its founding, the business was about to make a dramatic shift by going online.

In 2014, Southwest Farm Fresh started as a marketing distribution cooperative owned by local farmers that focused exclusively on wholesale by aggregating food from member farms and selling to restaurants and a few grocery stores in the Four Corners. This model worked, but the co-op consistently struggled to match supply with demand, since many of the farms were small and had limited capacity.

“After a few years, we started offering a CSA (community supported agriculture program), which evened out the supply and demand issue by offering large quantities to wholesale customers and smaller quantities to local retail customers,” Laurie says. “While this did help, we still found ourselves struggling to provide the minimum quantities that kept our customers happy.”

Then, in winter of 2019, the board and operations manager took a deep dive into the recurring issue of supply and demand and started looking for ways to achieve a profitable, viable business, given the constraints.

They began looking at creating an online market, but they quickly realized that they needed advice. Laurie says, “We contacted the SBDC and started working with their Holistic Ag Consultant, Cindy Dvergsten. Cindy is amazing; she has such a knowledge of agriculture in our region. She has deep expertise and is a great source of information about business planning.”

When Laurie told her that they were striving to achieve more balance in their business through an online market, Cindy helped them look at regional areas of Southwest Colorado and determine which population centers could support online purchasing on an individual basis. Together, they ran numbers and discussed which product offerings were most in demand, their operating costs, and what they could cut to make their methods more efficient.

“She really helped us think through what our options were. At the time, a lot of us were too close to it to be completely objective. Cindy really helped us tremendously by opening our eyes to possibilities we hadn’t considered, which allowed us to fine tune our direction going forward.”

After much research, Southwest Farm Fresh decided to make the dive into the online market, which seemed like the best of both worlds. With an online store, farmers could individually upload what they had available from week to week, greatly reducing the supply and demand issue by offering what they had rather than trying to make early season promises about what they were likely to have (which, due to natural causes like fire and drought, often changed as the season progressed).

After making the decision to go online, they dropped the CSA and intensive attention to wholesale markets and put their energy into an online market. Within a few weeks, COVID began to sweep across the United States, bringing with it a myriad of lockdowns, regulations, and closures.

“In retrospect, it was the best decision we ever could have made, even though none of us knew what was coming; it was luck of the draw,” Laurie says. “Cindy helped us understand the region’s strengths, which ultimately turned out to be the saving grace of Southwest Farm Fresh. Last year, we did more sales than any year since we started; we felt pretty darn good for making the decision to take our business online.”

Southwest Farm Fresh has just started their second season of the online store, and so far, it’s going well. They are curious to see how getting back to “normal” will affect their online business. They realize that they may not see the same numbers as 2019, but they are confident and optimistic.

At the end of last year, Laurie and her team started looking for ways to grow the business further. Instead of focusing exclusively on companies who produce agricultural products in the raw, they are also looking at other industries, such as cottage and canned goods. They are anxious to broaden the scope of what they consider an appropriate business member of the cooperative—not only to increase the bottom line but also to have more products available to sell, allowing their customers to complete all of their shopping in one location.

If you’re running a business and looking for ways to grow, Laurie has this encouragement, “Do as much as you can to look at all the options; don’t just rely on your own history or what you think might or might not work. The consultations with Cindy helped us create a viable business strategy that was very different from what we had done in the past. A professional consultation with someone who really knows the area and understands the business can make a world of difference!”

Coworking, or flexspace, is all the rage in the era of remote work. After all, what better way to build professional relationships than by sharing a workspace?

But, what if there was a flexspace designed specifically for coaches and therapists? And, what if that coworking space had a full team who could provide mental and physical health services? To make it even better, what if it had a full time administrative assistant who managed all referrals, appointments, insurance, and billing?

The more Stacy Reuille-Dupont thought about this idea, the more she wanted to make it a reality. Sure, it was something that had never been done before—at least not in Durango. But why should that stop her? After all, she was a professional psychologist with her own private practice. Her background in exercise management and physical fitness had opened her eyes to the power of integrative care. She had seen excellent results from combining nutrition, massage, acupuncture, and behavioral health, and she wanted to be able to provide all of these services under one umbrella.

Stacy decided to take her idea to the SBDC, where she met Carl Malmberg. Together, they began to flesh out how this concept would work. He spent time reviewing the business plan and asked all of the hard questions, which helped her articulate the business model in a way that could eventually be marketed. They also used the SBDC’s fiscal spreadsheet to get an overview of various financial scenarios.

Stacy says, “Carl was super instrumental in picking apart this concept. He helped me create a foundation of how it would work from a business point of view. We completed tons of different predictions, walked through scenarios, and got a robust look at the overall concept. It helped me develop a foundation for communicating who we are and what we do.”

Through this process, Stacy decided to call the facility Studio B because it is a place where you can be whoever you want to be—or where you can just be. It incorporates body and behavior as well as methods for living a balanced life. The word studio was incorporated because people come to create the life they want.

From a practitioner point of view, Studio B has it all—an office space, a private gym, a shared administrative assistant, and an opportunity to cowork alongside other outstanding coaches and therapists.

After months of planning, Studio B launched in July 2020—right in the heart of the pandemic. Initially, they had trouble acquiring the equipment they needed, and throughout the past year, have had to open and close to comply with local health directives. The practitioners have utilized Telehealth extensively, but they miss the in-person sense of community.

As the Studio approaches its one year anniversary, Stacy and the team are looking forward to fully opening the studio and can’t wait to start hosting events such as social skills coffee houses, wellness intensives, sober curious happy hours, and more. “It’s a place where everyone loves to be,” she says.

Stacy hopes that other entrepreneurs will see Studio B and be inspired to launch their businesses too. “Develop that passion and do it—then get help,” she says. “Launching this business was so much better than my previous experiences because, thanks to Carl Malmberg, I knew the resources that I needed to have in place before agreeing to start it.”

Some people adore yard work.

Others prefer to leave their lawn care to the experts, so they have the freedom to go play.

It is on this principle that Durango Lawns was founded. Although he is an electrician by trade, Pat Cass spent many of his early years working in lawn maintenance. He enjoys working outdoors and staying physically active, and for years, he dreamed of starting his own lawn company. Finally in 2019, he and his wife, Cyrilla, decided that it was time to make the dream a reality.

To get the ball rolling, they enrolled in the SBDC’s Starting Your Business Workshop. “The workshop was super helpful; we were so glad that we did it before embarking on this journey!” Cyrilla says.

They began conducting market research and learning about the local business opportunities. Soon, they discovered that a local lawn care company had gone up for sale. They were immediately interested in buying it.

Cyrilla met with Carl Malmberg, the SBDC’s financial consultant. Together, they analyzed the financials and management side of the business. “We needed a way to understand the numbers better. It turned out that it wasn’t a good fit for us. We realized that it would be better to start our own smaller business and grow from there. This way, we didn’t have to put in as much capital in the beginning.”

Although the decision to launch their own business was purely financial, they soon realized that they loved the idea of creating their own company from scratch. Pat is friendly and personable, and one of his main focuses is building personal relationships and providing high quality service. “By starting our own business, we were able to connect with customers in a more personalized way, earning their trust as we went along ” says Cyrilla.

Pat and Cyrilla decided to launch Durango Lawns, a company that would focus on becoming Durango’s experts in lawn care. They planned to provide all lawn maintenance services including mowing, aerations, and spring and fall cleanups.

By February 2020, they were ready to go. Everything was in place to launch the company at the end of March. Then, the pandemic hit. “We returned from a spring break trip to a complete shutdown. We struggled to decide if we should still launch the business. Ultimately, we just decided that our work would be outside, and we wouldn’t be in close interaction with people on a regular basis. We determined that we could safely operate, so we went for it.”

Since they weren’t able to attend any in-person networking events, the couple had to make some dramatic adjustments to their marketing plan. They pivoted by increasing spending on their Google ads, which turned out to be highly successful.

As the season progressed, the business continued to grow. By December of 2020, Cyrilla realized that she needed to upgrade the company’s bookkeeping system, and she once again sought out the SBDC. Although SBDC was not offering its regular QuickBooks (QB) classes, Cyrilla was able to meet with Amber Davis, one of the QB trainers. “She helped me a ton,” Cyrilla says, “I had no idea how complicated QB was; she really helped get our whole business set up in just 5 or 6 sessions. Even now, she makes herself available to answer all of my questions as I go along. I’m so grateful for her help!”

Looking forward to 2021, the couple is anticipating continued growth. During their first season, Pat completed all of the lawn care maintenance on his own because he felt it was important to build strong connections with his new clients. This year, they are looking forward to bringing on their first part-time employee. Once again, the SBDC has been an invaluable resource. “Hiring an employee is overwhelming; we had no idea where to start. Mary met with us and really helped us understand how to navigate the hiring process.”

Although their first year of business was nothing like they imagined, it turned out very well, and the couple is proud of succeeding at launching the company. Cyrilla encourages other prospective business owners, “Go for it. It’s scary at first because it feels so risky, but in the end, it feels really good to work for yourself. Before you launch, educate yourself on business basics, and have your ducks in a row. Use the SBDC; they have been a tremendous help to us. They have an amazing team of consultants who want small businesses to survive and thrive.”

In 2011, Erin Neer had finally found a solution.

Erin, who is a CPA, was working as a finance director for a municipality in Colorado. During her tenure, she began to see that many municipalities, cities, counties, and states throughout the country were struggling to streamline their tax collection and licensing processes for businesses within their communities. Most jurisdictions were using antiquated methods that involved manual calculations, paper coupons, extensive mail processing, and frequent runs to the bank.

This resulted in frustrated business owners, overworked staff members, unpaid fees, and a myriad of other issues.

The more Erin analyzed the situation, the more she realized that there had to be a better way.

She decided to create an online nexus to connect businesses and jurisdictions in the simplest, most streamlined way possible.

With MUNIRevs, businesses can log in to the system and take care of anything they owe the city. Jurisdictions can use the powerful processing tools to manage compliance through integrated automations and a full suite of reporting and auditing tools.

Throughout the pandemic, the need for MUNIRevs has increased dramatically. Since 95% of their process is electronic, jurisdictions no longer need to manually sort through mail or deposit checks. Instead, the entire collection process can be completed online with very little hands-on management; it’s a turnkey solution for every type of government entity.

“One of the most exciting things we’ve done in the last year is deliver new revenues through our system,” Erin says. “This applies when local jurisdictions form an economic nexus, and it has made a really big difference in terms of volume of revenue that we’ve been able to collect for the communities, all while making it easy for businesses to comply.”

Today, MUNIRevs provides services for the Colorado Department of Revenue, all of the cities in Alaska, and more than 90 other jurisdictions across the country. They even provide support for businesses in the jurisdictions they manage. When business owners have a question, they can reach out to MUNIRevs for an answer, which takes one more thing off the jurisdiction’s plate.

When she launched her company in 2011, Erin met several helpful advisors through the SBDC. “Gary Masner, who went on to form SCAPE, was crucial,” she says. “SCAPE has been integral in our growth. It introduced me to really great investors and board members, which helped MUNIRevs grow. We are really lucky to have so many robust experts in our community.”

Erin encourages other entrepreneurs to pursue depth of knowledge before launching a product and to get advice from local resources. “I really do believe it’s important to know your industry deeply before you launch a product. If you don’t know your industry intimately, you can’t invent the right solution. Get depth first, then find someone who resonates and get their advice. Don’t hold your cards too close to your vest.”