Open Writing

Have you ever wanted to own your own business; be your own boss? When I lived in England, almost 40 years ago, it seemed that almost everyone I knew wanted to quit their miserable job and buy a Post Office in Devon, or Cornwall, and a few actually succeeded. Napoleon once sneered that "L'Angleterre est une nation de boutiquiers," that England was a nation of shopkeepers.

The derisive phrase was later taken up by Hitler in World War II, as he paced the shore at Calais, frustrated that his generals had been unable or unwilling to invade Britain. Well, both Napoleon and Hitler discovered that shopkeepers are no pushover. Personally, I never shared the National ambition to sell groceries, or stamps, or whatever, though I did hope, or even at one time expect to have a bright idea that would make me a fortune. But it never happened. After moving to the US, I succeeded in having my own engineering business, but it wasn’t much fun; nor did it bring me fortune and fame.

Most business owners I know prosper only by dint of hard work and diligence, particularly if they created their businesses from scratch. In truth there is no way to a fast fortune except if you’re a lottery winner or get a good stock investment tip. Speaking of which, I read the other day that if you had invested $1000 in Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway company in 1965, it would have been worth $5 million by the year 2000! But who had $1000 to gamble with in 1965?

Given the illusiveness of easy money, it fascinates me to learn of people who, against all odds, turn a failure or a modest endeavor into a rousing success. It’s not so much that they don’t have to work hard, but more that their efforts succeed beyond their wildest dreams, or even their ambitions in some cases. The most recent example I came across was the story of William Chase, reported in the New York Times by Lisa McLaughlin.

Growing up in the English rural town of Leominster, Chase apparently always knew he would follow his father into farming. As a teenager, he worked on the family's Tyrrells Court farm, and in 1984, at age 20, he bought the place from his father with a $400,000 bank loan. Heavily in debt from the start, the farm faltered, and the bank foreclosed the loan in 1992. Chase was forced to declare bankruptcy.

Determined to make a success of his family legacy, Chase leased back part of the farm from the receivers until he could afford to buy it all back, eventually launching Tyrrells Court anew as a potato grower. By the mid-1990s, the farm was profitable, and Chase had set up a successful sideline as a consultant and broker between farmers and major supermarket chains.

But when the supermarkets started squeezing farmers on price by sourcing cheaper spuds from Eastern Europe, Chase knew he had to diversify. "It was time for something new," he says. “Something new” amounted to vertically integrating his operation by turning potatoes into potato chips, if you’re American, and potato crisps if you’re English, and doing his own distribution.

Obviously he couldn’t compete with the major chip/crisp manufacturers so he came up with a more gourmet product that had better flavor, and had the strength to spoon-up cheese dips etc. without snapping. He understandably stays away from supermarkets as outlets for his product, and sells them through specialty food stores. As of the New York Times report, Chase’s products were being marketed internationally, and sales had risen to $10 million annually.

I encountered another such story just before this last Christmas, at a time when toys manufactured in China were being withdrawn from sale in the US due to lead content in the paint they were decorated with. Parents, desperate to find suitably safe Christmas gifts for their children, turned to unpainted wooden toys. Wooden toymakers in America, England and Europe were inundated with orders and went into overtime to meet the demand.

Among the beneficiaries of this windfall was a Mr. Ron Voake, a one-man wooden toy maker, and the owner of Vermont Wooden Toys. “Every time there was a story about a toy recall, I got flooded with orders,” Mr. Voake said. “This year stacks up as preposterous. I’ve never had a year like this, and I hope I don’t have another one.”

Mr. Voake started woodworking in the early 1970s, when he and his wife were teachers in Southern California. The only experience he had was wood shop in junior high school, but where he had to wear a mask because he was allergic to sawdust. He credits his present lack of an allergic reaction to his move to Vermont, and no longer has to wear a mask.

Voake first sold his wares at the Vermont State Craft Center, and later branched out to phone and Internet orders. He taught himself how to make more complicated pieces by experimenting and adding details. He also had three sounding boards — his daughters, who are now in their 20s, and who were never shy about telling Mr. Voake which toys worked and which did not.

Call such experiences happenstance if you like, but a cliché I always fall back on when I learn of successes like these, is that luck is often years of careful preparation that suddenly converge with an opportunity.

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