Page 55 - 597 Business Ideas You can Start from Home - doing what you LOVE! (Beginner Internet Marketing Series)

44 Your I dea, I nc.

The venture may succeed or fail, but either way, you still have to go
to Thanksgiving dinner." This is funny, but true. You want to find
family and/or friends who want to invest in you and your product
because they believe in you and feel you are competent and likely
to succeed. You don't want to have to talk business and show your
accounting books every time you attend a family function. Choos­
ing a lender is very important and should be considered on these
emotional levels, too.

If they can do it,

Sf) ttut ff)U!

Mark and Stacy Andrus pinched pennies and l ived a frugal l ife­
style to put everything they had i nto their Stacy's Pita Chips busi­
ness, which started as a sandwich cart in Boston in 1 997. The cart
was so popu lar that when long li nes were forming at lunchtim e,
they g ave customers their homemade pita chips to keep them
ha ppy whil e they waited. I n 1 998, they gave up the cart and took
a leap of faith-they moved i nto a building to manufacture the
wi ldly popular Stacy's Pita Chips. They bought used equipment,
drove old cars, and cut pitas by hand u ntil they knew they could
afford automation. As of 200 1 , they had $370,000 in bank and
federa l loans to operate their business, which became profitable
that year. They acqu ired large cha i n-store accounts a nd began
to private label their chips for Trader Joe's. PepsiCo. bou ght
Stacy's Pita Chips i n 2005 as sales approached $60 m i ll i o n .

U tilizing Your Bank

Though business lending is extremely tough to come by, don't
ignore your local bank's options. For example, if you have a good
relationship with your bank, when you open your business check-