Starting a business is hard because it’s a fight with yourself, an internal battle – gaining the courage to get started, etc. Scaling a business is different – the challenges you face are mostly external to yourself. Each challenge has a million mini-challenges. We wanted to create a space for conversations and stories around growth and scaling. Below, you’ll find stories and insights from successful entrepreneurs across a variety of industries and markets.

Maggie Gulling

I’ve been in this game for over 25 years, and let me tell you—it wasn’t some fairytale start. I didn’t waltz in with a golden camera and a perfect plan. My head wasn’t in it at first, but that didn’t stop me. I clawed my way through, learning, adapting, and turning what started as a passion into a powerhouse business. Read more>>

Jennifer Fillmann

Scaling my business to three locations in under three years was a journey fueled by vision, passion, and some bold moves. Looking back, there were moments of doubt, big risks, and a lot of learning, but it’s been incredibly rewarding.

When I first started, building a strong brand was my priority. I wanted the experience we offered to be unique and memorable, but I was hesitant to scale. I was nervous about losing what made our business special. Initially, I thought I was the only one who could handle everything. I didn’t believe I could scale without compromising the quality and personal touch we had with every customer. But over time, I realized I couldn’t achieve my dreams and have the impact I wanted without including others. It was a game-changer. Read more>>

Suzanne Chadwick

When people ask me how I scaled my business, they’re often expecting tales of complex strategies and relentless hustle. The truth? My biggest growth came when I started doing less—a lot less. Read more>>

Jessica Mingledorff Catie Mcwhirter

Catie and I brought on a few assistants ( two of which we had worked with previously and had plans for them to go on the floor after a while. a manager who was a childhood friend that embodied the welcoming energy we were going for but had never worked in the beauty industry before , and 2 stylists that we had a long standing work relationship with . I think we opened the doors with maybe 8 total employees. it actually felt like a lot in that small space . and we just started grinding and building a reputation. earning a spot as athens BEST hair salon before we even hit our 1 year mark. Read more>>

Amanda Rome West

For me, how I scaled up so quickly was…. I learned how to properly delegate and be able to focus my time on the tasks that are most meaningful to my creative business as well as my artistry careers…. We ill have the same 24 hours in the day it’s about how you leverage and utilize them. Work smarter, not harder. Read more>>

Clarissa Rankin

When it comes down to my business, it started out very rocky, but I just decided to jump with a leap of faith. I told myself the only way I can scale up is to treat people like I would like to be treated when I was in CDL training. Provide good customer service show natural humanity customer service to each individual and on social media, of how the school respond back to STUDENTS as a whole from the beginning to the end. I just kept my prices low for every student at an affordable price, as much as possible and still be able to be in business. Read more>>

Alissa Schow

I had been on social media for about 4 years before I started growing fast. I had 30k followers and hadn’t grown much- I would lose and gain followers and not really get any momentum. I’d had a couple brand deals here and there but then they all just stopped or wouldn’t pay my rates and wanted to give me free product- which I wasn’t interested in anymore. Read more>>

Marissa Rodriguez

My company is called Through Experience because in the end, it is in going through our experience that we learn, evolve, and develop mastery in what we do. When I decided to really get involved in eCommerce and specifically in DTC (direct to consumer), which means working with businesses that only sell via their own website, there were not a lot of people focusing on this. There were no mentors or coaches for me to model against. That means that it took me longer to figure things out. I made so many mistakes. Read more>>

Dr. Tyler Tarver

When I started Tarver Academy and my speaking journey, I wasn’t making any money. Honestly, I just wanted to help teachers and grow myself as a leader and speaker. I spoke anywhere that would let me, sometimes six hours a day, completely free. It literally took 4 full years of speaking everywhere I could until someone offered to pay me. Now, that’s my family’s main source of income. Most of my speaking gigs come from posting free content that helps teachers, which is something else I did for years without ever making a dime. However, those 100s of hours of free tips and content about my favorite tools and companies eventually led to working with companies like Google and Canva. Read more>>

Gina King

When you hear the word scaling up, most people get scared or super excited. I was both. How am I going to scale up and still handle my business and work full time? Will I be able to handle this? How do I even start or where do I start? Like most entrepreneurs my life is about building my empire. I always knew I wanted to scale up and felt like I needed that extra piece but didn’t know how to do it. Read more>>