I started my first business at the way-too-young age of 19 years old. I'd been working for a small swim school that expanded to the San Antonio market. For various reasons after 12 months the considered shutting down the location and the owner pitched the idea of me taking over. I was in attending UTSA pursing a business degree with no money to start. Thankfully the owner and landlord thought a win-win-win scenario was helping me get things off the ground so everyone could benefit long term. It somehow worked! We found success offering a high quality instruction in small classes and things took off from there. There's a whole lot more to that story and how it ended, but we will save that for another day.
What's important about that story is the trials and learning experiences I went through during that time. I wasn't old enough to drink alcohol but I was old enough to be responsible for insurance, a commercial lease, employee management, customer service, taxes and so much more. I was taking business classes but they didn't teach me the real life application of running a business. For me and so many other people, we learn those business lessons the hard way.
After graduation I went into the banking and investment world working for large nationwide companies. It was here that I also got to see business ownership from the perspective of others taking the risk and challenges of being an owner. I realized that there were some common problems we all faced and not alot of easy or economical solutions in place.
I could see that there were many people out there great at a trade, service or had a great product to sell but that wasn't enough to be successful. It became obvious that dreams of a successful business are often derailed by poor planning, messy execution, financial chaos, and in many cases a lack of expertise in business operations. As I write that, 19 yr old me is raising his hand!
Most business owners will seek out help to work through knowledge gaps but if the company isn't large enough, many times they do without that help or they piece it together however they can. The problem with the first is not addressing problems early on, in many cases will turn into huge problems down the road. The second situation is a mix of different businesses and advisers who only have you in common and they typically don't collaborate on behalf of the business. This is why larger successful companies have highly compensated executives that all work with one unified common goal while leading their department's contributions to that goal.
How is a small growing business able to fund that kind of support and expertise to reach its big goals? In my experience, smaller businesses don't need to have so many highly compensated people on staff full time. They don't have the big logistical or complicated problems of large companies. They need guidance in smaller doses. They need it to be more affordable then a 6 figure salaried staff. And they need communication and collaboration with those that support them.
That is why we formed our company. We operate with the mindset that bringing those pieces together so our clients can focus on key operational and growth objectives gives them the best chance for success. We do what we can in-house where we feel our experience and capabilities are strong. When we can't do something at a high level, we bring in partners that can do the job. All the while, we are in constant contact with our client, our in-house team and external partners so everyone is moving in the same direction.
That is the Tribus origin story. We appreciate the opportunity to help you with your own business success story!