There are plenty of myths about family-owned companies. The subject matter ranges across a wide number of topics. Is the family-owned business model dead? Are the big-box retailers going to win 100% of the market share within the next few years? What about families who leverage the power of borrowing to achieve profits? Is that a wise move or a not so wise one? Finally, is it true that mom-and-pop owners tend to work more than 40 hours per week? Here are the facts.
Mom & Pop Merchants Can’t Fight Big-Box Sellers
The current trend favors small retailers. A decade ago, millions of small business owners worried that the mega corporations and big-box retailers would snuff the little guy out of the niche. It never happened. Instead, consumers began to gravitate toward independent owners and smaller enterprises where they could find better service, personalized attention, high-quality products, and other benefits. The big-box sellers are still around, of course, but they operate alongside a thriving community of indie entrepreneurs who focus on service, satisfaction, and lean-and-mean operations.
Should Be Debt-Free
Successful owners use personal loans for startups and other expenses. The idea of small enterprises striving to be debt-free sprang up in the early 2000s, just after the financial and liquidity crisis. The principle is not only unworkable today, but it’s also an unwise way to operate a for-profit enterprise. Of course, high-interest credit cards have no place in the financial life of owners, particularly couples who oversee the daily operations of a company they jointly own. Unfortunately, it’s all too easy for entrepreneurs to resort to personal credit cards and allow soaring interest expenses to sneak up, apparently out of nowhere.
What’s the answer? For millions of mom-and-pop and other family-oriented businesses, personal loans are the wise alternative. Loans from the right lender can help people consolidate high-interest debt, turn monthly budgets into simple affairs, and open the door to much lower interest rates on borrowed funds. By moving debt from card issuers to private lenders, borrowers can gain access to flexible terms and favorable repayment arrangements. That makes it possible to achieve other financial aims and stop paying sky-high interest charges on credit cards.
Owners Work Full-Time or More
In the 2020s, most family-owned businesses are part-time enterprises operated by married couples for extra income. The misinformation about work hours has been around for decades. Most consumers assume that family-ownership enterprises involve teams of workaholics who devote well more than 40 hours per week to their operations. The picture of the overworked, barely surviving couple staying up late every night to balance the books and take inventory is a common one in literature and modern media.
The problem is that it’s false. Yes you need to determine if you are ready to start a business based on the demands of entrepreneurship, but the sacrifices are not what they have been depicted as historically. Women and men who operate a typical FOB tend to be part-timers who have day jobs with corporations or government agencies. Indeed, many who operate family-based companies only give about 10 hours of their spare time each week to running their businesses from the comfort of a laptop in their kitchen or home office.
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