Category Archives: Business

America’s Fastest-Growing Retailer

No. 1 in Retail ModCloth 17,191% Three-Year Growth Revenue: $15.6 Million Employees: 100 CEO: Eric Koger Founded: 2002 Overall RANK: No. 2 Pittsburgh modcloth.com Just before starting college in 2002, Eric Koger convinced his girlfriend, Susan Gregg, to set up a site to sell her collection of vintage clothes. That site, ModCloth , now draws close to two million visitors a month and recently landed $19.8 million in funding from Accel Partners. Koger, who designed websites in high school, initially provided tech support for ModCloth, while Gregg handled sales. In 2005, they decided to turn their hobby into a full-fledged business by selling items from independent designers, and, in 2006, after graduating from Carnegie Mellon, they married. Koger now leads ModCloth’s operations and technology strategy, including the development of online contests that gauge the demand for new products, while his wife (now Susan Gregg Koger) remains the company’s creative muse. “We have a left-brain, right-brain kind of deal,” he says. Business – Accel Partners – Modcloth – Carnegie Mellon University – Technical support Continue reading

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America’s Fastest-Growing Construction Company

No. 1 in Construction Direct Exteriors 2,723.8% Three-Year Growth Revenue: $5.5 Million Employees: 32 President: Mike McAlpin Founded: 2003 Overall RANK: No. 91 Maple Grove, Minn. directexteriors.net Construction com Continue reading

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America’s Fastest-Growing Real Estate Company

No. 1 in Real Estate Platinum Realty 2,011.1% Three-Year Growth Revenue: $2.5 Million Employees: 4 CEO: Scott DeNeve Founded: 2005 Overall RANK: No. 129 Overland Park, Kan. platinumrealtykc.com Scott DeNeve was just 24 years old and had been working as a real estate agent for all of two years when he had his I-can’t-possibly-work-for-someone-else moment. He founded Platinum Realty during the housing bubble, but he was wise enough to avoid the high living he saw in his competitors. For the company’s first year and a half, DeNeve and his 20 agents crammed into a rented office that was just 110 square feet. He stressed the importance of working backward in order to stay debt free—the primary focus would be on profit, and more spacious digs would come later. DeNeve’s approach worked (meanwhile, a number of competitors didn’t survive the downturn), and his days in cramped quarters are now a thing of the past. Today, Platinum Realty has three offices and is the largest independent real estate company in Kansas City, with 242 agents. United States – Real estate broker – Real estate – Kansas City – Business Continue reading

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‘Marketing could save your business’

Times may be tough but your business marketing costs need not be expensive – and it may be the one thing that saves you. Continue reading

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America’s Fastest-Growing Media Company

No. 1 in Media Blurb 4,829.6% Three-Year Growth Revenue: $45 Million Employees: 68 CEO: Eileen Gittins Founded: 2005 Overall RANK: No. 47 San Francisco blurb.com In 2003, having led two tech companies to acquisitions, Eileen Gittins was doing some consulting and pursuing what she calls a self-assignment, which was to photograph entrepreneurs from the Internet boom. She wanted to turn her photos into a book to give to her subjects, but couldn’t find a press that would print only 40 copies at a reasonable rate. So Gittins decided to build one: an Internet-powered, geographically distributed press that would turn digital photo albums and blogs into beautiful books. It took a year to find investors willing to buy in. “We were putting digital assets back into analog,” she says. “To most people, it looked like I had two heads.” Once Blurb ’s service launched in 2006, however, the company quickly grew, and it became profitable after two years. Last year, the company published 350,000 titles. Publishing – San Francisco – Blurb – Eileen Gittins – United States Continue reading

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Future Fund to invest in start-up UK lender

THE taxpayer-backed Future Fund is turning its sights to the troubled British banking industry, investing in the country’s largest new lender to start up since the global financial crisis. Continue reading

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America’s Fastest-Growing Manufacturing Company

No. 1 in Manufacturing InterGroup International 1,285.2% Three-Year Growth Revenue: $3.2 Million Employees: 25 CEO: Neil Gloger Founded: 2005 Overall RANK: No. 239 Warren, Ohio intergroupinternational.com In December 2007, a fire broke out at one of InterGroup International ’s warehouses. The facility was filled with plastic scraps; InterGroup buys plastic from vendors, recycles it, and then sells the product to compounders. It took three days and an environmental contractor to put out the flames. The damage was catastrophic: The 40,000-square-foot building, and every single plastic product inside, was destroyed. InterGroup, however, was not. “I’m proud to say that during that experience, we didn’t miss one pickup,” says founder and CEO Neil Gloger. “We had to reroute deliveries, but we didn’t turn a single truck away. I told my employees, ‘Now, we’re just going to have to work a little harder.’ Once that decision was made, it supercharged our growth and made us even more focused and determined.” Plastic – Business – Ohio – United States – Polymers Continue reading

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Business briefs

Wade Patton Insurance moving to new locationAfter 46 years in one location, Wade Patton Insurance wi … Continue reading

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America’s Fastest-Growing IT Services Company

No. 1 in IT Services Carbonite 11,207.6% Three-Year Growth Revenue: $19.1 Million Employees: 100 CEO: David Friend Founded: 2005 Overall RANK: No. 9 Boston carbonite.com David Friend had observed that everyone with a PC had purchased, or obtained in a bundle with their computer, antivirus software. As more information moved into the cloud and the cost of digital storage dipped, Friend, who had founded four tech companies, decided to try to do for personal computer backup what Norton had done for antivirus protection: make it simple, inexpensive, and ubiquitous. With Jeff Flowers, who had been his co-founder and chief technology officer on three previous ventures, Friend founded Carbonite , the first company to sell unlimited online backup space. “Compared to anything else I’ve ever done, this is the biggest market,” Friend said. “We launched the service, and, literally on Day One, people started signing up.” Carbonite – Carbonite.com – Jeff Flowers – Backup – Information technology Continue reading

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Business digest: Associate attorney joins local law firm

Sharon K. Jiral has joined the Coghlan Crowson law firm as an associate. Jiral recently graduated with a juris doctorate degree, with a concentration in estate planning, from Baylor Law School. She interned with a federal magistrate judge and an associate judge during her law school career. Continue reading

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