Archive for April 2011
Finding Sunken Golf Balls Via Camera
Eric Schwartz was 8 years old when he began to wonder why golf ball retrievers did not come with underwater cameras. He was golfing with his grandfather that day, and he told young Eric to write that idea down. It has been many years, and according to The Palm Beach Post he is making that [...]
Peter Wooldridge’s two sons enjoy the benefits of their father’s job, but baulk at the idea of one day following in his footsteps. You see, Wooldridge Senior is a Tupperware salesman and can well appreciate his boys’ aversion to joining the family business. “They’ve grown up with Dad selling tupperware,” the Adelaide man says with [...]
Big Business In iPhone Accessories
For a company as innovative as Apple, you would think their iPhone, iPad, or iPod devices would use some color in their cables. They may not, but Laurens Laudowicz saw an opportunity to make a little money selling colorful cords that device owners could use. Laudowicz launched his project and posted it on Kickstarter for [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: April 29
1882 – The “Elektromote” – forerunner of the trolleybus – is tested by Ernst Werner von Siemens in Berlin. 1953 – The first U.S. experimental 3D-TV broadcast showed an episode of Space Patrol on Los Angeles ABC affiliate KECA-TV. 2004 – Oldsmobile builds its final car ending 107 years of production.
Surviving Entrepreneurship While Pregnant
If you thought being a mom-entrepreneur wasn’t hard enough, you should try being a pregnant entrepreneur. Darla DeMorrow has published a book outlining advice and tips for the mom or mom-to-be that is trying to run a business while fitting in everything else in between. She tackles the topics that many moms do not consider [...]
Perhaps this is a message best read via teleprompter. ABC News reports that the inventor of the teleprompter, Hubert J. ‘Hub’ Schlafly Jr., died last week at the age of 91. His device not only helped change the way news reporters read the news or actors acted, it is even used to help the president [...]
A Bookstore That Only Sells One Book
At a small bookstore in New York City, if you’ve seen one book, you’ve seen them all, because the shop only sells one book, Martian Summer: Robot Arms, Cowboy Spacemen, and My 90 Days With the Phoenix Mars Mission. The author rented the small retail space to promote his book for a few weeks. The [...]
Adam Cahan has a success story that many people dream about. Three months ago he launched IntoNow, an app that allows people to share what they are watching on television. He recently sold IntoNow to Yahoo for between $20- $30 million, reports Mail Online. Mr Cahan has now been made a new vice-president at Yahoo! [...]
Erica Ehm has done a lot as a busy mom, but now she’s working even harder as a busy mom helping other moms through her Yummy Mummy Club, a website run solely by moms, reports The Globe and Mail. There are 10 staff members and 25 bloggers who submit articles on a regular basis, including [...]
Through the years people have found some interesting places to hide things. Sometimes it is money stuffed in a shoe or sock or even a well hidden wrist money pouch. ArchPort is giving customers yet another option: in the sole of their shoes. ArchPort has created a unique shoe that allows you to hide card-sized [...]
9 Year Old Reinvents Under-The-Fridge Duster
According to NJ.com, Alicia Petrany saw a problem and decided to fix it. The under-the-fridge dusting device her family was using just wasn’t doing the trick. Rather than settle for what they had, she decided to make a new one that would do a better job gathering up dust bunnies. “A clean refrigerator uses less [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: April 28
1869 – Chinese and Irish laborers for the Central Pacific Railroad working on the First Transcontinental Railroad lay 10 miles of track in one day, a feat which has never been matched. 1930 – The first night game in organized baseball history takes place in Independence, Kansas. 1932 – A vaccine for yellow fever is [...]
Do-It-Yourselfers Turning Into Inventors
Danny Kleinman does not fit the stereotype for a hacker. He’s clean, social, and even has a girlfriend. Yet, according to The Herald, the electronics in his living room are all hacked. Aiming his smartphone at a lamp, he controls the light with the volume controls. Up, on. Down, off. He tells his TV “Discovery [...]
CNN Money: If you’re reading these words through bifocals or progressive lenses, your life could change in June. That’s when a company called PixelOptics in Roanoke, Va., plans to release emPower, a line of electronic eyeglasses that let wearers toggle between two prescriptions, with settings for close-up and distance vision. The new emPower glasses are [...]
Mompreneur Guides Fellow Moms Through Business And Life
Kathryn Bechthold never felt quite like she had the balance thing worked out. On the first day she was set to do her first media appearance as the publisher of Mompreneur magazine, her baby daughter got sick. She had to find a last minute babysitter willing to care for her. That moment left her with [...]
Turning Lobster Shells into Golf Balls
You’d think I’m a golfer with all of the golf related stories recently. This one came out of the University of Maine: Golfers on the high seas can breathe a little easier — and so can the marine life around them — thanks to researchers at the University of Maine. In conjunction with The Lobster [...]
Build a Better Golf Ball: Win $10,000
The Alternative Golf Association today launched the $10,000 Longest Golf Ball Challenge to inspire inventors and engineers to add fun for players of its new game, testing under the name Project Flogton (“not golf,” backward). AGA founder Bob Zider, himself an inventor of Flexon eyeglass frames and golf clubs, conceptualized and funded the challenge to [...]
Business Ideas from Twitter: Ribs and Rubs
New business idea: Rubs and Ribs. Massages while eating ribs. @BuffaloJohnny
Former Football Champs Launches Crepe Restaurant
MyFoxBoston: You’ll remember him as key member of the New England Patriots. Former linebacker Matt Chatham has gone from flattening running backs to flattening crepes. The three-time Super Bowl champ just won a prestigious business MBA business plan award from Babson College, which will help launch SkyCrepers. Chatham’s business is an innovative new fast-serve crepe [...]
Niche Biz: Pot Supplies Vending Machine
It seems there is a vending machine for everything now-a-days. There’s a machine that’ll make you a pizza in minutes, the vending machine that’ll let you break ceramics, and even one that will dispense live crabs. With the rise of medical marijuana, it should come as no surprise that a vending machine for smoking accessories [...]
Debi DeShon used to train dogs to sniff for drugs and other contraband, but as the economy slowed she looked for a new niche. She found on in mussels: At her new business she’s using some of the same techniques she used to “Mussel Dogs” is DeShon’s new detective venture, and She’s training dogs to [...]
Discovery.com: HydroBOB is an underwater scooter that lets riders explore their underwater life aquatic without any diving or swimming experience necessary. The yellow apparatus is currently available to rent at Ft. Lauderdale’s Hydrodome. A $25 one hour package lets riders explore the mysteries of the deep…the deep end of a swimming pool that is. Unfortunately, [...]
Closed Super Market Opens Itself Up For Business
A grocery store in New Zealand was scheduled to be closed for Good Friday last week, but no one told the computer system that controlled the lights, cash registers, alarm and door locks. Bright and early Friday morning the store opened it self up and within minutes shoppers started arriving. Within three minutes the public [...]
It is a safe bet that almost everyone loves a good sandwich. The proof is in the success of big box sub shops like Subway. There is another contender in the sandwich business that is ready to elbow its way into the spotlight. That business is Capriotti’s. Capriotti’s is a specialty sandwich shop franchise. Their [...]
Weird: Chinese Street Sweeper Invention
If you attach a handful of brooms to a rotating drum and then drag that behind the car, will the streets get cleaned? There’s a video here. Yes they will.
Today in Entrepreneurial History: April 26
1956 – First container ship left Port Newark, New Jersey for Houston, Texas. 1958 – Final run of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad‘s Royal Blue from Washington, D.C., to New York City after 68 years, the first U.S. passenger train to use electric locomotives. 1981 – Dr. Michael R. Harrison of the University of California, San [...]
Spring is finally here! While you’re doing a little spring cleaning in your home, Savannah Morning News has a few tips that will help you spring clean your business, too. Clean up your excess inventory An easy place to start cleaning may be with your inventory. If you are a retailer, you should analyze your [...]
Super Mom In Business And At Home
Not many people can see themselves raising nine children. Even less would start a business too. However, Robyn Pellei not only runs a successful business and cares for a large family, but she home schools each one. Needless to say, she is a busy woman, but she is also very driven in what she does. [...]
Cleaning Up The Community Laundry
With a life of drugs, crime and incarceration long behind her, Shantae Holmes has found a new life as an entrepreneur, reports StarTribune. Holmes has started a laundromat called, “All Washed Up.” It had been years since the last laundromat closed its doors in that area, and she felt it was time to bring a [...]
Their techniques may have changed a little, but the general principles of the con atrist remain the same as they were when this article from a 1930s issue of Popular Mechanics: Recently a middle-aged man walked up to the teller’s window in a small mid-western bank and asked to be given a fifty dollar bill [...]
Advertising: Only Visible When Wet
Fresh Green Ads: “Fresh Green Ads has developed a Raincampaign for Sea Life Scheveningen. Every time it rains the octopus of Sea Life Scheveningen appears on the streets and out of public drains and man-hole covers with its tentacles holding the text: ‘Sea Life laat je niet meer los’ (Sea Life never lets you go). [...]
If social media has taught entrepreneurs anything, it is an important tool in connecting with customers. The educational system realizes that too, reports US News. With millions of users on social media websites like Twitter and Facebook, business schools are becoming acutely aware of just how important it is for them to teach their MBA [...]
Weird: A Restaurant for Plants
You can’t get a seat at a new restaurant in Sacramento, California unless you have roots and live in a pot. The Photosynthetic Restaurant serves filtered sunlight in various combinations to to plants. Wired has the story: “My recipes are all based on the scientific study of plant physiology, applied to the fine art of [...]
What happens if you do not have enough room to bring your surfboard to the beach? C4 Waterman considered that problem when they launched a line of inflatable surfboards, paddleboards, and rescue equipment. Their inflatable line of gear makes it easy for people to transport it to the beach, where they can inflate it, and [...]
Divorce is Up With the Economy
The US divorce rate is seems to be a macabre indicator of the economic health of the country. The divorce rate that fell as the country slipped into recession is rising again, according to the Financial Times. “There is huge pent-up demand,” said Marshal Willick, a Las Vegas matrimonial attorney, who has noted an upturn [...]
Video: How They Built the Model-T Ford
The Model T Ford single-handedly brought us from a horse and buggy era to one where we had machine running on gasoline engines. Using a moving assembly line Henry Ford was able to manufacture one in about a tenth of the time it took to build other vehicles by hand.
Wife, mother, and life-long crafter, Susan Miller, would appear to be a busy woman. However, she has added another job to her list: entrepreneur. According to Franklin Lakes Patch, Miller designs a variety of jewelry pieces that are all inspired by mother nature. Miller wove together her interests in jewelry design, crafting and the natural [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: April 25
1859 – British and French engineers break ground for the Suez Canal. 1901 – New York becomes the first U.S. state to require automobile license plates. 1938 – U.S. Supreme Court delivers its opinion in Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins and overturns a century of federal common law. 1939 – DC Comics publishes its second [...]
Time To Hire A Social Media Manager?
Entrepreneurs have a ton of tasks they need to complete each day, and almost never enough time to do it all. Unfortunately, this kind of business schedule does not do much good for your businesses’ social media presence. Business Insider believes if you do not have enough time to keep your online presence fresh, it [...]
Do you love golf and inventing? Project Flogton is looking for you. According to Inventor’s Digest, the project goal is to help inventors create a golf ball that will fly farther the average ball for long distance shots. The Alternative Golf Association launched the $10,000 Longest Golf Ball Challenge to inspire inventors and engineers to [...]
Women Entrepreneurs Paying It Forward
For the women in the Women Who Barter network, business is not dog-eat-dog. According to Powder Springs-Lithia Springs Patch, these women utilize a pay-it-forward attitude to help fellow women in the business world succeed. Our intent is to support every type of business owner, whether you are a mompreneur, seniorpreneur or well-established company of any [...]
Beauty Student Finds A Need In Wigs
Cancer has always been around Rachel Fortin. Her mom and many of her relatives suffered from the disease in some way. So, when a friend and former boss lost her hair during chemotherapy, Fortin found a way to help, reports Morning Sentinel. Empire participates in a national program called “Look Good, Feel Better,” where wigs [...]
They’ll Paint Your Home in One Day
When Brian Scudamore, President of 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, recently hired a company to paint his home he was so impressed he bought the business. That’s the whirlwind story behind 1-800-GOT-JUNK’s brand new sister company, 1-888-WOW-1DAY!, a fresh face offering a big promise: to paint your entire home in one short day. Formerly known as One Day Painting, [...]
) Men In Kilts, a window and exterior building cleaning company, has taken their kilted lads down south. CEO, Tressa Wood comments, “We’re very excited to bring the Men In Kilts concept to the US and open our first franchise location in Seattle; it’s the perfect city to launch in as we begin our US [...]
Huggies MomInspired Financing Mompreneurs For Another Year
Aspiring mompreneurs once again have the opportunity to receive some funding through the Huggies MomInspired program. The program awards money to deserving moms with inventions or ideas that are inspired by motherhood. At a time when American entrepreneurs are credited with starting the most businesses – more than half a million per month – than [...]
Successful Entrepreneurs Are ‘B’ Students
Who is an ‘A’ student anyway? They’re the best in their field. They know a lot about one topic. They are also not a representative of the entrepreneurial world as a whole. While they know a plenty, they do not know enough about everything. Business Insider takes a closer look at the comparison between grade [...]
Baby Boomers Seeking New Careers As Entrepreneurs
Early retirement ended Chuck Salley’s career as a sales and marketing executive. That is not stopping him from reaching the ranks of entrepreneur, though, reports Westport News. Salley, 69, is one of many baby boomers pushing into new fields through TechTown, a business incubator at Detroit’s Wayne State University. Nearly a third of people attending [...]
It seems that you can combine anything with coffee and make a business out of it. A Oregon woman has started a coffee and dancing establishment: Darlene Chapman isn’t looking for Dancing with the Stars competitors at her new business, Jitterbug n Java. She is looking instead for music lovers who want to socialize, drink [...]
A WAVE Of Better Solutions For Your Home
What if you could improve many areas within your home? Would you want increased water efficiency in appliances, like your washer? How about better air quality? These are all questions that WAVE Home Solutions would like you to ask yourself. After all, it is their solutions that will make all of those improvements a reality. [...]
Video: How They Made Books in 1947
