Richard Proffer: Lessons on starting a business

Small businesses are, in a sense, the heartbeat of Southeast Missouri. Southeast Missouri Business Today reporter Robyn Gautschy recently visited with Richard Proffer, business development specialist with the University of Missouri Extension and Small Business Development Center in Jackson. Proffer graduated from Southeast Missouri State University with a bachelor's degree in advertising, public relations and speech communication and a minor in marketing. He also has a master's degree in business administration with a focus on marketing from Davenport University. Proffer worked in marketing and advertising until joining the extension office in 2006. When he's not in the office, Proffer enjoys reading, spending time with family, growing plants, getting involved with civic organizations and cooking, especially on the grill. The following interview originally appeared in the June 2009 edition of Business Today.

Q: How did you get into the business of helping businesses?

A: The bulk of my clients [in marketing and advertising] were small businesses so I always had to understand their problems and mindsets. I was able then to help them achieve their goals through tailoring what we were doing on the media side to what they needed or wanted or what they communicated to us. My father was a self-employed bricklayer. He was an entrepreneurial person. He wouldn't know that, he wouldn't say that... but he was a true entrepreneur and he made our lives as comfortable as could be. We lived on a farm, and I've always been around small businesses.

Q: What interests you about small businesses?

A: For me it's the fact that they are so important to us. Seventy-five percent of all new jobs come from small businesses. Of the growth that's been going on in our economy, it comes from small businesses. Our country was built on small business. If we didn't have small businesses we would not be the America that we are today and that's such a fascinating thing for me. These businesses have such impact on our country and can change things. When we think of business we think of the Fortune 500s and Fortune 100s when in reality it's the small people who make this country go. I'm helping these people achieve their dreams.

Q: What's a typical day for you?

A: I come in and address [the work on] my desk: what's going on with it, what I need to do, and I start working down my task list. It's phone calls, taking care of client counseling. I may work on some client projects, which can be anything from doing a financial analysis of their business to doing an advertising analysis of their business to preparing for class that night. We employ a lot of training techniques, and I plan for that.

Overall I help people start businesses, help them stay in business, and help them plan for future growth and expansion. That encompasses everything that I do, from education to counseling and mentoring. I'm what they call the business counselor for a lot of my business startups. I'm a resource provider for them.

Q: What's the most satisfying part of your job?

A: It's seeing these people achieve what they set out to do, and they're seeing that they can actually make this work. I have a client who's had it in her heart of hearts to open up a gently used clothing store for children. She attended some of my classes and she saw how she could make that happen and she's now going to open. That's exciting for me. It's not because of anything that I've done; it's because they've acted on it. But we've maybe given them the motivation or encouragement to act.

Q: And the most difficult?

A: Time management. I have 133 different projects, and I'm trying to get them all done in a timely fashion. In this position I'm part small business development center and I'm part extension, so I have to balance those two, which is a good thing. Extension gives me the freedom to work with a lot of people and projects and the small business side gives me the support I need to help those people.

Q: What trends are you seeing in small businesses right now?

A: There are a lot of people very interested. This has been my busiest first three months of the year of the three years I've been here. People across the state are all saying the same thing: We're all just really busy. My people are telling me, 'I've decided it's now or never. I've lost my job, it's now or never. I don't like my job, it's now or never. My job isn't secure anyway, it's now or never.' And I firmly believe this is the best time ever to start a new business. Today is. Tomorrow will be the best day to start a business, as long as you are prepared for it. And that's part of what we do here, is help you prepare for it.

Businesses now are more aimed at service: bookkeeping, tax preparation, home cleaning, retail. I'm also seeing a growth in homemade products. A lot of people are looking to start that. They've come up with their concept, they've developed it, and now they're looking for ways to market it. I've seen a lot of that, ranging from food items to agricultural products. I'm also seeing people interested in franchises, which is a good thing. Franchises tend to be one of the more successful new business startups because they've got the support of home office. But they also are the most expensive because you have your startup costs, but at the same time you've got to pay home office.

In this area we'll always see some agriculture because agriculture is so big here. When I talk to other people across the state, especially around St. Louis or Kansas City, I'll say, 'Yeah, I've got three worm farmers!' and they'll say 'What? Worm farmers?' I'll say, 'Yeah, and I've got beekeepers for honey!' and they kind of look at me like, 'Who are you really with?' For our counterparts in St. Louis, that's not something they're going to hear about much, but that's part of what we are here.

Q: What are businesses doing to cope with tough times?

A: It is harder to start because money is tighter, so your idea really has to be on target, whereas before it might have been a little easier to get money. Now, banks are saying if you want to start a business you need to go see Richard or go see our brother organization over at Southeast Missouri State. You need to work with them. And by the way, after you get your loan you still need to work with them, whereas before, maybe [the banks] didn't say that. [Banks] now require them to have a business plan, whereas before maybe they didn't have to do that. And it is in that business-planning process that a lot of people start to realize, you know, maybe this isn't for me.

I'm a firm believer that it is better for us and for you that you never go into business, than to go into business, incur the debt, and then go out of business. It's not that I spend my time discouraging people, but I do spend my time really making sure they've thought about this. And we do a lot of scenarios and I'll ask them a lot of questions in our counseling process and I've had people come up to me later and say, 'When I left your office my bubble had been burst!' But they come back and say, 'You know, thank God, I'm glad because I would have made such a terrible mistake. You allowed me to see what I wasn't able to see with my idea.' We do that business plan so they know what to expect with their idea.

The entire interview can be found in this month's issue of Southeast Missouri Business Today. To order the publication, call 388-2781 or stop by the Southeast Missourian office at 301 Broadway in Cape Girardeau.