Chris Weenig

        I interviewed Chris Weenig. He is good friend to my wife's side of the family. He is a very successful entrepreneur, but it the most down to earth person that I have ever met. I don't have as close of a relationship with him as my wife and her family, so I was very interested to get the personal details of his story and what I could learn from chatting with him. Growing up he didn't know exactly what he wanted to do or study. During school he still felt the same way, and ended up getting his degree in exercise science. He thought that it would leave the door open for medical or dental school.
         He ended up working with his uncle who had a construction business after graduating for about a year. He had decided that he was not going to work in the medical field. His decision was not easy for him. He took off a month of work and traveled and cleared his mind so that he could make the best decision for him. He told me that he felt that he should just go with the flow and see what opportunities presented themselves. This went on for about a year or so and then he decided that he would be the one that had to find the opportunity. He looked online at several different businesses and idea, and came to the conclusion of he would open copying and scanning business particularly for documents.This may seem a little outdated now, but he was the pioneer to the industry. They now offer man fine products from mutli functional copiers, data security solutions, It support, interactive presentation boards, and etc. His growth was very slow and steady, but he said that he never aggressively leveraged his business and this helped. There were good times and bad times and he didn't want to incur large amounts of debt, and then have a bad year that would put him out of business.
He talked about how having a supportive and loving spouse is key to starting your own business. He credits his wife to a large amount of the success. He said he always made time for his family, when he could have been doing something for the business. He wouln't neglect either one of the two, but he always placed family first. I'm starting to see that this is common advice from the entrepreneurs that I have interviewed. I will be sure that I make sure that my priorities are in line when starting and running a business as well. I thought this family picture of his is very fitting for my closing

Jeff Erickson

        I had an interview with Jeff over the phone, because he was out of town. I had heard him talk in on of my lecture series classes and I thought that he would be a good person to interview. It was interesting that right off the bat into our conversation, he asked what things drive me. What things make you tick he asked. It took a little while for me to respond. Thoughts of sports, cars, and money all passed through my mind, but I answered back by saying family. He loved the answer and told me that first and for most family is the most important thing to keep close during all life's journey. He said, "It doesn't matter if you are working a 9-5 job, graveyard shift, on business vacations, or a self made multimillionaire,  make sure that things are right with your family."
        Before anything else that's what he wanted to get across. He later told me more of his story as a dentist and how he was successful. He graduated from dental school and became partners in a dentist office that focused on dental work for children. He worked there for a couple years and decided that he didn't particularly enjoy what he was doing. He decided to go back to school and specialized anesthesiology in the dental area. He could now work in the office, but mainly just deal with putting them to sleep. He saw a niche in the market that he was in and there were no go dental offices for low income families with children. Primarily medicaid customers. He decided to open a practice to treat this target market. It was slow for a few years, but he was extremely successful and was the only dental office hitting this market in a radius of over 200 miles. He ended up selling that practice for millions of dollars. He claims that he was quiet lucky to be there at the right time with the opportunity. He said that some successful people do have some degree of luck on their side hit it big.
       He now invests in various projects and investments in all areas. He is opening what will be the largest dental office in Texas. In the office they will again be marketing to those children on medicaid. He asked what field of work or entrepreneur sector I am looking at coming into. I didn't have a set answer as I'm still figuring out exactly what I want to be know as. I am thinking the sectors of finance and real estate. Jeff has had many investments in real estate, and most have turned out well for him. It was good to hear his outlook on starting a business and he was very motivating.