Bedtime Stories for Entrepreneurs:
Inspiring Stories from Clevelanders Who Found Success
Great Lakes Publishing

Running your own business can be scary. Call it life without a net, especially after coming from a “corporatized” work environment, where everything often feels as static and homogenized as a Happy Meal. In contrast, you live and die by the day-to-day of your small business—there are highs and lows, moments of sheer terror and desperation, “buyer’s remorse” and the unabashed absurdity in situations that take a huge left turn when they were supposed to go right.

Therein lies the focus of Bedtime Stories for Entrepreneurs—a book which features Northeast Ohio success stories gathered together by COSE, the 33-year-old Council of Smaller Enterprises. COSE is the small business division of the Greater Cleveland Partnership, one of the nation’s largest metropolitan chambers of commerce, thank you very much. If anyone knows those inspiring business folk and relating their stories, it’s COSE: the council serves as an advocate, facilitator and support system for close to 17,000 Greater Cleveland area small businesses and shows no signs of slowing down.

Bedtime features 31 local businesses, highlighting their humble beginnings, growing pains and nail-biting moments on the edge of the abyss. What’s more, it is a fairly easy-to-digest book with small, biographical stories (hence the “bedtime stories” motif) in a breezy, conversational tone. The book's approach makes you feel like you know each business owner intimately after their tales.

Truth is, you already know a lot of these small businesses more intimately than you think. Find me a Clevelander who hasn’t had Adele Malley’s chocolate-covered strawberries for Valentine’s Day, or at least heard about them...? Or a family who hasn't thought to look for a new bed at the Original Mattress Factory? Or a Northeast Ohio bride-to-be, saved from Bridezilla immortality thanks to Pat Catan’s divine dress selections? Or a beer lover who hasn't enjoyed a pint of Dortmunder Gold from the Great Lakes Brewing Company?

These are but a few examples of area business success stories found here. COSE touches on everyone from the brothers at Heinen’s (who operate their grocery locations with some 2300 employees), to niche small businesses like Morgan Packaging (in business for decades with a staff of up to 10 individuals at one time) to the local barbeque authority Hot Sauce Williams--a BBQ scholar more appreciated by celebrities, pro athletes and entertainers than by Clevelanders themselves.

Reading game master Danny Vegh’s success as an immigrant fleeing the communist regime in Soviet-occupied Hungary is particularly moving; the man is “living the American Dream, from the bottom up” and was motivated to be successful at all costs. Conversely, the chapter on Brulant, Inc. drops Clevelanders into the heart of a Silicon Valley crisis. Their chapter draws out the finer points of Brulant’s survival in the tech market, through meteoric growth and “the dot-com bust,” to emerge a leader in tech consulting. Yup, all in Cleveland.

It’s no secret that businesses are crucial to our future economic development and success as a region. Small businesses create some 60-80% of the new jobs generated in the area annually, according to recent stats. That’s nothing to sneeze at, to be sure. The future of the area literally depends on these entrepreneurs and thousands of others in Northeast Ohio.

Moral of the story: We can't all hold our breath waiting for a large corporate entity to swoop into our fair city like Superman with a capeful of new jobs.

Nothing about owning and operating your own business is ever certain. It takes a special kind of person to live, breathe, eat and sleep their work… and really take the “Someday we’ll look back on this and laugh” pathos to heart, day in and out. Bedtime Stories for Entrepreneurs touches on the entire small business spectrum in Cleveland and could easily be the first of a multi-volume set of books--assuming that was something COSE wanted to do. And they really should consider it.

In the time it took me to write this review, I thought about the local businesses I patronized last week: Great Lakes Brewing Company, Market Avenue Wine Bar, Johnny Mango World Cafe, Music Saves, Heck's, City Buddha, Big Fun, Winking Lizard, Heinen's, quite a few local music clubs... ok, you're right... a tad hedonistic, I admit it.

Now, take a minute to think about all the small and locally-grown businesses you patronize. Only then will you know why Bedtime Stories is a great and important read for all of us, especially those with small businesses, or the dream and the will to start one. And when someone tells you that “this town is dead” for economic success, do be a good doctor:

Tell them to take two of these Bedtime Stories and call you in the morning.

Inspired? If you're focused on growing a successful, profitable, sustainable company through the application of Growth Management, check out the COSE seminar, "Growth Management: Converting Entrepreneurial Passion into Profitable Growth and Personal Wealth." It takes place Thursday, June 22. For more details and registration, or to purchase Bedtime Stories for Entrepreneurs: Inspiring Stories from Clevelanders Who Found Success, visit COSE’s website at http://www.cose.org/

By Cool Cleveland contributor Peter Chakerian peterATcoolcleveland.com

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