Home Biz Comes Naturally

As proprietor of three home-run businesses — TLC Kennels, Ceres Greenhouses and Sophisticated Baby Gifts — Barbara Gile needs the space, reports The Ithaca Journal.

“I opened the kennels 15 years ago,” she says. “It was just a temporary home for people’s pets if they were going on vacation, or couldn’t take care of them.” Beginning with modest ads in the Yellow Pages, there are now days that Gile has as many as 40 dogs under her care. The business helps pay for the household’s utilities.

Gile isn’t afraid of jumping in. From revamping a bankrupt Candor grocery store in 1984 to setting up two hydroponic greenhouses in her backyard in 2001, Gile’s gentle, smiling demeanor conceals an innate sense of business. “You just have to have common sense, and be willing to put in the time.”

Her greenhouses produce tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers, which she and husband, Oscar, sell at the Ithaca Farmers’ Market every week. “The recession has made things a little harder, yes, but at least I don’t have to worry about getting laid off,” she says.

Gile’s recent foray into e-business, Sophisticated Baby Gifts is an online store for baby products such as clothes, blankets, toys and diaper cakes — basic baby supplies packaged in attractive ways — as well as gifts for parents and siblings.

Customers make their purchases online, and Gile forwards their orders to various wholeslaers around the country, who then ship the products within two days.

All she needs to run this business is a computer with Internet access; for someone as accustomed to physical labor as Gile, it’s like “being on holiday.”

Photo by The Ithaca Journal.

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