From Humble Beginnings

Like every entrepreneur, I was so excited when I decided to make the jump.  I had rented an old house on Whitsett Street in Greenville SC, I had an office telephone number, and my desktop Gateway computers were on the way!  I had this grand vision of what my office would look like based on too many years of watching Dallas as a child and LA Law as a college student, and as you may guess, reality was a bit different.

My first day in my new office, May 22, 2002, looked something like this:

• A newly painted office….bright yellow paint on grasscloth wallpaper
• A folding chair that could have been stolen from any church basement
• A padded blue card-table that I borrowed from my mother and father, which had been used at our last Thanksgiving celebration
• A fax machine roughly the size of a Fiat…the old faxes that actually had telephone receivers on them (which was helpful since I had no office phones yet)
• A Dell laptop that I had charged on my credit card
• A Nokia cell phone, in case I couldn’t get the fax receiver to work

I had no assistant.  I had no coffee machines or copiers yet.  I had no rugs, so the hardwoods echoed like an empty warehouse.  I certainly wasn’t JR Ewing or Michael Kuzak (those of you too young to remember those names, Google them right now).

But it was mine.  And I was thrilled beyond words.  I was ready to get to work, and later that same day, I had my first client.  I was off to the races, and I was certain that nothing could stop me. 

What is Start-Up School?

Start-Up School was an idea borne out of a desire to work with an under-served segment of small business owners….the start-ups.  

The dilemma goes a little like this:

CPA firms like long-term relationships with guaranteed cash flow.
Entrepreneurs seldom begin a business with guaranteed cash flow.

So, CPA firms typically shy away from start-ups because of that very reason.

Anyone who has attempted to start a small business knows they have limited resources with which to work. They are also aware that there is no real guarantee of consistent cash flow. But, since they are new, they know that they are going to need some help and advice.

Help and advice are generally found in a variety of different professionals, and most of the time, they aren't free. And free advice that you Googled or asked your neighbor about, may or may not be right for you.

But, all successful businesses had to start somewhere, right?

There had to be a way to work with start-ups that would give them what they needed, which was a chance. It is very hard for a start-up to commit to a long-term relationship with a monthly fee. Especially if they don't know if they will be in open in six months.

As a knowledge-based business, we can't just give our service away.  We would never ask another business to do that.  We would never advise a client to do that. 

Then, the real question jumped out at us.  Can we add knowledge capital and value to a start-up so that it has a chance of long-term survival without making the entrepreneur commit to a long-term relationship with us?

Yes, that is something we can do. That is something we would like to be a part of.