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.

Aaron Troyer

When I was in high school and college I would be in bands constantly, and helping other people write music. Naturally, bands need demos, and simple recordings to get ideas out, so I would usually start making simple recordings of songs I would write. I would use the only means I had at my disposable – so a simple Macbook, Garageband and my guitar. At first it was always demos leading to real studio dates where we would track the final version. During this process, I started to really love songwriting and production. Read more>>

Diana Gregor

I bought my dance studio in 2006 with only 60 students. I could see that the business was falling apart and needed structure, organization and systems in place. By committing myself fully to building my business, I worked on creating personal relationships with customers, finding a reliable and talented staff, and being as organized and communicative as possible. All of these factors helped the studio grow to 200 students, to 500, and right before Covid we hit 800 students. Read more>>

Gina McNeil

First step in scaling up, and I didn’t even realize I was in this stage til hindsight, was wrapping my mind around the reality of my business. Being real about where it was, it’s weak points, and it’s strong suits gave me a good starting point for moving up. After taking a look at the business’ status, I then took a realistic look at my contribution. Do I invest as much time and money as I can? If that answer isn’t a yes (and it wasn’t for me!), thr path to scaling up was made crystal clear. I saw turn around for the better not long after moving more like I believed in my business, as opposed to moving like I was scared of trying too hard. Read more>>

Jesse Kankowski

The pandemic was a changing point for us. We took a team of 10 and become a team of 22 in a matter of 3 years. For many businesses (and people), the pandemic was life shattering in many ways. Our team was lucky, being in the website industry, businesses were focused on how to make their websites work for them in world that had become isolated with storefronts shuttered. Read more>>