I walked into a local retail shop in Alva, Oklahoma, population 4,000. It’s called Bates & Co., and they are best known for their handcrafted hairbows for infants and kids. But when I walked into their store, they had all kinds of things under one roof: women’s clothes, fashion jewelry, travel accessories and more. It…
I’ve been in business a long time now, from retail to service to ag, and I’ve learned some things about wrapping up one year and getting ready for the next. Some of it I learned the hard way! Whether you run your business on paper, desktop software, mobile or cloud services, there are common tasks…
By Rob Hatch Thirty-six weeks. Part of my process for planning my business for the New Year is to do a little reality check on exactly how much time I have to work with. What are you talking about, Rob? You have a year. Technically, that’s true. However, on closer inspection, I only have 36…
Part of our Global Entrepreneurship Week celebration Nov 13-19, 2023. Guest post by Mike Humphrey, Japan Skiing has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. I don’t know why my parents decided skiing would be our family sport. They were not avid skiers, and we didn’t live in a ski…
Do you tend to panic about a lack of business at a certain point during the year? Do you always feel like you’ll never get enough bookings for the fall? I know several independent professionals who feel like this: a professional photographer who always worries in late summer that there won’t be enough bookings for…
Guest post by Rob Hatch My dear friend John Grossman and his wife Dawn own the Holyoke Hummus Company in Holyoke, Massachusetts. I’ve marveled at how they grew from setting up a small folding table at a local park selling falafel sandwiches to acquiring a cart. Next, they outgrew the cart and bought a food…
Be frugal. One of the Small Town Rules is to spend your brain power before spending dollars. Be creative about how you handle challenges rather than to throw money at the problem. Venture capital vs. Bootstrapped We’ve all heard about startups that have been funded by whatever venture capitalist or angel that has just dropped a…
Small towns have endured boom and bust cycles, commodity crashes, mill and factory closures, environmental disasters and losing their economic reason for existing. Rural communities have reinvented themselves before, and rural businesses are re-inventing the way they do things. How Holyoke Hummus stays Idea Friendly through a crisis John is the owner of Holyoke Hummus…
Glad you dropped in to the rural and small town business blog, established in 2006.
We want you to feel at home, so please take our guided tour.
Meet our authors on the About page.
Have something to say? You can give us a holler on the contact form.
Want to search our past articles? Catch up with the latest stories? Browse through the categories? All the good stuff is on the Front Page.
We partner with campaigns and organizations that we think best benefit rural small businesses.
Copyright © 2006–2026 Becky McCray • Site by Webdancers