As he took on more hoarding clients, Mr. Paxton quickly noticed that the messier the job, the less likely his competitors were to take it. "I realized this was where we needed to go," he says. Not only could he charge a premium, but the emotional rewards were great. In extreme cases, clients have been contacted by authorities and are close to losing their homes or their children. --Wall Street Journal
Ms. Shaw says that having a team or workout buddy can drag you to the gym on even the worst days. Her volleyball team uses an electronic invitation system that tracks who can attend each game. "When I look and see that I'm the fourth person, then I know that if I don't go nobody else gets to play. Getting to the gym is half the battle. Once I'm there I'm always glad I played." -- Wall Street Journal
Outside a brick building in a drab industrial neighborhood at the edge of town, a kaleidoscope of color flashes in the early sun. It's the lineup of scooters that marks the location of Scoot Richmond. Inside, owner Chelsea Lahmers bounds around the store's large, open loft space answering questions and adjusting displays. Her short red hair is tousled from her scooter ride to work. --Fortune Small Business
Another bright day breaks in Boulder. On most mornings Michael Jackson and his wife, Wink, would hop on their bicycles and ride the 15 miles to the office, but today they drive. The tanned and toned couple want to be fresh for their Makeover. Before they leave home, each grabs a pair of oversize sunglasses.. --Fortune Small Business
As a student at the University of Guelph, near Toronto, Ted Kennedy finished the 1,500-meter run in three minutes and 50 seconds, a school record that still stands 31 years later. He continues to make regular podium finishes in triathlon and duathlon. Now he also devotes his energy to working with a select group of athletes. We're talking about corporate CEOs, not pro jocks. Kennedy's company, CEO Challenges, enables some of the most competitive people on earth to prove themselves outside the business arena. --Fortune Small Business
"I've seen people with your talent sell themselves out of business because they can't deliver or finance deals," says finance advisor John Armour. Around the table, heads nod. Division 9 eases its cash-flow woes by buying materials for big jobs with bank debt. Armour disapproves. --Fortune Small Business
I remember sitting there thinking it couldn't be true," Sands says. She was about to turn 55. "All the female relatives in my family have lived into their 90s. My goal was to make it to 100." She had recently launched a new ranching business and had aggressive plans for growth. But now Sands had non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, with a cancerous lymph node in her neck and a bigger one near her stomach. --Fortune Small Business
The hardest part of succession planning is making the decision to sell the business, and pharmacist Leonard Edloe is no exception. “My father worked hard, and he had more obstacles and fewer resources than I did,” he says quietly. “Am I taking the easy way out?” On the other hand, he admits to being tired. He is thinking of the past year of slow reimbursement under Medicare Part D, mounting bank debt and long hours. “Yesterday I filled 224 prescriptions myself, and realized how burned out I am.” --Fortune Small Business
In the office above his spacious aircraft hangar in Warrenton, Virginia, Ken Hyde pulls on a pair of white cotton gloves and reaches reverently inside a plastic bag for a small piece of yellowed muslin. What Hyde has is a four-foot length from the left lower wing of the original Wright Flyer. Artifacts like this make Hyde's dream team of aircraft builders the one against which all others are being measured as they race to build reproduction Flyers for the Wright Brothers centennial celebrations. -- Smithsonian Air & Space
Russell Straub's high-end clients were straining his business with more and more demands. Was it time to go downmarket? --Inc.
The Wrights had gotten back in business in the nick of time, or so it seemed, for within the next few years a handful of North American aircraft builders would take to the air as well….Out of that group came the man over whom the Wright brothers would obsess until their deaths: Glenn Curtiss. --Forbes.com and American Heritage of Invention & Technology [cover]
Oxford's rise, fall, and renewal present a striking illustration of how easily even a high-flying business can be brought to its knees by computer ills, as well as an example of the sort of aggressive measures it takes to recover. --Forbes ASAP
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