by Johnny Gilbert
in Business (submitted 2011-07-07)
In the world of the small business, success often comes to those who, having taken their business ideas to a large enterprise for sympathy, are turned down and left with no option but to try to make a go of it themselves. There so many business ideas that big businesses have proven itself to be just too slow to capitalize on. They are just too hobbled by inertia to take advantage of them. To small entrepreneurs who are hungry for success, the potential of these ideas is easy to recognize, and they pounce on them. There are so many businesses that turn ideas rejected by large corporations into wonderful small business concepts. Let's take a closer look.
Large businesses reach their level of success by focusing on something narrow, and becoming really good at what they do. They often aren't interested in exploring a new idea, because it would be too far a departure from what they are good at doing. The company that makes kitchen appliances for instance, isn't going to be interested in some innovator who approaches them with an idea for a better sheet metal manufacturing technique. As far as those people are concerned, their area of interest starts with the buying of the steel, and not the making of it. The switches, the motors, the sheet metal, all of these materials that go into the making of a home appliance, are sourced from elsewhere. It's the putting together, the assembling, that an appliance company specializes in. They will often reject any business ideas for anything that's outside of their core business area.
Sometimes, money is the reason why large businesses will often reject business ideas that would work splendidly for a small entrepreneur. Large businesses have an interest only in large revenue projects. Business ideas that can bring in too little revenue, are often going to be rejected as too smalltime. Even if the idea does fall within their area of core interest. Microsoft for instance had no interest in the web browser business to begin with. They just felt it was too smalltime for them. It was when Netscape came along and tried to take over the entire Internet that Microsoft began to sit up and take notice. Netscape had nowhere to go to when Microsoft did enter the business finally.
But it isn't always for some sensible reason that large business will reject promising business ideas. Sometimes, the people in power at a large corporation will just not see the point of a business idea. The world is full of examples of this kind where the powers that be don't see the potential of the business idea that are presented to them. It's when a small business makes a big deal out of a business idea that is rejected by the powers that the world hears about it the most. An example of such a thing? The handcranked radio for the poor countries in Africa. A battery free radio is such a powerful idea now, that it's turned a smalltime inventor into a millionaire many times over in Britain pursuing this idea.
