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1. Rent-A-Green Box Entrepreneur: Spencer Brown * Product/Service: Environmentally friendly moving supplies, delivery and pickup Start Date: 2005 Startup Costs:
by DevX101 16y ago
1. Rent-A-Green Box
Entrepreneur: Spencer Brown *
Product/Service: Environmentally friendly moving supplies, delivery and pickup
Start Date: 2005
Startup Costs: $7 million
Revenue: $2.6 million in 2009
2. Mabel's Labels
Entrepreneur: Julie Cole
Product/Service: Personalized, permanent labels for kids' stuff
Start Date: 2002
Startup Costs: About $10,000
Revenue: $4 million in 2009
3. Fatheadz
Entrepreneur: Rico Elmore
Product/Service: Sunglasses for large people
Start Date: 2004
Start-up Costs: About $500,000
Revenue: Estimated $2 million in 2010
4. Stave Puzzles
Entrepreneur: Steve Richardson
Product/Service: Hand-made wooden jigsaw puzzles.
Start Date: 1974
Startup Costs: About $5,000
Revenue: $2.5 million in 2009
Ranging in price from $125 to $5,000, these puzzles are made of cherry wood, covered with a dry-mounted image drawn by one of 100 licensed artists, and individually hand-cut into as many as 2,500 pieces. Bill Gates has one, and Barbara Bush gave another as a gift to Queen Elizabeth. "We try to make them hard to put together," said 71-year-old Richardson, who calls himself the company's chief tormentor.
5. Texas Driving Experience
Entrepreneur: Dawn Stokes
Product/Service: High-performance driving lessons and retreats
Start Date: 2004
Startup Costs: About $500,000
Revenue: Estimated $1.8 million in 2010
6. Litecubes
Entrepreneur: Carl VanderSchuit
Product/Service: Fake ice cubes that glow
Start Date: 2001
Startup Costs: About $100,000
Revenue: $1.3 million in 2009
7. Smarter Fuel
Entrepreneur: Dave Dunham
Product/Service: Biodiesel fuel from restaurant frying oil
Start Date: 2004
Startup Costs: $50,000
Revenue: $3 million in 2009
8. Sky Zone
Entrepreneur: Rick Platt
Product/Service: Arenas covered with trampolines
Start Date: 2009
Startup Costs: About $2 million
Revenue: $3 million-plus in 2009
9. Sanidoor
Entrepreneur: Gale Lemrand.
Product/Service: Sanitary, touchless restroom-door openers
Start Date: 2009.
Startup Costs: About $3.5 million
Revenue: Estimated $2.2 million in 2010
10. Geese Police
Entrepreneur: Dave Marcks
Product/Service: Geese abatement using collies
Start Date: 1987
Startup Costs: About $3,000
Revenue: Estimated $2.5 million in 2010
- DevX101 16y ago11. Neuberg & Neuberg Entrepreneur: Larry Neuberg Product/Service: Importing gold for gilding Start Date: 1962 Startup Costs: Virtually none Revenue: Estimated $3 million in 2010 12. Deeplocal Entrepreneur: Nathan Martin Product/Service: Promotions mixing the digital and physical Start Date: 2006 Startup Costs: Financed out of initial $30,000 contract Revenue: Estimated $1 million-plus in 2010 13. BlackSocks Entrepreneur: Samuel Liechti Product/Service: Sock subscriptions Start Date: 1999 Startup Costs: $30,000 Revenue: $5 million in 2009 14. DNA 11 Entrepreneurs: Adrian Salamunovic and Nazim Ahmed Product/Service: DNA artwork Start Date: 2005 Start-up Costs: $2,000 Revenue: $1.4 million in 2009 15. The Fiero Store Entrepreneur: Matthew Hartzog. Product/Service: Parts and accessories for the Pontiac Fiero Start Date: 1991 Start-up Costs: $5,000 Revenue: $2 million in 2009 16. Heritage Link Brands Entrepreneurs: Selena Cuffe and Khary Cuffe Product/Service: African wine Start Date: 2005 Start-up Costs: $75,000 Revenue: $1 million in 2009 17. Jimmy Beans Wool Entrepreneur: Laura Zander Product/Service: Knitting and crochet supplies Start Date: 2002 Startup Costs: $30,000 Revenue: $2.8 million in 2009 18. PetRelocation.com Entrepreneur: Kevin O'Brien and Angie O'Brien Product/Service: Pet travel Start Date: 2004 Start-up Costs: $97,000 Revenue: Estimated $4 million in 2010 19. Murray Associates Entrepreneur: Kevin D. Murray Product/Service: Eavesdropping detection and counterespionage Start Date: 1978 Startup Costs: $5,000 Revenue in 2009: $760,000
- AlexC04 16y agothank you so much. I was interested in the article, but couldn't continue reading past the labels. I'm surprised that forbes.com (ostensibly a reputable magazine) has gone with a "2leep" style layout. Adsense "clickbombs" everywhere and completely unreadable. This is 'content farm' quality at best, which is a shame because it seems an interesting article.
- taylorbuley 16y agoI'm sorry you feel that way. As a Forbes developer, I can tell you we are trying to make the site as usable as possible. If you have any specific feedback I can pass along drop me an email at buley.reports at gmail
- pitdesi 16y agoEVERYONE feels that way. I don't bother sending around Forbes links anymore because they require so many clicks. One piece of advice - make a printable page that way we don't have to click so many times
- zach 16y agoI certainly agree. The real problem is what mandatory interstitials (not in this case, I see), AdSense boxes next to content and tiny amounts of content per page do to a site. They exude an aura closer to desperation than success. I'm guessing Forbes readers can pick up on that better than most. I know internet publishing is a tough business, but we all know there's a problem here.
- cullenking 16y agoSummarize in as few as pages possible - the less clicks needed the better. Not sure how well that works with the management since they are probably interested more in pageviews than anything else, but it would be a start. Second, the information in this "article" was factual, not pictorial, so why was it in a slideshow? The pictures are second to the numbers - they certainly aid in telling the story, but they aren't THE story.
- metageek 16y ago>Biodiesel fuel from restaurant frying oil My sister-in-law sells restaurant equipment. One of her products is a catalyst (some sort of metal mesh, I think) that you put in the fryer to keep the oil fresh--makes it last 3 times as long, I think. That sort of thing will make it harder to find oil for biodiesel.