come back soon to learn more about what is going on in Tyler’s life!

Wow, it has only been two years since I said to myself: “I would like to start a computer support business”.

Now, with five full-time employees, seven part-time people… we are having a lot of fun.

From 2006 to 2007 we grew 600% (revenue numbers). We have already matched our 2007 revenue in the first six months of 2008 and looking to end this year with 200% growth.

This is fun.

I think it is possible to double our revenue again by the end of 2008 and double our staff within 12 months.

Thoughts?

Wow, 2007 was an amazing year. 2008 is upon us and I am excited for what it will become!

Thanks to all of our clients, partners, employees, families, and friends who have helped make our dreams a reality!

Here are some of HelpMeTy.com’s Accomplishments from 2007:

Over 5 fold increase in average revenue during last 12 months
Over 6 fold increase in client base over last 12 months
Opened formal office in New Brighton in Spring of 2007
Expanded New Brighton office in Fall of 2007
Summer of 2007 HelpMeTy.com became Carbon Neutral
HelpMeTy.com has adopted 2 Metro Transit Bus Shelters located right outside the Saint Paul Area Chamber Center.
Received the Saint Paul Area Chamber of Commerce 2007 Celebrate Small Business Success Award
International Finalist for the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards
Minnesota Cup Entrepreneurship Competition Finalist
<Pentair Award for Entrepreneurship Winner
Complete Solutions for Small Business
Joined 2 Local Chambers of Commerce
Received Multiple Press from business journals to newspapers.
• Went from 3 team members (1 FT, 2 PT) in January 1st, 2007 to 15 team members (4 FT, 11 PT) January 1st, 2008!
Incorporated in January of 2008

I found out this week that I no longer have to take any more college classes.

On one hand, I am moving forward in life and no longer have the requirements of school nagging at me day and night.

On the other hand… this means there will no longer be any student discounts for events, software, and other stuff I want to buy or do. Wow… apparently that was the first thing I thought of when I thought of reasons I want to remain a student. Well, the opportunities and free advice from professors and fellow students will likely remain for awhile but will eventually end.

It is time to move on… the business needs me. I am very excited to soon be able to spend a lot more time in the business and get the many things done that have been needing to get done for a very long time.

While “studying” for one of my finals yesterday, I discovered some vloggers (video bloggers) who made me laugh for hours. If you need some entertainment in your life, check out http://www.youtube.com/vlogbrothers and http://www.youtube.com/sxephil. These guys have hundreds of thousands of views and post new videos every single day. On December 17th, the vlog brothers announced “Project Awesome” which had the mission of putting a Super Nintendo style logo across YouTube and also supporting charities along the way. They succeeded. If you go to youtube and search for “awesome” videos with the highest ratings of all time, the videos have taken over the entire list. Watch this video about “Project Awesome”

We just turned in our thirty page strategic analysis of where HelpMeTy.com should go over the next three years. For those who have never done pro forma statements before… “wow”, is all I can say. They are very difficult to create accurately, but when completed, they are tremendously useful. They allow us to have a high-level look at all upcoming expenses and revenues over the coming years.

Now that we (myself with Lisa and Andrew who are amazing co-partners) have turned in the strategic analysis, we have to pitch our plan to a panel of entrepreneurs & investors. Our instructor informed us that he purposely gave us the most critical judges for the presentation.  I believe this will be tremendously useful for us, but will likely be a difficult presentation to pull off well because expectations on us are so high because we are one of the few groups that actually is already operating a business.

Of course, during this time of preparation for exams, work never ends. We only had about seven clients request help from us this past weekend. And did I forget to mention that our office manager is on vacation this weekend while our assistant takes leave as well to work on his finals?  Thus, it will be an interesting two weeks as we work hard to keep up with good customer service to our clients and finish up with exams.

Growth-stage businesses are interesting. Excitement is in the air. Opportunity is seen. Business model is proven. Profits are sucked back into the business as retained earnings. Overtime hours are regular.

We are approaching our growth-stage. As we prepare for growth, so many opportunities and questions present themselves. What will our exit strategy be? How should we grow? Who will our long-term target market be and how/when will it transition from our current target market?

I discovered this evening while talking to one of my entrepreneurial advisors that Zubaz, the zebra-style flamboyant pants, were invented in Minnesota. Not only that, but the founders of the original Zubaz are getting back together to see if they can create another tidal wave to ride. They are pursuing the 15 – 25 age bracket like they did before and are working on myspace, facebook, and youtube marketing campaigns.

I will plan on buying some Zubaz for this holiday season and see if they need any help.

Check them out at www.zubaz.com

For those who don’t know, Black Friday is the day when most retail stores finally enter the black (profit) and it is the biggest shopping day in America. Many items are 60% off retail or more. For two years, I worked at Circuit City for Black Friday. Those days sit among the favorite days of my life. There is nothing like showing up for work at 3:30AM and seeing 100 people in line in sub-zero weather for a 5AM opening.

This year, we wanted to take advantage of these huge discounts. With four people from our team attacking stores around the cities and a strategy designed to limit waits in lines – we successfully acquired a significant amount of cheap inventory in a matter of a few hours. The following was the 2007 HelpMeTy.com Black Friday attack list:

Thanksgiving is, by far, my favorite holiday. The combination of food, family, football, and black friday makes the entire weekend simply amazing.

For 2007, we drove to Green Bay, WI to visit the cousins. I called up Sprint the night before and asked how much it would cost to add the ability to have wireless internet in the car the whole way to Green Bay. They responded with – “wait, they did not include it for you either”? It is always nice to save $1500 over the course of year.

The Packers played well. Not sure what to think about that. We ate at Favre’s steakhouse the evening before. He actually had been there the day before. Favre’s signature steak certainly is amazing. For those interested, Favre likes crayfish and porterhouse steaks.

My cousins are amazing! Our family interaction is hilarious. We decided the dogs’ hair were too flat for pictures, so we decided to gel their hair straight up. Andrew’s new fiance told us we needed to play balderdash as a family (very brave thing for a new member of the family) and wow was it fun! Making up definitions to real words works out great with a room full of people with the gene of random humor.

Anyways, I love Thanksgiving… may the leftovers last the weekend!

How does one choose which blog system to use?

Why have a blog?

What should I do with this blog?

- I still haven’t figured out that last answer, but I am going to start and find out the hard way (my typical way of learning things)