Small Business

Patricia Peacock is a woman with a big mission: to keep the region's small business owners in business. As the head of Rutgers University's Regional Small Business Development Center in Camden, Peacock must help new business owners in Camden, Burlington, Gloucester and Salem Counties avoid the pitfalls of start-up businesses. The other part, she said, is to make sure small business owners know the law. "Most people starting a business have good trade skills," said Peacock.

President Obama and his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney , have been talking up the importance of small business to the U.S. economy. But what exactly is a small business? We often hear it defined as any enterprise with fewer than 500 employees. That general cut-off is used by the federal government for contracting purposes when set-asides for small business are involved. Still, few people think a business with that many workers is small. Medium-sized, maybe. The Census Bureau counted 27.28 million U.S. firms in its 2007 economic census.

A total of 43 local businesses will display their wares today through Saturday at the Granite Run Mall in Middletown Township as part of a small- business fair. "This is a promotional event for businesses to show their products to the consumer," said Madeline Pfaff, small-business coordinator for the Delaware County Chamber of Commerce, organizer of the event, its seventh annual. "Businesses at the fair pass out brochures to mall customers and find it is a very successful way of generating future business," she said.

George Thomas Wake is wiser than he was a year ago when he opened a West Philadelphia cafeteria. And a lot more tired. "No, I wouldn't do it today," he said glumly. "I should never have ventured into the restaurant field without having the education and knowledge of the business. If I had gone to school and learned the administrative end and the hands-on, I would know how to control it. . . . "But now I am trying to learn it while I am running it, and it is very costly. It is very, very costly.

Edith Hindermann realized a lifelong dream 10 months ago when she bought her own business, a small leather-goods factory in the low-income Kensington area. But once on the job, Hindermann quickly learned that she would need more money than she had planned to cover operating expenses, including salaries for her five employees during slow seasons. She applied for a $60,000 loan from Fidelity Bank. That's when she discovered how difficult it was to get a bank loan. Still ensnared in the application process five months later, Hindermann, 49, says she's ready to tell the bankers "to go fly a kite.

A six-week course to help people either start or expand their small businesses will be offered next month by the Delaware County Chamber of Commerce and Women's Opportunities Resource Center of Philadelphia. Classes will include such subjects as marketing, management, financing, establishing a business plan, advertising and promotion. Called Start Smart, the course also will help participants determine whether self-employment is the right choice for them. "Beginning a small business in our tight economy is a tremendous challenge," said Lynne Cutler, president of WORC.

Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan barnstormed across Pennsylvania Tuesday, trying to return the focus of the campaign to the economy and President Obama's supposed hostility to small business after a detour of several days' debate over abortion and Medicare. Not only has Obama burdened business with more regulation, his recent "you didn't build that" remark was a moment when the president "lowers the veil and we see what is going on in his mind and the philosophy of government he has," Ryan told a cheering crowd of about 3,000 outside the American Helicopter Museum and Education Center near West Chester.

Jim Brennan is a rarity for a small-business owner: He has an executive-style corner office. But before you get too envious, consider that it is partly made from a shipping container. Then again, be envious. From his rather unusual perch in Burlington County, Brennan has been presiding over a business whose growth has been staggering, especially for these woeful economic times - and for a U.S.-based manufacturer. For 28 years, Brennan's Sea Box Inc., in Cinnaminson, has been demonstrating with astonishing creativity the many uses for shipping containers - including a giant movie screen when stacked 10 high, living quarters for circus elephants, mobile repair stations for military vehicles in war zones, and the latest adaptation, temporary emergency housing.

These days we all worship at the shrine of "small business. " In the debate about President Clinton's budget, opponents argued that higher taxes on incomes over $180,000 would not just hit the affluent because "small businesses" pay taxes at personal income tax rates. The Clintonites replied that the budget bill was filled with new goodies for small businesses. The question whether "small business" is deserving of all this solicitude did not arise. Small business is an important part of the American economy.

The Phoenixville business district could get a facelift come summer. On Wednesday night, the Phoenixville Planning Commission approved sketch plans for converting the former SCM/Orient Chemical Facility into Green-Ways Technological Park. William E. Lampe of PCI Inc. of Phoenixville has proposed a small-business incubator program for the park, which is at the intersection of Nutt Road and Route 113. An incubator program offers both financial and development assistance to small or start-up businesses.