The First Family Business Blog Post !

Welcome fun people… I glad your here!  My name is Rich Wilson and I’ve been involved with family businesses for as long as I can remember. 

So who is this blog for?  Anyone that is part of a family owned or family controlled business, those that work for a family business, those that are thinking about starting a family business and lets not forget all the professionals that serve as advisers and vendors for family businesses.  WOW that was a mouthful.  (Deep breath)

As for my posts, they will be straight from my brain to my fingers so I can’t guarentee my spelling.  Actually Amy was an editor and it drives her crazy. (She once told me that my spelling wa so bad that it made her eyes bleed  :)   SO… let me apologize now. 

Amy and I own a family business (CORA Corporation) and the majority of our clients are family businesses. I was also honored a few years ago to be the Chairman of the Family Business Celebration during the anniversary of the city of Pittsburgh called Pittsburgh 250.

During that celebration we had a large number of people there representing hundreds of family businesses.  The great part was that while many of those people did not know each other except by name, the event was more like a big wedding reception.  Actually I had people contact me after the event and tell me that they did more business that evening than they had done in the last 6 months!  Not only that but it was all done over a coffee and and a handshake.   What other type of business can that happen?

As you can probably tell I really like people and I have a sense of humor that Im sure will come through in my postings.

So why are Family businesses are special?  Its actually very simple… we are what has made this country great.
Every business at some point started around a kitchen table.  I can almost hear it now… “You know, we could probably do that and make money at it.”  Family owned or controlled businesses employ more people than any other employer type yet often we are over looked because we are so busy wearing all the “hats” keeping our businesses profitable.   There are some serious advantages of having a family business but there are also some issues that are particular to family businesses that no other business has to deal with. We will talk about all of these on this blog… Im looking forward to it. :)

The reason that I started the Family Business Chamber of Commerce is to help family businesses succeed.  To help them generate business, and to keep the family together.  Nothing would make me happier than to know that we were able to help your family business make a GREAT DEAL of money.  See, if your successful, other family businesses will be successful and you will need to do one of the things we are known for… GENERATING JOBS!  The more people we employ the more money is spent, boosting our countries economy. 

Its a Win Win Win!!  You win because your bottom line will increase, your friends and neighbors will win because you will need to employ more people and the country wins because it will cause ecomonic growth.

This is an open blog so if you have anything that you wish to talk about please post it.

Ill be posting again tomorrow and putting together a survey form to see what type of issues and topics that we will address here.

Till then…

HAVE A GREAT DAY AND A PROFITABLE WEEK

Rich