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Fun N Sun Tanning owners Diane Lindfors and Terri Walker say the future of the tanning salon business looks bright after a successful year.
STAR PHOTO BY KATE TRACY
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According to the national average, new businesses have a high fatality rate in their first five years, but the owners of three local businesses say they are optimistic about defying those odds one year at a time.
Only one in 100 new businesses survive over a five-year period according to the national average, said Debbie Daisy, director of the Anchorage Small Business Development Center.
"It's not pretty," Daisy said.
Sam Dickey, district director for the Small Business Administration office in Anchorage, said the fatality rate in the first few years is generally higher than 50 percent.
Chugiak-Eagle River Chamber of Commerce special events director Merry Braham said it's tough to defy those odds locally.
"A lot of (businesses) are gone in 24 months," she said.
Susan Terwilliger, Stacy Scott Orr, Diane Lindfors and Terri Walker own and operate service-oriented businesses in Eagle River. Their backgrounds and experience are as varied as the services they offer, but they all seem to have found a common key to success and say business is good.
Daisy said owners of about 85 percent of the businesses that survive the first five years typically have advanced business education or background.
"They are upping their chances of survival just because of understanding business techniques," she said.
Fun N Sun Tanning
Diane Lindfors and Terri Walker are co-owners of Fun N Sun Tanning in Eagle River.
The pair spent about $150,000 to purchase, gut, remodel and revamp an existing business in 2005, which previously housed a photography studio.
Walker said she was thinking about continuing her education toward a business degree and had some classes under her belt when in May 2005 she met Lindfors, who was thinking about taking on the business venture.
Lindfors said a series of back surgeries in 2004 left her unable to continue working for Alaska Refuse.
After her husband, John, passed away in May 2004, Lindfors said, "I had to do something."
With a lot of hard work, the help of friends and a new business partnership, the doors of the completely remodeled 1,000-square-foot salon with all new equipment, including seven beds, a sunless spray tan machine and a new computer system opened July 18, 2005.
"The people that came back after the six-week closure, they didn't have to," Lindfors said. "They chose to and it's from their word of mouth that has created phenomenal success for us."
A year ago they started with 643 customers. Lindfors said the salon's latest client is number 2,120, and the business has started to break even as far as paying for itself.
Dickey said while proper capitalization or loan guarantees and "filling in business knowledge gaps," such as understanding how cash flow works and what a balance sheet is play important factors, distinguishing your business from the competition can also be a key to success.
"What makes you unique? What makes you the business that people want to go to?" he asked. "People still shop by price, but many people shop by value. So, again, I would come back to, what distinguishes you?"
Both Lindfors and Walker cite a lifetime of customer service experience, which they say has paid off in a service-oriented field.
"It all comes down to how you treat people," Lindfors said, adding the business' strongest features are cleanliness and how people feel when they walk through the door.
"They've got to feel wanted," Walker said.
The duo also boasts a knowledgeable staff. While not required by law, all Fun N Sun Tanning employees are certified.
Lindfors said all employees complete an online program and take a test to become certified in knowing about skin, skincare, UV light and skin moisturizers. In addition, she said they receive additional training about the products that are sold in order to match clients with the right tanning and skin care products.
Braham said it's also important for business owners to understand the target market.
"You try and offer service. That's the only thing you have to offer," Braham said, adding that successful business owners "do their research in the community and see what are we looking for what are we needing here."
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Pawsitively Pets owner Stacy Scott Orr sits with her own critters, Bianca, 5, an American Eskimo she calls a "runaway circus dog," and Limbo, 7, a cat Orr found in a trash can as a kitten that fit in her hand and had to be bottle fed. "She thinks I'm her mother," Orr said.
STAR PHOTO BY KATE TRACY
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Pawsitively Pets
Shortly after moving to Alaska, Pawsitively Pets owner and "critter sitter" Stacy Scott Orr identified a business venture that would meet the community's needs and allow her to pursue her personal interests.
A former corporate flight attendant and yacht captain, Orr moved to Alaska from the Virgin Islands in 2003 after marrying her husband Roderic.
She said not only had she never "been cold before," but the move left her feeling a little lost.
"I've been in customer service for most of my life, so I knew I got along with people. I knew I loved animals, and I wanted to get out. I love to go hiking and walking," Orr said, so she began pet sitting in 2004.
Orr is now an accredited pet sitter with a licensed, bonded and insured business.
She said about half of her $2,000 startup costs went towards licensing and insurance.
"I definitely want to be licensed, insured and bonded, because I'm going into someone's home," she said.
Orr created her own graphics for her business cards and has expanded to offer T-shirts and magnets.
Business has increased so much in the past year, Orr said she's considering hiring help.
"I used to get one or two phone calls a week, and now I get three a day," she said.
For $20 a visit, Orr said she tries to keep the same routine of pet owners and guarantees spending one hour minimum caring for your pet during each visit throughout the day.
She said she'll water the plants, watch Animal Planet with the cat, walk the dog or give the cat and the dog an extra brushing and has even been hired to care for seedlings.
Watering the seedlings, caring for "Peanut," a leopard gecko, and keeping a watchful eye on two scorpions named Inspector Clouseau and Cato, who dined on live crickets, are among Orr's most memorable jobs.
She credits word of mouth for the increase in steady business and said she's in it for the long haul.
"I love it!" Orr said. "This is long term. I would like to open a place for cats like this place called 'The Cat Hotel' in Santa Barbara."
Braham said businesses that survive are those that try not to expand too quickly.
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Susan Terwilliger, owner of Alaska Birthing, takes a break in between clients at her Eagle River office, which she opened last summer. When not providing care for her own clients, Terwilliger said she assists other midwives in Anchorage and the Matanuska Valley.
STAR PHOTO BY KATE TRACY
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Alaska Birthing
Terwilliger, a certified midwife with 17 years experience, opened Alaska Birthing in Eagle River Aug. 1, 2005, after moving here from Texas where she previously owned Texas Birthing, which she said was so successful after 17 years she barely had to advertise.
But it didn't start out that way.
"I just started out real slow and gathered my equipment together, found free advertising where I could and gradually just built from there," she said.
Although she considers her new beginning here a success one year later, Terwilliger admits, "To get my existence known in Eagle River was a little more challenging than I anticipated."
Midwifery, Terwilliger said, is such personal business that at the end of the day, "it's really a word-of-mouth business."
"I think (clients) look for a personal connection," she said. "Someone who's competent and even more than that, someone they feel like they can still hold onto their own power and feel comfortable with in what is in fact a very intimate event in their life."
She describes midwifery as the "melding of ancient art of midwifery with modern technology," and said she loves that the practice treats mom and baby as one unit and offers women a wonderful option.
As a certified direct entry midwife, Terwilliger provides prenatal and postpartum care, assists clients in home birthing, and files all insurance and birth certificate paperwork.
"I'm a one-woman show," she said.
With "several people rumbling right now," Terwilliger said she considers her first year a success, especially considering that she's starting over again.
"I love being in Eagle River, and I know that my business will grow over time because of word of mouth. I just love the process," Terwilliger said. "Doing the work to make the business grow can really be the fun part."
She said midwifery is more commonly practiced in Alaska as compared to many other states.
"Alaska is a great place for midwifery," Terwilliger said. "It's growing and midwifery care is covered by Medicaid and insurance, which is somewhat unusual in the United States so that makes it accessible."
Reach the reporter at kate.tracy@alaskastar.com.
