Carry on No Matter What Happens

I am certain that there must be an entrepreneur somewhere that had everything go along exactly as planned. I’ve never met that person but I’m sure that they must exist.

The type of small business developer that I have always met is more like me. They have had to adjust to almost any change that comes along and carry on like nothing really happened. While cases of this abound we’ll use Phil to illustrate this particular point.

Phil loved sports. He was a jock of no small accomplishment himself. He hung out with others who also loved to grunt and get dirty together in pursuit of nothing serious. He worked for years as a fireman and saved his money to buy his dream, a sporting goods store.

Now Phil was a guy who believed in manly arts. He boxed and played softball and hockey in the winter. He had been an all star hockey player in high school. He even went to Notre Dame on a hockey scholarship but grew homesick and left after one year.

Eventually Phil met his match. He found a woman who wanted to own a business and married her. They put together their resources and started a small sporting goods store in a building near the high school that Phil attended.

Phil kept his job as a fireman. That turned out to be a good thing. The storefront they had chosen had some hidden liabilities. Some old wiring was hidden from the inspectors under a plasterboard facade. Phil never noticed it nor did any of the other people who should have caught it.

The store opened with a great promotion. One of the local professional hockey greats agreed to make an appearance. That same week Phil had scheduled visits from the local baseball announcer and a couple of other notable sports figures.

That night, after the grand opening, the gremlin in the store worked late. Phil was off duty but heard sirens off in the direction of the school. The store was burning merrily when he drove up. I know he had to feel despair at that point. But Phil carried on with a little help from his friends.

The publicity around the fire made a lot of people aware of Phil’s new business and what had happened. A local TV station put together a real nice story about the destruction of Phil’s lifelong dream. The local newspaper also gave Phil a lot of good press.

Phil put up a big tent in the parking lot the next day and moved all of the water and smoke damaged stuff that was recoverable into the tent. He held a fire sale and sold a lot of the remains of his stock.

The insurance paid for rebuilding the store and a part of the cost of replacing all of the thousands of dollars of really ruined stock.

Phil’s friends took up a collection, held a couple of sporting events and got together enough of a bundle to pay for the rest of the replacement stock. Phil was back in business within a few weeks. Everyone knew where his store was because of the fire.

Today Phil and his wife are retired. Their son still runs the store and has expanded it to four new locations around town. He’s a fireman in his spare time. I guess you could say he’s a chip off the old jock.