My flight
to London had barely lifted off when my seatmate and I began to chat.
I soon learned that the handsome man seated next to me was a former art
teacher who reinvented his life and now is a fulltime painter. Since English
landscapes are his specialty, he was a frequent flyer to England. "Do
you live in the city?" I asked.
"I lived
all over the Twin Cities when I was teaching," he said, "but
now I live in a small town south of there and I just love it. It's so
quiet. I go to my studio and paint to my heart's content."
Not long after,
I found myself seated next to another small town enthusiast on a flight
to Dallas. This man was a former pilot who had left flying when he was
diagnosed with a serious illness. He had just become a flight training
instructor, but he was most excited about the little bed and breakfast
inn he and his wife owned in a small town in northeastern Pennsylvania.
It was their second such venture and he regaled me with stories about
his life as an innkeeper.
While small
town living isn't for everyone, relocating to smaller places is becoming
increasingly popular. The entrepreneurial revolution is partially responsible
for this new wave of emigration. Computers, modems and fax machines make
it possible to do all sorts of work in the most remote locations.
If
you're dreaming about becoming an entrepreneurial villager yourself, you
need to decide if you want to create a local business that only serves
your community or if you want to serve a clientele unlimited by geography.
Either kind of business is possible in the new world of cottage industries.
Since today's cottage is apt to be an electronic one, small towns are
home to an endless array of enterprises that would have been unthinkable
even a decade ago. Here are a few ideas for profit centers that are especially
suited to village life:
At
your service. My old favorite, the service business, gets high
points for small town enterprise. Even the tiniest communities can support
a wide range of services.
On
a recent visit to my old hometown, I noticed how shabby the houses and
offices had become. This would be a great place to be a housepainter or
to rehab buildings, I thought. Many small towns have a down-at-the-heels
look following years of neglect as people moved away. Now that small towns
are becoming fashionable again, renovation will become a popular pastime
as residents spruce things up and make them charming places to live.
Even
somewhat exotic services can be located in small towns if they attract
a clientele from beyond their immediate area. Antique restorers and other
repair specialists, for instance, often develop a reputation that attracts
business from all over.
Put
your computer to work. Although computers are becoming commonplace
in rural areas (and the popular Gateway computers are even manufactured
in a small town), many businesses in these areas use them to handle things
like accounting and inventory control. If you have good desktop publishing
skills, you could find an eager market for your services producing business
materials, reports and the like.
Since
most writers can live wherever they want, freelancers, as well as novelists,
often live in small communities. With the Internet putting research sources
within reach of everyone, freelancing from the boonies has gotten even
easier.
And,
of course, marketing online is open to anyone, anywhere. Whether you fancy
selling used merchandise on auction sites or launching your own product
line globally, computers make it possible to run your marketing empire
from the tiniest of places.
Create
a destination business. When a new highway threatened to close
Betty's Pies on the North Shore of Lake Superior, customers rallied to
save this popular tourist stop. The effort paid off and Betty's will continue
to make pie eaters happy during the coming summer season.
Although
many small towns have seen the demise of local businesses such as hardware
stores and clothing shops, creative shopkeepers are bringing commercial
spaces to life again with art galleries, antique shops, inns and unique
restaurants that bring in out-of-town customers. On a road trip a couple
of years ago, we stopped in winsome Goshen, Indiana, and visited a quilt
shop that had collectors coming from all over the world to buy their stunning
creations.
Charming
villages in New England have long been home to wonderful local businesses
that draw city dwellers to their shops on the weekends; this trend is
gathering speed in other parts of the country, too, with artistic and
innovative shops springing up in off-the-beaten-path locales. Archer City,
Texas, might be just a quiet ranch town if it weren't for bestselling
author and local resident Larry McMurtry, who has turned this hamlet into
a haven for bibliophiles, drawing booklovers from all over the country
who love to search for used books. If it's special, people will come.
Market
products to the world. You don't have to look very far to see
that mail order has long flourished in tiny towns. Thousands of people
will never set foot in Dodgeville, Wisconsin (pop. 3,458), but they'll
buy something from Land's End catalog, which is based there. A quick survey
of smaller mail order operations shows that geography is not a consideration
for marketing products through the mail. You can order maple syrup directly
from Vermont, Christmas trees from Michigan, and software from New Hampshire.
Direct mail marketing has enormous profit potential and it's fun, besides.
And
it's not just big catalog companies that succeed via the mail. All sorts
of small specialty businesses sell their products to people all over the
globe. Often a mail order business makes a great addition to other things
that you're doing. Mail order has long been popular with people wanting
to live in smaller towns and still build a sizable business. It might
make sense for you, too.
If
small town living appeals to you, make your own opportunities in a place
that you love. As Jack Lessinger says, "Build something, help something,
save something. The possibilities are endless." Small towns are still
great places for entrepreneurs who also want to create a nice quality
of life without the stresses of modern city living.
