Small Business Revolution. Barry C. McCarthy

you.

      I believe strongly in how businesses, no matter the size, impact their communities. One of the things we talk about a lot at Deluxe is that we champion businesses so their communities can thrive. When people ask me what that means, I tell them our goal—and frankly it should be everyone's goal—is that businesses, no matter where they are located, have the help and resources they need to thrive so their communities can thrive.

      The best way I can explain it is through an example from the reality TV show Deluxe produces called Small Business Revolution. Throughout this book, I share examples not only from the many customers we have helped in the past 100-plus years, but from the first five years of the series itself. Our concept is simple: we pick one small town or community to receive a $500,000 makeover from Deluxe, and we help six businesses and the community with business advice and physical makeovers.

      In the first year in Wabash, Indiana, as we worked with the town, one business owner shared with us that he didn't see the point of what we were doing. He said the only businesses benefiting were those featured on the show. Yet a few weeks after his comments, his landscape business was hired by the city to build a new park on an empty lot downtown. Our team, in working with the community of Wabash, asked what needs the town had for aesthetic improvement. One was to improve this one corner where a burned building used to stand. So, Deluxe provided the funds, helped create the look, and then hired this small-business owner to bring the vision to life.

This small-business owner was able to build this beautiful park and pay his workers and himself, who in turn invested those dollars in other small businesses, and the cycle continued. He changed his tune when he saw that every dollar that goes into a small business—no matter where it comes from—in turn, cycles through the community in so many different ways. The small-business ecosystem sustains itself with each new dollar that comes in. Only when business succeeds are there funds for roads, schools, parks, health care, and more. In this way business is the core of a community's success.

      That's why this book exists. After more than 100 years helping small businesses, we have learned a few things that can help your business, that can keep you on track or get you thinking differently about your next steps. In the following pages, I hope you'll find the advice, knowledge, and encouragement to follow in Mr. Hotchkiss's footsteps. Because when you do, it's not just you who benefits—our communities and country do too.

1 The Small Business: You Are a Very Big Part of America

      YOU'VE JUST PICKED UP this book and you're wondering if it's worth reading. The way I figure it, I have roughly 60 seconds before you decide, one way or the other. So, allow me to make that task unusually easy for you.

      If you're a small-business owner, you are most likely working yourself to exhaustion on most days (and weekends). You have basically no time for your family, and you feel bad about that. But you're trying to support your family and community through your business.

      The problem is that you've plowed your savings into your business and also may be close to maxing out your credit cards. You may not even be paying yourself a salary at this point, because you put yourself last in line. You care so very deeply about your employees and others who look to you to make this business carry on.

      And you have secret doubts. How can I work any harder? What can I do differently? Would somebody who knows about small-business success please give me some advice that I can believe in, advice that can help me? Or should I maybe throw in the towel at this point?

If this does not sound like your situation, then maybe you don't need to read this book. But if my description sounds anything like the situation you're in, then this book may very well be the thing that changes the direction of your business.

We're in Your Corner

      You may put on a strong and confident face to your family and employees, but I know the challenges you're facing as a small-business owner. I've started and run two successful small businesses, one when I was 15 years old painting houses and another in my thirties in the Silicon Valley around electronic payments. While I don't own a small business anymore, I run a big one. I'm the President and CEO of Deluxe, a Trusted Payments and Business Technology™ company that has been around for more than a century helping businesses succeed. Nearly 6,000 employees and their families look to me and my team for their livelihood, and millions of investors have trusted that their savings will grow by investing in our stock.

      Your great-great-grandparents and every generation since has purchased checks from us, because we've been around since 1915. In fact, the founder of this company, W.R. Hotchkiss, invented the checkbook, making Deluxe the original payment company.

      I wrote this book because Deluxe has an extremely unusual vantage point into the workings of small businesses. It's true, we provide services to literally thousands of some of the largest businesses on the planet. But we have more than four million customers, and millions of them are small businesses. They call us every day, not just to order more checks, but also to find out how we can help to grow their businesses. In fact, you might say that small businesses are our bread and butter.

      We've evolved from being a check printer into providing many of the services that small businesses need to survive and thrive. Here's a short list of some of the services we offer to small businesses:

       Incorporation and business licensing services

       Checks and forms

       Logo design

       Trademark filing

       Designing, building, and hosting your website

       Marketing—both online and in print

       Promotional products

       Retail packaging

       Payroll solutions

       Online payments

       Merchant services (credit card acceptance and processing)

      The list goes on. But here's what I want you to understand right from the start: this is NOT a book about promoting Deluxe products and services, like some long sales pitch. We have a great set of products and services, and you should check them out. There, that's my pitch.

      But the truth is, you have bigger fish to fry at the moment. You're trying to keep your business afloat and the many other challenges that small businesses face.

       This book is about how small businesses can successfully navigate big challenges.

      If I'm able to help you through those challenges, I figure that you'll have gotten your money's worth from this book, and then some.

Seismic Events

      On one level, we're still recovering from something of epic proportions with COVID. The world has had cases of deadly influenza before, in addition to plagues and such. Even so, the speed with which the coronavirus spread across the world has no precedent, with never-before-seen impact on small business.

      So without any warning, you may have been having your best year ever, and the next month was your worst month ever. With no end in sight. Now your business may be recovering well, or still struggling for survival.

I don't need to recount all the COVID upheavals and lessons, but I want to point something out: if the only challenges small businesses faced were COVID or macroeconomic events, there might not be a need for this book. But there are so many other major challenges—which I call seismic events—that you also have to contend with. How many of these have happened to you?

       One or more big-box stores moved into town, and they slashed prices. In some cases, they can sell a product for less than you pay for the same product, wholesale.

       Amazon now sells just about everything, and