Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big, 10th-Anniversary Edition

272 Pages·2016·1.8 MB·English

by  Bo Burlingham

PORTFOLIO/PENGUIN
SMALL GIANTS
Bo Burlingham is a contributing writer at Forbes magazine and former executive
editor and editor at large of Inc. magazine, where he worked for thirty-three
years. He is also the cofounder, with Paul Spiegelman, of the Small Giants
Community (www.smallgiants.org). He lives in Oakland, California, with his
wife, Lisa.
Also by Bo Burlingham
Finish Big: How Great Entrepreneurs Exit Their Companies on Top
Street Smarts: An All-Purpose Tool Kit for Entrepreneurs (with Norm Brodsky)
A Stake in the Outcome: Building a Culture of Ownership for the Long-Term
Success of Your Business (with Jack Stack) The Great Game of Business: The
Only Sensible Way to Run a Company (with Jack Stack)

PORTFOLIO / PENGUIN
An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
375 Hudson Street
New York, New York 10014
penguin.com
First published in the United States of America by Portfolio, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2005
This revised and expanded edition published in Portfolio 2016
Copyright © 2005, 2016 Bo Burlingham
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EBook ISBN 9781101992333
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Names: Burlingham, Bo, author.
Title: Small giants : companies that choose to be great instead of big, 10th-anniversary edition / Bo Burlingham.
Description: 10th-anniversary edition. | New York City : Portfolio, 2016. |
Revised edition of the author’s Small giants, 2005.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016030870 | ISBN 9780143109600 (paperback) Subjects: LCSH: Small business—United States—Management. |
Private Companies—United States—Management. | Close corporations—United States—Management. | Success in business—United
States. | BISAC: BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Corporate & Business History. | BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Small Business. |
BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Business.
Classification: LCC HD62.7 .B835 2016 | DDC 658.4/09—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016030870
While the author has made every effort to provide accurate Internet addresses, telephone numbers, and other contact information at the
time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors or for changes that occur after
publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web
sites or their content.
Cover design: Joe Montgomery
Cover photograph: Gandee Vasan / Getty Images
Version_1
To the love of my life, Lisa;
to our children, Jake and Kate, and our children-in-law, Maria and
Matt,
and to our grandchildren, Owen and Kiki, Fiona and Jack,
because family is everything
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Movies have credits, and books have acknowledgments, but I feel as though
many of the people involved in the production of this one deserve something
more—say, a standing ovation. Let’s start with the people who came up with the
idea. Credit for that goes to Patrick Nolan, then the director of trade paperback
sales for Penguin, and now vice president, editor in chief, and associate
publisher of Penguin Books, who had the original inspiration, and to Adrian
Zackheim, founder and publisher of the Portfolio imprint at Penguin Random
House, who contacted me after reading a cover story I had written in Inc.
magazine on Zingerman’s, entitled “The Coolest Small Company in America.”
He said he saw the possibility of a book growing out of the article. I didn’t get it
at first, but I agreed to meet with him. Over breakfast at Pershing Square
Restaurant in Manhattan, he articulated the idea so clearly and so brilliantly that,
by the time I left, my involvement was a foregone conclusion. After conferring
with my wife, Lisa, and my literary-agent-head-cheerleader-guardian-angel, Jill
Kneerim, I got started.
By then, a whole bunch of other people had already had an impact on what
would eventually become Small Giants: former Inc. editor in chief George
Gendron, who had assigned the Zingerman’s article and helped guide me
through the research; Leigh Buchanan, who’d edited the piece; and George’s
successor, John Koten, who’d put it on the cover with a particularly catchy cover
line—not to mention Ari Weinzweig, Paul Saginaw, and their colleagues at
Zingerman’s, including Maggie Bayless, Dave Carson, Frank Carollo, Amy
Emberling, Holly Firmin, Mo Frechette, Stas’ Kazmierski, Ron Maurer, Todd
Wickstrom, and Lynn Yates. Subsequently both Ari and George played crucial
roles in helping me think through the themes of the book and identify companies
I should look at. George, in particular, came through (as he always has) with
those incisive observations at crucial moments that are the mark of a great editor.
In addition, I received much valuable support and advice from Jack Stack, CEO
of SRC Holdings Corp. (formerly Springfield ReManufacturing Corp.), my
mentor and sometime coauthor, as well as numerous other friends, relatives, and
colleagues, including Peter Carpenter, John Case, Susan Donovan, John Ellis the
elder, John R. Ellis the younger, Richard Fried, Gary Heil, Michael Hopkins, Joe
Knight, Joel Kotkin, Sara Noble, John O’Neil, Bill Palmer, and Greg Wittstock.
Norm Brodsky, another mentor and sometime coauthor, contributed on
several different levels. He suggested companies to look at; he helped flesh out
themes; he gave me important feedback at various stages of the process; and his
company at the time, CitiStorage, turned out to be a great example of a small
giant, something I didn’t realize when I started. Among those who helped me
realize it were his colleagues at CitiStorage, including Brad Clinton, Peter
Gunderson, Mike Harper, Bruce Howard, Sherry James, Manny Jimenez, Sam
Kaplan, Noelle Keating, Patty Lightfoot, Patti Kanner Post, Louis Weiner, and
last—but far from least—Elaine Brodsky.
The first person I interviewed for the original edition of this book was Gary
Erickson of Clif Bar & Co., who immediately turned the tables on me, asking me
a series of questions that helped get me on the right track from the start. He was
able to do it because he was in the midst of writing his own book, Raising the
Bar, which addressed many of the same issues I would wind up grappling with.
Dean Mayer and Leslie Henrichsen were of great help as well, serving early on
as guides through the wonderful world of Clif Bar. For this edition of the book,
Clif Bar CEO Kevin Cleary and Gary's wife and partner, Kit Crawford, were
both incredibly helpful, as were Kate Torgersen and Heather Salazar.
As it turned out, the Erickson interview was just the beginning of one of the
most stimulating, uplifting, thoroughly enjoyable reporting episodes of my
career. Never have I had the opportunity to hang out with so many interesting
people at so many fascinating companies, one right after the other. If you’ve
already read the book, you know what I’m talking about, and you can easily
imagine why the experience was exhilarating. Here I would simply like to give
credit to the people who helped make the reporting phase of both editions so
much fun:
• at Anchor Brewing in San Francisco: John Dannerbeck, Keith Greggor,
Fritz Maytag, and Linda Rowe
• at ECCO in Boise, Idaho: Karen Campbell, Rob Corrigan, Michelle
Howard, Todd Mansfield, Chris Marshall, Bob Ohlson, Mike Pironi, Mike
Scoll, Chris Thompson, Jim Thompson, Richard Vinson, and Ed Zimmer
• at Hammerhead Productions in Studio City, California: Thad Beier, Dan
Chuba, and Jamie Dixon
• at New Hope Contracting in Dorchester, Massachusetts: Chris Howell,
Rob Moreno, Chris Painten, Gene Pettiford, Danny Power, Peter Power,
and Steve Quinn
• at Nick's Pizza & Pub in Crystal Lake and Elgin, Illinois: Aubrey Judson,
Rudy Miick, and Nick Sarillo
• at O.C. Tanner Co. in Salt Lake City: Ed Bagley, Adrian Gostick, Dan
Martinez, Kent Murdock, Gary Peterson, and Shauna Raso
• at Reell Precision Manufacturing in St. Paul, Minnesota: Joe Arnold, Bob
Carlson, Eric Donaldson, Shari Erdman, Jessica Faust, Jim Grubs, Lee
Johnson, John Kossett, Margaret Lulic, the late Dale Merrick, George
Moroz, Joy Moroz, Michael J. Naughton, Kyle Smith, Bob Wahlstedt, and
Steve Wikstrom
• at Rhythm & Hues Studio in Los Angeles: R. Scot Byrd and John Hughes
• at Righteous Babe Records and LFS Touring in Buffalo: Susan Alzner,
Mary Begley, Ani DiFranco, Ron Ehmke, Scot Fisher, Sean Giblin, Brian
Grunert, Karen Hayes, Phil Karatz, Heidi Kunkel, Sarah Otto, Jessie
Schnell, Steve Schrems, and Susan Tanner
• at Selima Inc. in Miami Beach: Selima Stavola
• at The Goltz Group in Chicago: Renoir Battle, Felice M. Davis, Jay Goltz,
Luan Le, and Dale Zeimen
• at TriNet in San Leandro, California: Martin Babinec and Maureen Kleven
• at Union Square Hospitality Group in New York City: Haley Carroll,
Jenny Zinman Dirksen, Brandi Hudson, and Danny Meyer
• at W. L. Butler Construction Inc. in Redwood City, California: Michelle
Arani, Bill Butler, and Frank York

They weren’t alone, either. In the course of my research, I had the
opportunity to interview many other great people who graciously shared their
time and wisdom with me, including Jim Ansara of Shawmut Design &
Construction in Boston; Chris Brown of Bull Moose Music in Portland, Maine;
Ed Cardoni of Hallwalls in Buffalo; Robert Catlin of Signature Mortgage in
Canton, Ohio; Gary Cristall of Gary Cristall Artist Management in Vancouver,
British Columbia; Joe DiPasquale of Planet Love in Buffalo; Paul Eichen of
Rokenbok Toy Company in Solana Beach, California; Don Esmond of the
Buffalo News; Jim Fleming of Fleming & Associates in Ann Arbor, Michigan;
Susan Frazier of Goldenrod Music in Lansing, Michigan; Laurie Fuchs of
Ladyslipper Music in Durham, North Carolina; Virginia Giordano of Giordano