The Charm and Innovation of Small Business Owners

No matter where you travel in this county you keep seeing the same cookie cutter stores. The Wal-Mart's, Target's, ABC Warehouse's and McDonald type stores litter the cities and small towns all across America. The frightening thing is that the very thing that made America great is almost no more. The small business owner has nearly died out.

It is difficult to open up a store and compete with the large chains that attract masses of people with their low priced products and one stop shopping. Thus the American dream of one day being your own boss and building something great is almost gone. The few stores that are remaining have to fight tooth and nail to keep their position.

When the country loses their little stores the average American loses the chance to build a better future. The old saying, "The wealthy keep on getting wealthier" is truer today than any time in American history. It costs millions of dollars to open a store and only the wealthy can leverage themselves to be able to purchase these products. Therefore the average man is cut out from such deals.

These big stores have little variety and even less differences between them. Despite the nice logos and colors most of the stores are precisely the same and offering the same products. Therefore the uniqueness and charm of American entrepreneurial spirit have little avenue for expression.

One of the biggest problems facing the country is, not only that the average American cannot hope to be a business owner, but that the country is becoming less innovative. In the U.S. there is a proud tradition of small business owners like Benjamin Franklin inventing the light bulb or Henry Ford building the first assembly line.

The more avenues of coming up with new ideas (i.e. more small businesses) the stronger the country will be in the long run. These inventions haven't been contributed by large corporations but by people like you and me; people who know how to think outside the "corporate box". It takes the ingenuity, independence and the creative will of the small business owner.

Small businesses do have one advantage that they can capitalize on if they wanted to. They can make their small storefronts, offices and garages more unique and original than anything the larger corporations can muster. Thus they are original and will appeal to a core group of customers. They have effectively developed a niche market. Large corporations go for the average which is where most of the sales are but small businesses can go for the edges of this average and have consistent business.