After six banks turned down her requests for loans, Inez Sandberg started Habitude Salon, Day Spa and Gallery with $10,000 in savings and two credit cards. She and a receptionist were the only employees.
Five years later, the Ballard-based business has three locations and 52 employees. Along the way, Sandberg found time to create a Ballard art walk and weathered the close of her business for a month because of damage from a nearby fire.
Habitude has been honored as one of 10 winners of the 2001 Mayor's Small Business Awards (as have the businesses listed below).
Much of the salon's culture is based on Native American tradition and philosophy. The staff meets monthly for "pow wows," and employees who demonstrate superior customer service are rewarded with symbols called "caring totems."
Sandberg is now working on developing a fourth Habitude location at South Lake Union. The 6,000-square-foot spa will feature waterfalls, aromatherapy and lighting designed to create an urban rustic, lodgelike feel.
Botanical Designs has literally and figuratively become an integral part of the Seattle landscape.
The company, founded in 1995 from owner Scott Barron's personal savings and a Small Business Administration loan, is responsible for many of the most scenic interior and exterior landscapes in office buildings and retail shopping centers around the region.
Botanical Designs, which has grown from five to 36 employees since its inception, is responsible for award-winning landscapes at Two Union Square, Washington Mutual Tower, Fisher Westlake Union Center and the Sea-Tac Seattle Marriott Hotel.
Company policy dictates that all customer phone calls must be returned the same day, and all customers can e-mail directly to each employee's pager. The firm, whose rate of customer retention is 98 percent, also has a full-time CPA on staff to help control costs.
Botanical Designs also supports numerous charities.
Lisa Cooper had a hunch.
When Cooper and Jerry Cohen started Ebbets Field Flannels in 1989, nobody knew there would be a market for historic sports apparel.
Cooper and Cohen, however, believed consumers would want authentic, replicated baseball, hockey and professional football uniforms, jackets and caps, such as Seattle Rainiers jerseys, Negro league uniforms and other mementos of times past.
They were right. The company operates a retail store near Safeco Field and an e-commerce site, and publishes several catalogs a year. Its products have been displayed on "Late Night with David Letterman," in several movies and numerous national publications.
The company's accomplishments are especially impressive considering that large companies such as Nike and Adidas dominate the sports apparel market.
Ebbets Field Flannels also donates uniforms and apparel to inner-city youth groups and various fund raisers, and has donated several valuable items to the Negro League Museum in Kansas City.
Not many businesses focus on providing travel services to the Hispanic Spanish-speaking and bilingual community, as Excelsior Travel Service does.
Started by Rosamaria Rosales in 1990 from her apartment on Capitol Hill, the agency focuses on travel to Mexico and Central and South American countries.
Excelsior also provides translation services for official documents such as passports, marriage licenses, birth certificates and voter registration.
Sales have increased eightfold since 1991.
To counter a 50 percent reduction in commissions the airline industry pays to travel agencies for bookings, the agency has begun marketing to a larger geographic area and has added train and cruise travel planning to its menu.
Rosales and her business partner, Samuel Martinez, are also active in children's issues.
Successful third-generation businesses are rare. Genesee Fuel and Heating Co. is a notable exception.
The firm provides home delivery of fuel oil and heating and cooling installation to more than 12,000 homeowners in the Puget Sound region.
Founded in 1929 by Gordon and Russell Clark in Seattle's Rainier Valley - where it still operates - the company is now run by Steve Clark, Gordon's grandson. Since Steve Clark took over seven years ago, the firm has more than doubled its account base and annual revenue.
A key to company success has been its "be right over" attitude that was common in mom-and-pop operations of the past. Genesee employees often respond to customer needs outside the scope of business, such as fixing a broken screen door for a longtime elderly customer or clearing a gutter downspout on a hard-to-reach roof corner. Thirteen of the company's 30 full-time employees have worked at Genesee for more than 15 years.
Genesee has been a sponsor of the Rainier Valley Heritage Festival since its inception and is involved in numerous charities.
Ernesto Rios opened a restaurant in 1991 when his mother told him she wanted a job. He operated a hair salon at the time.
Rios, who immigrated to Seattle in the late 1970s, still gives the occasional haircut. Usually, though, he's immersed in his three restaurants - Inay's Kitchen at Uwajimaya Village, Inay's Manila Grill in the University District and Rios Bar and Grill in the International District.
After Rios came to Seattle, his mother and 10 siblings followed. After initially opening a barber shop, Rios opened Inay's Kitchen (Inay's means "mother") on Beacon Hill. The original Inay's was sold in 1999 to finance Inay's Manila Grill.
Rios opened the original Inay's Kitchen because he thought a small Filipino restaurant would be a good part-time hobby and job for his mother. The restaurant quickly became a Filipino community and gathering place. Since opening the first restaurant, gross sales have increased tenfold.
Over the years, Rios has supported countless Filipino neighborhood events, including creating fund raisers for poor children in Manila and holding a Filipino fashion show.
La Panzanella began by accident, but there's been nothing random about the bakery's success.
Owner Ciro Pasciuto and his wife, Kim, moved to Seattle from Italy in 1986. Ciro initially began making bread at home for friends.
Three years later, some acquaintances opening an Italian restaurant asked Pasciuto to make bread for them. La Panzanella was born. The wholesale bakery and retail bakery/cafe now provides handmade Italian bread and crackers to a variety of restaurants, small independent grocery stores and gourmet specialty shops in Seattle and on the Eastside. Customers can also enjoy soups, salads, sandwiches and pastries at the bakery's retail store and cafe.
When the bakery was wiped out in the 1995 Pang Warehouse fire - it was located in the basement of the building - Pasciuto used personal savings to restart the business at its current Capitol Hill location. Without Pasciuto's conservative financial planning and his philosophy of eschewing debt, the business probably wouldn't be around today.
La Panzanella helps its employees - many of whom come from other countries - find community resources and study for ESL classes. It also supports various community organizations.
Market Optical isn't an ordinary eyewear retail store.
For one, owner Ruvane Richman purchases eyewear directly from manufacturers and designers, which allows the company to control costs. Unlike other optical establishments, it doesn't rely on annual visits to sales shows for its inventory; company buyers instead travel to Europe, Asia and around the U.S. four times each year to buy eyewear. That allows the firm to sell eyewear based on customer needs rather than back-inventory levels.
In addition, many eyewear designers give Market Optical exclusive rights to sell their lines. Richman also designs his own line of eyewear called Myopium.
If Market Optical employees want to become licensed opticians in the state of Washington, the company offers an apprenticeship program that pays half the cost of schooling. Unlike many other stores, the company trains each employee to assist customers with every aspect of their optical needs.
Annual revenue has increased more than 200 percent since the business opened in 1982. Four years ago, the company opened a second location in Bellevue Square.
The company is involved with various charities, including Vision USA, a program that provides free eye exams and free eyewear to working-poor patients.
H. Eric Vennes knows the definition of creative financing - when he started his legal messenger and process service at age 22, he convinced his brother to defer his compensation for several months.
Such tactics are no longer necessary. NW Legal Support has increased annual revenue fourteenfold since its inception in 1986 and now employs 31 full- and part-time process servers.
Most revenue comes from serving legal documents such as summons, complaints, subpoenas, divorce documents and property foreclosures.
Because clients will soon be able to transfer and file documents electronically from desktop to court and to opposing counsel and back - which could cost the firm more than 45 percent of its revenue stream - Vennes has increased the company's emphasis on in-person process-serving, a business line unaffected by advances in technology.
The company is involved with numerous charities, including the Chicken Soup Brigade, Big Brothers Big Sisters and local Boys & Girls Clubs.
Western Foil products are highly recognizable, even if the company is one of Seattle's best-kept secrets.
Western Foil is a regional distributor and manufacturer of decorative packaging products such as gift wrap, ribbons, bows and specialty products such as aluminum foil candy and sandwich wraps. The company serves the gift, floral, candy and food industries.
Founded in 1949, the company is run by Marianne Weingarten, the daughter of the founders, though it is in the process of transferring ownership to a third generation.
Western Foil still does business with a handful of suppliers who have been customers since it opened. The company also has many second-generation employees.
Its community involvement includes supporting Children's Hospital Festival of Trees program, Junior Achievement and contributing in-kind products to many charities.