Beer, Zipcars, and Band Shirts; All Before Breakfast

• Posted: November 24, 2009
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• Author: Adam
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• Filed under: Uncategorized, Young Professonal
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• Tags: Boston, By, Entrepreneurship, WBZ Business Breakfast

Last Thursday I attended another WBZ Business Breakfast.  Like the last one I went to with guest speaker Richard Branson, this one was on the theme of entrepreneurship in interview format with a Q&A session afterward. Unlike the last one I went to with Richard Branson, this one was a panel setting with four local(ish) entrepreneurs; Jim Koch, Scott Griffith, Mike Teresa, and David Murray.

Jim Koch

Company: Boston Beer Company (Samuel Adams)

Founding Location: Jamaica Plain, Boston, Massachusetts

Years in Business: 25

Jim started Boston Beer Company back in 1984 with nothing more than a family recipe and a “stupid idea”, or so claimed his father. After opening his Jamaica Plain brewery, Jim had some trouble selling to retailers as the state of Massachusetts has a law that a wholesaler could not sell directly to a retailer, a distributor must act as a middle man. Fortunately for Jim, the commonwealth also has a loophole which allows one to become his own distributor. Weeks later, Jim hit the streets with a box truck and a suit pedaling his wear and the rest was history. One quote that Jim had, that really spoke to the early entrepreneur mentality was, “I figured if we do well I will have about 6 months and then I will hire an accountant. And it all worked out.”

Jim’s main business & marketing advice was to first arm yourself with a product that is better or cheaper, if not both, than the competition. Without this initial incentive your market is virtually impossible to reach in any scalable manner. In the case of Samuel Adams, his product was better and within a relatively short time span Jim brought prideful beer back to the United States and single-handedly started the American micro-brew industry.

Scott Griffith

Company: Zipcar

Years in Business: 9

Founding Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts

Scott had some great things to say about what it takes to run a successful business in a niche market and the past and future of Zipcar. Scott explained the initial one-liner of the business plan, bring a better thing to the car market than car ownership, and to “Sell car ownership one hour at a time”. This concept was very city-dweller friendly and the company thought they could ultimately service the close to 50% of the world’s population who lived in cities, as 14 million people live within a 10 minute walk of a Zipcar, Scott cited.  Throughout the life of the company marketing has never been a major investment for them as a concept like this is unique and radical enough to spread organically through word-of-mouth, the best marketing you can’t buy. Scott said he is confident this is part of the reason Zipcar has been able to maintain over 350k members.

In recent years, the company’s financials began to weaken and with the sharp downturn in the domestic economy last year, Zipcar had to make some tough decisions. One such decision was to hold off on expansion into new cities in 2009, leaving many of the nations metropolises vulnerable to competitors entering the short-term car rental business. This paid off however, and Zipcar is gaining financial strength by the day as they gear up to enter the European market in 2010, In fact, Scott baffled much of the audience by claiming Zipcar will ONLY expand into European cities in 2010, leaving the US market free of expansion for at least 2 years,  no doubt a bold move.

Mike Dreese

Company: Newbury Comics

Founding Location: Boston, Massachusetts

Years in Business: 31

"Thank God I didn't go to Harvard. Instead, I went to the trade school down the river." Dreese referring to his time at MIT

With a relaxed posture and a microphone, Mike was definitely the most outspoken in the group. Mike did a fantastic job of outlining the founding principals, basic marketing strategy, and investment mentality that has not only kept Newb’s open, but has allowed it to expand to 26 stores while staying profitable and investing in other businesses while not taking on a single bank loan. One main point he made was that top leadership needs to be transparent, stating, “no company is immune to the trust factor”. Without ensuring that you can be trusted, your market will bail on you the second it gets the chance and this can make or break a business in economic slumps. This is a major part of the strategy that allowed the chain to survive the double-digit-percentage sales drop they encountered in Q4 of 2008. By cutting top management salary by 20% and line workers salary by 2%, Newbury Comics was able to get through the worst sales period in the company’s history without laying off a single employee. They have since been able to recoup losses and raise wages back to their pre-slump rate.

The chain has also taken to social media as a way to utilize open communication and serve as a marketing vehicle while embracing the transparent attitude the company holds dear. Dreese explained a recent “flash sale” they put on featuring buy-one, get-one used cd’s at the chain’s flagship location on Newbury Street. After a single tweet was sent announcing the deal, sales rose over 850% for the four hour sale period and skewed the daily sales for the entire chain 17% for the day!

David Murray

Author: Borrowing Brilliance: The Six Steps to Business Innovation by Building on the Ideas of Others

David was a refreshing addition to the panel as he was able to speak from more of a big picture context as he was not just discussing his business. David could speak intelligently to many strategies he found while consulting and researching for his own book. One concept that really stuck out in my mind was the notion that Ideas are solutions to problems and if you study ideas and how they evolve you will inevitably solve your problem. David pointed out that there are two ways to approach a market; you can start from the bottom up and find people with a problem with which you have the solution (product or service) or you can identify a problem and create a solution. This, along with many of his macro concepts really helped me understand the creative aspects of business that many are quick to forget and others never learn. This reaffirmed my enthusiasm for having taken the Creativity in Business class that Champlain College requires every 4th year business student take.

To be honest I thought David’s presentation was overshadowed at times by the wealth of great anecdotes and advice the other panelists had, but overall, David really added value in many contextual areas.  He’s currently promoting his new book, noted above the picture, I’ll let you know if I read it.

Coda

This presentation was excellent. Not only did I get to meet Jim Koch, a personal hero of mine, I also got free breakfast, did some pre-coffee networking (not the easiest thing, mind you) and got enough advice, stories, and inspiration to write five blog posts and motivate my own entrepreneurial spirit. If you live in the Boston area I highly recommend attending these events that WBZ hosts, I think they happen every 6 months or so.

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