Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big

Synopsis

How maverick companies have passed up revenue growth—and focused on greatness instead

Most books about successful businesses focus on public companies, where the definition for success is steady growth in revenue and profits. Yet there are many excellent, privately held companies marching to the beat of a different drum; they have stricken revenue and profit growth from the top of their mission statements. Instead, they define themselves by their passion for their products and their commitment to their employees, customers, and community—embracing a clarity and loyalty to purpose that's an anomaly in today's environment.

Small Giants is a fascinating book about the unconventional people who run these purpose-driven companies. Longtime Inc. magazine editor Bo Burlingham takes us deep inside these companies to determine the secret ingredient, the elusive “mojo” that makes them great.

He profiles fourteen of the best, including Anchor Brewing, CitiStorage, Clif Bar Inc., Righteous Babe Records, Reel Precision Manufacturing, and Zingerman's Community of Businesses. These companies are consistently profitable yet have consciously resisted convention by staying small and great instead of becoming large and mediocre.

For anyone who wants to explore America's most innovative and inspiring small business successes, this unique book is the place to start.

Publishers Weekly

What do the Anchor Stream microbrewery and underground rock star Ani DiFranco have in common? The two are among Burlingham's examples of privately held businesses that have become "giants" in their field without becoming huge corporations. (And if you don't think being a rock star is a business, consider that DiFranco's dealings with local vendors in her Buffalo neighborhood have led to the creation of more than 100 new jobs.) For the 14 small companies profiled here, success comes by getting richer, not by getting bigger. Burlingham's central conceit, that these are companies that excel in generating "mojo," may seem abstract at first, but he carefully demystifies the term by focusing on issues like community relations and customer service. The owners he interviews speak from hard-won experience about resisting the pressure to simply keep expanding or sell the company to the highest bidder and staying true to their original visions for excellence. Burlingham, an editor-at-large at Inc., closes his account with a tribute to the magazine's late founder, Bernard A. Goldhirsh, whose celebration of entrepreneurship and loose managerial style clearly provided a lasting influence. (Jan.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.