Brian Boggs, Chairmaker – Small Business Brief #14

Posted on 23. Feb, 2010 by Tracy Sigler in Small Business Briefs

Shaky cam strikes again! Too much coffee this morning, or not enough? I’m not sure. But I think you can still clearly see how fantastic this handmade furniture is, by Brian Boggs and company. The barstools Brian shows us in this video are exquisite. They are an interesting juxtaposition of hard edged precision geometry and deliberately visible hand work. And freakishly comfortable.

We really enjoyed our time in the shop today and for a furniture nerd like me it’s hard to not start dreaming up things to make after being around all that creativity and craftsmanship, and tools (covet covet).

Visit BrianBoggsChairs.com for more info.

Lab Escape – Small Business Brief #13

Posted on 20. Jan, 2010 by Tracy Sigler in Small Business Briefs

“I— Am— Sil-ho-uette Man, In-ter-view-ing peo-ple as fast as I can…”

First time I’ve used the Flip camera in the conference room at the new office. Now I know. Don’t sit in front of the windows, too much backlight. I had a great meeting with Eric and Trevor at Lab Escape. They are from a software company, based in Asheville, that makes “heat map” products.

“Lab Escape provides information visualization solutions for businesses seeking to better understand their data. Our products include our Tree Map, which shows trends and highlights anomalies, and our Data Map SDK, which provides support for building your own data maps.”

It’s an interesting business with several big name clients. I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to say beyond that but when I say big I mean el grande. So if you’re wrestling with great gobs of data, trying to make sense of it all, check out their heat map software.

Heat maps can help you visualize:

“Sales Performance
Risk Management
Market Share Analysis
Asset Management
Market Basket Analysis
Network Monitoring
Investment Performance
Budget Analysis
Portfolio Management
Performance Tracking
Trend Detection
Opportunity Analysis”

That’s all for now.

Rainbow Mountain Children’s School – Small Business Brief #12

Posted on 16. Dec, 2009 by Tracy Sigler in Small Business Briefs

Yesterday I met with Renee Owen, Executive Director at Rainbow Mountain Children’s School. This is a great, small private school in west Asheville. They serve kids from preschool through eighth grade. I have firsthand experience with school because both of my kids have been students there, and it’s been a good experience. The school has developed a fantastic community of students, parents and faculty.

If you’re looking for a private school in Asheville find more about Rainbow at RMCS.org.

WallStCheatSheet.com – Small Business Brief #11

Posted on 11. Dec, 2009 by Tracy Sigler in Small Business Briefs

The Hoffman brothers, Damien and Derek, remind me of my last real job. I used to work for the media company The Motley Fool (Fool.com) before moving to Asheville. The Fool also covers the stock market and other financial matters, and was founded by brothers Tom and David Gardner.

The Hoffmans are the new, new media guys in this category and I admire their DIY-get-it-done work ethic. You too can grow your site traffic massively in a few short months using their simple approach: work your ass off, create great original content, and develop relationships everywhere you can.

Stay on top of the stock market, trading and investing with WallStCheatSheet.com.

Dog Tag Art – Small Business Brief #10

Posted on 30. Nov, 2009 by Tracy Sigler in Small Business Briefs

Oh man. It’s hard to keep a straight face when the interviewee is wearing a giant dog head. Say hello to Jack Carrier, founder of DogTagArt.com. I am a huge fan of “crowdsourcing” and that’s exactly the house that Jack’s built. If you’re familiar with Threadless.com, the very popular t-shirt site, then you have an idea what’s going on here. Artists submit designs for custom dog tags that anyone can order. There’s more to it than that so I suggest you check out the site yourself.

One of my favorites says “I love squirrels.”

Visit DogTagArt.com to see tons of custom dog tags.

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