Turning Points: When Did These CEOs Smell Success?

For many successful businesses, there is that moment when their founders realize that their business model is working – that they have struck on a product or service that is in demand and their company is headed for great growth. The Business Journal spoke with the chief executives from five companies on the 2009 Fastest Growing Private Companies list to find out when that point came for them. Sandy Stein Alexx Inc. Manufacturer of Finders Key Purse Accessories Turning Point: Four months into our business we grossed a million dollars straight out of the shoot. It came really quick. I attribute it to a good product. It is functional, cute and priced right. I have a very unique sales team. None of them knew what they were doing. It was a bunch of my flight attendant friends. I had no experienced sales personnel. We believed in the product and it moved. When you solve a problem and solve it in a cute way with an inexpensive product you are successful. Matt Fay Bamboo Pipeline Landscape and Plant Material Wholesaler Turning Point: It was in our second year. In the first year we did $1 million (in revenues) and the second year we did $3.3 million. We saw rapid growth. Word of mouth was taking over at the time and we were getting more well known. We refined our marketing message and method and that was working. We relied quite extensively on direct mail. Our customers are identifiable – licensed contractors and designers – so getting a list was not difficult. There was a combination of direct mail and word of mouth. The other thing was we have had a web presence from the earliest day, which is an anomaly in the green industry. A lot of the marketing brings customers back to the website and that is a complementary method to communicate with our customers. Tom Bailey Providea Conferencing LLC Video Conferencing and Audio Visual Provider Turning Point: This is a second go around in this business. I was an original member of a company called Viewtech that went public in 1995. We got out of that opportunity and decided to do it again in a different way. The idea was to follow a cell phone model where we would provide the equipment and service on a contract commitment basis. We did $10 million in revenue the first year (1999) then went flat and have been going up ever since. Honestly we knew we had a winner from the get go. In the last four to five years video conferencing has taken off. Cisco buying Tandberg and Logitech (International) buying LifeSize Communications really validated the technology. When Cisco buys into it you know it’s for real. Therese Tucker Blackline Systems Financial Software Turning Point: We started in 2001 and almost disappeared in 2004 and nearly went out of business. Then we came out with a new product and that is the one that is growing like mad. We did realize (by March 2006) we had a product with an enormous market in front of us. There are companies that do certain financial activities in Excel that could do them much better and faster in our software. We added companies like Chrysler, eBay and Costco and we were on the way. We had this great product that was validated by these big names. Cliff Warner Thinkwell Design & Production Designers and Producers of Exhibits and Themed Attractions Turning Point: By year three we started to realize we were developing a process and our team of people really had something special going on. We were already focused on themed entertainment, and at that point we went from the concept stage to development stage of a large museum tour for the Jurassic Park Institute for the education component of that brand. We were creating a 50,000 square foot traveling museum, with 20 animatronics dinosaurs…that we were able to accomplish on a tight schedule with a minimum budget. We said, ‘We know what we are doing.’ It started to make sense we could offer our services and be able to take what we learned and offer them to museums, corporate branding world, and special events. What was becoming popular were mixed use projects with an entertainment overlay. We started getting involved in that as well.