Australian Paul Tory studied accounting after leaving high school. But after”two quite dull years,” he realized the profession was not for him and decided to try out a trade. He undertook a engine mechanics apprenticeship for five years before his father encouraged him in 1998 to combine the household Sydney beachside-based wholesale meat company, Total […]
Tag: learned:
Lessons Learned: T-shirt Retailer Launches in Dorm Room
You would think running a fledgling beer t-shirt company as a finance and marketing student would get you extra points with your New York University lecturers. But rather, in 2004, it got Roy Laniado thrown from his dorm room. Like most universities, NYU prohibits conducting a business for profit from student dorms. Laniado, who was […]
Lessons Learned: By Police Officer to Wedding-products Retailer
If Erica Tevis had passed her guns test for a rookie New York police officer 12 decades back, it is highly unlikely the New Jersey woman would have turned into a wedding products online merchant. Tevis, with a bachelor’s and master’s in criminal justice from St. John’s University and Iona College respectively, passed all of […]
Lessons Learned: Forced Time Away Sews a Passion
With multiple sclerosis-like symptoms became a boon for Shelley Mitchell. Born in Taiwan, she relocated to Melbourne, Australia with her meteorologist dad and music-teacher mum when she was 13. Her grandmother had taught her to sew; Mitchell made her own clothes, such as gowns for college formals as a teenager. After she attained her fashion […]
The formula to Internet success, from’Lessons Learned’ merchants
Since March 2012, I have been writing the monthly”Lessons Learned” column, which has profiled online merchants selling goods which range from remedies for intestinal problems (“Trusting your Gut to Online Success”) to cheap backyard sheds (“Fall of Communism leads to Affordable Sheds’ Success”). Could there be a formula for online success? From assessing the stories, […]
Lessons Learned: Serial Entrepreneur Heels a Pain
Like most serial entrepreneurs who build something from nothing, Jason Schultz was blessed with insight and great timing. Born and raised in California, Schultz started experimenting with Tandy and Commodore 64 computers and bulletin board systems as a kid. After the Internet blossomed in the early 1990s, he taught himself how to program and create […]
Lessons Learned: Buddhist Search Inspires Lotus Sculpture
From the novel Siddhartha, writer Hermann Hesse describes the spiritual journey of a man who matches Gautama Buddha in ancient India. Six years later reading Siddhartha in seventh grade, Greenwich, Conn.-born Kyle Tortora went on a similar search for significance, entirely supported by his devout Catholic parents. He visited Chiang Mai, Thailand in 1995 to […]