Owner, Editor and Author of the Sapulpa Times, Sapulpa, Oklahoma, population 20,000

Angrily, I hit “Send” on the message, certain that I was burning a bridge by doing so, but at this point, I didn’t care.

It was 2015 and I had just spent far too long chasing a deal with a prospective client that went nowhere. Despite literal years of doing favors and having conversations with numerous staff, customers and other interested parties, I had finally gathered enough information to send them a decent proposal, only to receive crickets on the other end. My polite but consistent prodding did not help the situation. I did not get a formal rejection—I got nothing at all. Silence.

Micah Choquette, waiting for news to break in Sapulpa Oklahoma. Photo by Julia Choquette. 

Less than 2 years earlier, I had left a job working for the largest media site in Northeast Oklahoma, where I was doing the best work of my career as a web designer for The Tulsa World. When they were purchased by BH Media in 2013, I made the decision to leave, and we parted ways on great terms.

Even so, I had found at The Tulsa World the intersection of a number of things I loved: The web, design, and journalism. So I eagerly watched for another opportunity to use my skills to do something similar.

In late 2014, the website for my hometown’s local newspaper went down and never came back up. I had been a columnist for them before my days at The Tulsa World, and had kept up a relationship with the folks there, even handling their email administration as a favor to them. The work involved was minimal and I did it purely for the chance to stay in touch.

I emailed the editor and asked for the chance to submit a proposal to give them a brand new website with all the needed functionality to help them provide value to their readers and bring in more revenue. He gave the go-ahead and I got to work. It looked as though those years of doing favors were about to pay off!

Over the next several months, I began having numerous conversations with their staff, their readers and their advertisers. We began exploring what their needs were and how we could use this opportunity to launch them into the digital world in a big way. I met with a team of designers and content producers to ensure that when we did this, we were going to do it really, really well.

Finally, in March of 2015, I had enough to submit a thorough and ready-to-execute proposal. I emailed it over to them and waited with baited breath.

And waited.

And waited.

I checked the address. Did I send it to the right person? Yes. I sent a follow-up email a couple days later. Still nothing.

I reached out to my usual proxies. Had the boss seen the email? Was he mulling it over? Was there something he didn’t like? Something we needed to change or work out? They all assured me he had seen the proposal, but nobody could give me an answer on whether or not he wanted to move forward.

As the days and weeks went by I became increasingly frustrated at his silence. Finally, I could tolerate it no longer and sent a message that told him I’d no longer be pursuing the project and wished them the best.

That final click of the Send button was the point at which I decided to wash my hands of them entirely. There would be no more favors. No more trying to help those that wouldn’t be helped.

But the problem remained: there was no longer an online news presence for the local folks. I really felt an obligation to the community to inform them of what was happening around town, as well as share their stories. So I began to look for another opportunity.

That very day, I turned to a man who had started a Facebook Page writing those types of stories. He was a veteran journalist and publisher who was using his retirement to write feature stories on the happenings in Sapulpa, as well as repost other news and events that folks sent his way.

I asked him if he’d be up for writing his stories for a website so they could be archived and shared around and searched for. He was extremely responsive, and I met him just a little while later to get the details ironed out.

By the way, that conversation? A whole 90 seconds.

Later that summer, he came to me and asked if I’d be willing to run the show on this little adventure we were starting. He was retired, and didn’t want to deal with the headaches of running a news organization, even if it was online-only. I agreed and again, got to work.

A short while later, SapulpaTimes.com was born on August 26th, 2015. There’s been a lot of love and dedication to this project, and a year and a half later, a lot of great things have come out of it:

• We now have four contributing writers, and are able to cover even more territory.
• Our Facebook Page, which was at 3,000 when we launched, now stands at 6,800 and we have growing followings on Twitter and Instagram.
• The community has recognized that we’re here to help them do well, and they contribute to us generously.
• And not the least, we get about 10,000 views a month, roughly 3-5 times the circulation of the newspaper that wouldn’t hire me.

And we are still progressing on this journey! We all take a great deal of satisfaction in seeing our work published to a grateful community. We continue to find new ways to serve, and have a roadmap to carry us for quite awhile.

There are a number of lessons that have been learned in the last couple of years on this venture, some a little harder-learned than others. If you’re looking to find a way to make your passion happen in a way that it will benefit your town, here are a few things to bear in mind.

Look for a way to fill a need that your town already has. This whole ordeal would never have worked as well or as quickly if there hadn’t been a vacuum in the area of online news for my community. With so many directions that I could’ve gone with my skills as web designer and developer, creating Sapulpa Times was the one that made the most sense, and what I was most excited about. Try to find a way to fill a real need that your town has, and once you’ve found it…

Use what you know and what you have. In the world I live in of software engineering, there’s an adage most developers live by: “Shipped is better than perfect.” This means that getting the product finished and out the door is more important than getting it absolutely flawless. Too many people I know are waiting to get all their ducks in a row before they can get started. I’m telling you that if you’re trying to wait for all the conditions to be right, you’re never going to get there! Start now, use what you know and learn what you don’t!

Create and document the processes as early as possible. As you begin to explore this new-fangled idea that your community seems to resonate with, you’re going to find something that you do more than once. Maybe it’s emailing someone with specific information. Maybe it’s answering a certain set of questions for someone who’s interested in your product. Whatever the case may be, as soon as you find yourself doing something more than once, do two things: 1) Create a process to get it done as efficiently and painlessly as possible, and 2) Document that process. Because as soon as you have a repetitive process that will help you get to where you’re going faster, it’s time to move to the next step…

Find other passionate people to help carry the burden. I do not care how small your town is, there is bound to be someone who believes in what you’re doing enough to help you with it, particularly if what you’re doing is to the betterment of the town you both live in. Find and connect with these people, and begin building something larger than you ever could’ve done on your own.

Be consistent and stick with it for the long haul. It’s important to find something you have the passion for, because trust me, there are going to be days you don’t want to keep going. But it’s like John Maxwell says, “Motivation is to get you going, but discipline is to get you growing.” There is very little that you can do consistently that will not begin to produce results at some point. Running a website like Sapulpa Times is a 7-days-a-week job, but I still do it faithfully, because I know that as long as we are continuing to push out content and provide value, we’ll continue to grow and do new, better things, and in turn impact our town that much more.

Ditch Witch equipment can be found all around the world, but it all comes from one small town: Perry, Oklahoma. Photo by Stephen Greene on Flickr.

How do utility lines get underground? Everything from water, sewer, cable, fiber optic, phone lines, natural gas and even electric lines have to be laid under streets, through yards and beneath buildings. Those lines are laid using a trenching machine. That type of equipment, and an entire industry of manufacturing it, was invented in the 1940s by a small town company, Charles Machine Works.

Their Ditch Witch brand trenchers are used all over the world, but they are all still made in Perry, Oklahoma, population 5,000. Today, they’ve diversified into many other related construction equipment lines, and the company is still owned by the founding Malzahn family and the company’s 1300 employees.

Proud of their small town roots, the company website says, “the majority of our employees past and present have brought to their jobs the grit, work ethic and pride of ownership that come from growing up in rural America.”

Read more about the company on their website, in Orange Blood.

This article is part of our new series, Small Town, Big Company, where we profile companies that have started and stayed in small towns even while they’ve grown far beyond their local market. If you know a company we should include, hit reply or mention it in the comments below. 

You’ve seen the Jiffy Mix boxes in grocery stores a thousand times. But did you know they come from a small town? Photo by Becky McCray.

If you live in the US, I’ll bet you have a Jiffy Mix in your kitchen cabinet right now. I have three. I counted. Even if you don’t, surely you recognize the iconic blue boxes with their simple branding, even though Chelsea Milling Company doesn’t spend a dime to advertise them.

Chelsea, Michigan, is a city under 5,000 people. In 1901, locals started a traditional milling company, the kind of flour mill every small town used to have. Today, Chelsea Milling is still locally owned, still thriving and still producing dozens of kinds of mixes that are found on store shelves and in commercial kitchens all over the country, generating revenues of $100 million per year.

Chelsea Milling Company takes pride in paying decent wages, supporting their community, and caring about everything they do. Just like you’d expect a good small town company to do. They routinely get press attention for these “outdated” values that are suddenly back in fashion in business today. Read “7 Reasons This Muffin Mix Can Save America” as an example. (It’s really good.)

And make some Jiffy corn muffins. They’re really good, too.

This article is part of our new series, Small Town, Big Company, where we profile companies that have started and stayed in small towns even while they’ve grown far beyond their local market. If you know a company we should include, hit reply or mention it in the comments below. 

One of the goals of SeaTurtle Sports was to get more people interacting and playing together in the real world “offline.” Photo used by permission.

Guest Post by SeaTurtle Sports Co-founder Allen Bell and Allison Goldman, Director of SeaTurtle Sports

Allen and Jeanne Bell launched SeaTurtle Sports in New Orleans, Louisiana, in 2003 to design and manufacture premium beach and backyard games. As its founders, we observed a lack of new ideas in the category and what we felt was an unhealthy shift away from traditional “offline” interaction among family and friends.

In 2011, with the success of our first product, Beach Bocce Ball, we moved from a hobby to operating as a full time business. Over the course of the last two years, we relocated our headquarters and warehouse from New Orleans (already a second or third tier market) to the even smaller town of Pass Christian, Mississippi. Pass Christian is a unique southern town, and much like New Orleans, remains fragile, still rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina leveled it in 2005. We knew the move would come with its challenges, but it has also provided our company with significant advantages and unexpected benefits.

Our experiences in post-Katrina New Orleans prepared us to look past the perceived obstacles to see new opportunities. Here, we’ve isolated what we found to be some of the distinct operating advantages that can be leveraged to grow your business in a small market.

The problem in small business

A recent article appearing in a national business publication described a rapidly growing craft brewery approaching $5 million in sales with 35 employees, but barely breaking even and the owner still unable to quit his day job. In 2006, Visa USA reported that small businesses account for nearly 30% ($4.7 trillion) of commercial spending in the U.S. The point of these references is, that while achieving profitability may be elusive and challenging, even operating out of a small town, there is a huge market for small business products and services. Keeping an eye on minimizing your operating costs from the outset will pay dividends as you grow your business and hopefully your profit margins as well.

The small town advantage

SeaTurtle Sports warehouse and shipping operation. Photo used by permission.

If we told you that you could reduce your business’s operating costs by 50% or more, would you consider our suggestion? We have seen a dramatic decrease in operating costs by moving our headquarters and storage facility to Pass Christian. We had assumed that we would be able to lower our monthly expenses, but we didn’t realize by how much and in so many functional areas of the business. As one example, we have been able to double our warehousing space while reducing the cost to half of what we paid in New Orleans.

Another example is the opportunity cost of operating a business out of a home versus in an office or house in an urban setting. Compared to either big city solution, using a second or third bedroom in a small town to operate a business represents a fraction of the housing expense versus a big city.

A third example is the use of virtual staffing in small towns. Often times there simply isn’t an expert with a specific skill set required to complete a project located in your small town. Virtual staffing is a way to reduce overhead costs, have multiple team members completing projects simultaneously, and decrease the cost of bundled services.

Smaller towns also have better, low-cost options to try out pop-up retailing for product-based companies. Towns often put on annual festivals meant to showcase products developed in their own towns and to share with the community and surrounding communities. Often at a cost of around $100 for a weekend of retailing, these small towns offer a chance for a company to get a lot of local exposure, support, and sales with virtually no additional costs. SeaTurtle Sports has leveraged these cross-market opportunities in the past with ROIs upwards of 500%.

Lower cost and flexible leases on retail space in town centers are another way to trial pop-up retailing without having to pay for the respective costs of retailing in larger centers. Both of these pop-up retailing options allow you to get close to you customer, request real-time customer feedback, and receive great word-of-mouth PR.

The larger benefit

With any business, no matter its location, challenges and hurdles come up unexpectedly. However, you may find, as we have, that your sense of connection in a small town will not only help your business meet these challenges, but can help it thrive. In turn, over time, your personal and professional investment in a small town can have exponential impact. The ultimate reward is developing a highly successful business that becomes one with the community it calls home.

Thanks to SeaTurtle Sports for this guest post and the accompanying photos. 

In this vintage 1990’s photo, Mike Cronin was just getting ready to take Gettysburg Flag business online.

From Upstate New York town to Global Marketplace: How we got our flags off the ground

Guest Post by Mike Cronin

My business, Gettysburg Flag Works, is a manufacturer of flags and flag-related items. Although we love our brick and mortar operation, we realized that we needed a digital presence in order to remain competitive. Our first website launched in 1999 and was more a digital business card than an online retailer. For us at that time, though, having a website made us feel like a “real” company.

We’ve been part of the fabric of our upstate New York community for many years, and our employees are like family. While patriotism isn’t disappearing any time soon, maintaining a business in a small community is a challenge for lots of business owners. However, especially because of my unique product line, I have been able to make a successful transition to online, while still maintaining my business’ home base. What this does is not to detract from my retail store; it provides an additional revenue stream so that I can continue to grow all aspects to my business.

For us, the leap was exciting, but a little scary. Because of the nature of our business, going online meant exploring a host of considerations that we’d never had to consider. For example, we had to suddenly worry about time zones and shipping costs. Customers would come to us at all hours of the day and night with requests, and we had to have the manpower and know-how to be prepared. We definitely made some mistakes, made some apologies, and started to make some money.

What did we learn from the experience of taking our business online?

What we “learned” was something we already knew, but working in a different sphere made us appreciate it more. We learned that business is business.

Our online customers want good service, to talk with a human being if they have a question, quality products and fair prices. Ultimately, isn’t that the same as what our walk-in customers want? We think so. Since we already know what our customers look for in a business, we just had to adjust how to give it to them in a different way than if they’re standing in front of us. We had to figure out the best way to show customers and prospective customers what is unique about Gettysburg Flag Works. If they’re coming to us, rather than going to the competition, then there’s a reason for that.

When we started online back in ‘99, e-commerce was just starting to hit its stride. Today, the platforms make it easier and less expensive for you to dive in to what truly is a global marketplace.

Want to share your small town business story?

Contact me.

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Fargo, North Dakota, tech startup co-founders Brandon Medenwald and Bill Burgess.

Simply Made Apps is a tech start-up based out of Fargo, North Dakota, population 110,000. They reached out to us because although that’s not really a small town, it is definitely rural and remote. Co-founder Brandon Medenwald talked about what it’s like to run a high-tech business in an isolated small city, far from the “usual” startup centers.

What has been a challenge about your location?

Hiring is definitely a challenge. North Dakota has an extremely low unemployment rate, so the few programmers living in the area already have jobs. Remote employees are a possibility, but as a start-up it’s not necessarily a good idea to use valuable resources to fly applicants in for an interview. Maybe once we’re more established we can hire someone just based on a few Skype conversations but right now that is very risky. A bad hire would just set us back too far.

There is very limited access to investors so we are bootstrapping all the way. Although, we’ve heard our fair share of venture capital horror stories, so maybe that’s a blessing in disguise. ;)

Surviving the freezing cold winters. Seriously though, running a start-up is stressful enough without having to worry about shoveling snow, bad road conditions, and dead car batteries.

What is actually easier or better about being in Fargo?

The cost of living is ridiculously low compared to Silicon Valley and other popular areas for tech start-ups. That means we can pay employees less and we can rent office space for not a lot of money.

It’s such a supportive community. It seems like everyone we share our story with wishes us the best and wants us to succeed.

Going back to hiring, a few of the schools in the Fargo/Moorhead area offer various technical and engineering degrees. We just hired an Android intern who’s attending classes at NDSU.

How have you connected with other rural/sorta rural start-ups?

The small business community is pretty strong, but definitely more centered around brick and mortar shops. Within the last couple of years, the tech startup scene has really started to unfold. Fargo just held its second annual Start-up Weekend, there’s a monthly networking event, and probably a couple more things I can’t think of off the top of my head. There’s definitely potential for more tech start-ups if the community continues to foster those kind of events.

Thanks to Brandon from Simply Made Apps for talking with us, and to Michelle Vasicek who helped coordinate our back-and-forth. 

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MP3 download: Gregg McLachlan mini interview

Gregg McLachlan built a nation-wide resource site in Canada from his cabin in the woods using dial-up internet access. He told me how in this short, 3 minute interview.

I was struck by what a great lesson he had for any business struggling with limits and for any people struggling with an industry that is dying or at least changing around them.

Catch up with Gregg at Work Cabin Communications or on Twitter as @GreggMcLachlan. Or take a look at his Canadian environmental jobs site, Work Cabin.

Transcript of Gregg’s comments:

I’ve spent 22 years in media. I’m actually from the city of Toronto, and I moved down here 23 years ago. In 2007, I realized that the media business was changing dramatically. So it was time to look for a Plan B.

I looked at what were the things that connected me to a potential business opportunity. I live in the forest, do a lot of work in the forest. I’m an amateur naturalist and wildlife photographer so I decided, OK, there’s an opportunity here to look at the environmental jobs business, because there was a real void in Canada for how you find those types of jobs. I could deliver that service and be genuinely authentic because I’m part of that community. I thought, let’s give it a shot. That’s what I did.

I live in a community of 200 hundred people. I have a 30 acre forest where I live. When I launched the business in 2007, it existed on dial-up for several years because the forest blocked a lot of the signals.

The world doesn’t know that you’re on dial-up. They access your service. They don’t know the behind the scenes. It ran fine; it ran smoothly. We had broadband come in several years ago, so now I can get my signal going up, rather than through the forest.

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Caleb Pollard

I’ve never met Caleb Pollard in person, but I am constantly pulled in by his positive view. Recently, he moved from working as an economic developer to building a brewery. It’s more than beer; it’s building something that will last. And that’s something worth drinking to. Drop by Scratchtown Brewing to get acquainted.

Why this podcast exists

If you’re “just a business owner” or “just” someone in a small town, you often feel like you’re the only one. Either the only one with a positive outlook or the only one who is trying to create change. The whole point of this podcast is to bring all of us together. You are not alone.

That’s why I’ve started interviewing people who share my positive view of rural. To keep this going, I need to know who you think I should talk to. Who else shares a positive view of rural? You? A friend? Someone you know? Give me your suggestions in the comments.

You can subscribe in iTunes through this link. Or you can subscribe manually to this feed: https://smallbizsurvival.com/?feed=podcast

You can view all the Positive View of Rural Podcast episodes here.

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Cascade Supply Lumber and Builders Supply. The locals know where Skiyou is.

They aren’t kidding about “You name it, we got it.”

The owner, Don, told me that a customer may come wanting three things. If he doesn’t have any one of them, the customer is just as likely to leave empty handed, knowing they have to make a trip to the big box store half an hour away. While I was there four people came in with varied requests, and Don met them all. That’s how you survive in a small town.

Since he’s owned the store for less than a decade, he’s still something of a newcomer in town, or so he says.

Don is the owner, and knows where everything is.

Being in the Cascade Range, fishing and hunting and camping are big around here. Don supplies them all, including the firearms. After a rare break-in, they’ve had to move the guns into a safe. They did keep the rock the thief used to smash the window, though. And they still sell ammo, too.

I found about four things I’d been looking for, but didn’t have room in my carry-on to take any of them home. Next time, I’ll have Don ship it for me. He said he would.

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Guest Post by Joel Bennett

Coworking spaces have been touted as great resources for small businesses and entrepreneurs who are looking for a place to call their own.  Although they can be found across the world in large metropolitan areas, many entrepreneurs don’t expect to find them in their local small town.  But that is changing quickly.

Co-working at Veel Hoeden, in Pella, Iowa.

Veel Hoeden was launched in October of 2010 in Pella, Iowa, population 10,000.  Our focus was to provide a space where local small business people and entrepreneurs could work and collaborate in an environment that felt more professional than a coffee shop, more interactive than a home office, and more interesting than a table at the public library.

As we researched coworking spaces, it was hard to find examples in towns our size, but with a little digging we found a few popping up in towns of less than 25,000 people to benchmark.  In the 6 months that have passed, even more have hit the radar and are carving out a spot in their local towns.

If you think a coworking space would be a great venture to start in your small town, here are 5 things to remember as you start the journey.

1. Prime the Pump.  Gauge interest in a coworking space by talking to other small business people who currently work out of their home, their cars, or as “mobile warriors” in coffee shops and other local wifi hotspots.  Then talk to those who are starting new ventures, dabble in part-time businesses (like makeup, jewelry, and cookware consultants), or anyone else who has a small business dream and the drive to chase it.  Don’t limit yourself to “white collar” workers or service companies.  Talk to people from all different fields and occupations that share a need for what your space can offer.

2. Ask Questions. Now that you have folks interested, make sure you understand what they want. Wifi, a place to spread out with their laptop, and access to conference rooms usually rise to the top, but ask you members before assuming that is what is needed.  Many spaces go overboard early buying printers, copiers, fax machines, and other “nice to haves” that rarely get used. Save your money and buy what is on their “have to have” list and upgrade later if the need arises.

3. Focus on Community First, Space Second. When I say community I don’t mean the town you are in, I mean the relationships built between your members.  Don’t get me wrong, you have to have some sort of space to have coworking, but the space doesn’t define the community, the community defines the space.  Find every opportunity before and after startup to get the group together— talking, networking, collaborating, problem solving, laughing and even playing together.  The stronger the community, the stronger the coworking space, and strong coworking communities work together to make sure they survive and are successful.

4. Do the Math. Before you launch, know what it will cost to run your coworking community.  Draw up a budget with all of your expenses.  Drop in who has committed to working in the space and how much you’ll bring in for memberships.  Talk to other coworking communities on what they spend their money on so you don’t get surprised (for example, we were shocked that we spend more each month on toilet paper than printer paper).  If the numbers work, move ahead.  If not, circle up your group again and see what you can come up with.  It may mean building up your community more by utilizing Jellies, sharing space in someone’s home or at a local business, or other “creative” arrangements until you build critical mass for your own space.

5. Be Resourceful. You can spend a lot of money outfitting your space with all the newest stuff…just to find yourself closing in 2 months because you’ve run out of cash.  Instead, talk to your members about what they can bring to the table.  Most have some of the office furniture, supplies, and equipment needed to start sitting in their old home office or in storage.  And since they’ll be working with you, they’ll usually be more than happy to share their stuff with people they know and trust (see #3).  Our members wanted a professional yet eclectic space to work in (some would call it whimsical), so we were fine with mismatched (but nice) furniture and unique decorating items because it brought our character into the space. If you don’t have it at home, check out thrift stores, garage sales, auctions, and places like Habitat ReStore for great deals on nice items.  You can always upgrade these items as better pieces become available or as you have some buffer in your bank account.

My hope is that more small towns will look at coworking spaces, and with the right preparation, take the leap of faith to start their own.  If you are interested in taking that next step, lean on the global coworking community to help you make it a success.  Then make it your own.

While serving as the fulltime Executive Director for A Call To Serve Ministries of Iowa, Joel is also the Chief Dreamchaser for Veel Hoeden, a coworking space in rural Pella, Iowa.  His passion for connecting people and ideas serves him well in both capacities.

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